The condominium fees are a burden that many of us are required to bear. Specifically, these are the sums of money that owners of real estate units within a condominium must periodically pay to contribute to and provide for the management, maintenance and general administration of the building. However, not everyone manages to stay up to date with payments, and for various reasons.
In some cases, the condominium owner is not required to pay the amount, because at a certain point, as in many other legal cases, the prescription.
When the obligation lapses
Really anything can happen. It can happen, for example, that the owner of the property is unable to pay the huge maintenance costs of the building. Or that he has taken possession of the apartment finding himself burdened by a load of debts left unpaid by the previous owner. What do you do in these cases? Article 2948 of the Civil Code comes to our aid.
Basically, when we talk about ordinary expensesthe condominium has 5 years to obtain what is due from the owner of the apartment; when, however, it is a question of extraordinary expensesthe time available doubles to 10 years. Once these time limits are exceeded, the statute of limitations begins. Ordinary expenses are all those almost daily interventions that concern the building, such as cleaning the stairs, lighting, or small restoration interventions. The situation is more complex when we move on to extraordinary expenses: here we mean large interventions, such as renovations, extraordinary maintenance of the facade and much more. The figures are also more considerable.
Condominium fees are calculated using the thousandths tablesused to carry out the distribution.
So, as we said, after a certain time the statute of limitations comes. However, it must be specified that this can be interrupted. This occurs when documents are filed in which the condominium reiterates its desire to collect the payment. The documents, specifically, are a registered letter with acknowledgement of receipt, the notification of an injunction and a judicial document requesting the recovery of the money. Each time one of these documents is filed, the limitation period is reset and starts over again.
The unpaid debt
When the condominium is unable to recover the amounts due in any way, then it is the others condomini to cover the insolvent’s expenses. In this case too, the logic of the thousandths is followed.
In the event that the defaulter’s apartment has passed from one owner to another, the condominium administrator can ask both the new and the old owner to account for the unpaid expenses.
L’tenant of the apartment in question, however, is required to pay the costs for ordinary maintenance, but in this case the statute of limitations starts after only 2 years.