Florida condo owners will get financial relief under a new law

FILE - A giant tarp, bottom, covers a section of rubble at the Champlain Towers South condo building, July 4, 2021, in Surfside, Fla. Photo by Lynne Sladky /AP

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Florida condominium residents grappling with the steep cost of building improvements will get some financial relief under a new bill signed into law by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday.

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The new measure gives condo homeowner associations more flexibility in how to build up their reserve funds and eases some requirements for safety assessments.

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Approval came the day before the fourth anniversary of the partial collapse of Champlain Towers South, which killed 98 people in Surfside in 2021. The new law goes into effect July 1 and is aimed at reforming a condo safety law passed in 2022 in the wake of that disaster.

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Speaking at Monday’s bill signing in Clearwater, Republican state Sen. Ed Hooper said the 2022 law was meant to ensure there was never another collapse like Surfside. In retrospect, he said some of the requirements enacted were probably an overreaction, which lawmakers are now hoping to correct.

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“Now it’s time to make the change,” Hooper said. “Elderly people are losing their condos because they could not afford to make the increase in their monthly HOA fees. That’s just wrong.”

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Condo owners in Florida faced rising costs under the 2022 law, which requires condo associations to have sufficient reserves to cover major repairs. In the aftermath of the Surfside disaster, some residents were caught off guard by hefty fees levied to cover years of deferred maintenance expenses required to bring their buildings into compliance with the 2022 legislation.

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The mounting costs to cover renovations and build up reserve funds have strained residents in the condo haven of South Florida, especially retirees and those living on fixed incomes.

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Condo owners along the state’s southwest coast have taken the extra hit of last year’s back-to-back hurricanes, which clobbered waterfront communities in the Tampa Bay area and forced additional renovations and repairs.

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“It’s a full-time job for me keeping track of this,” condo owner Earle Cooper said of the repairs to his building in Belleair. “Hurricanes just multiply the problems.”

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The new measure allows certain condo associations to fund their reserves through a loan or line of credit. It also gives residents greater flexibility to pause payments into their reserve funds while they prioritize needed repairs and extends the deadline for associations to complete structural integrity studies. Some smaller buildings will be exempt from having to do those analyses.

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“I think that this will provide relief,” DeSantis said. “But to the extent that there needs to be some cleanup next year when the legislature reconvenes, we got to be willing to do that.” ___ Kate Payne is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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