Author: Dan Rafter / Source: Wise Bread
Yard work fills you with dread. The thought of shoveling your way through another winter is already causing your back to ache. And ever since your children moved on to college, half the rooms in your home sit unused.
You’re ready to downsize from a single-family home to a condo.
It’s a move that makes sense: You don’t need the space of a house, you’re ready for a smaller monthly mortgage payment, and you’re eager to chuck the chores and maintenance that come with a larger home.But before you make the move into a condo, know that condo living does come with surprises. And many of them aren’t pleasant. They don’t have to scare you away, but you do need to be prepared for them.
Here are a few surprises that might await you when you become a condo owner.
1. Special assessments
When you become a condo owner, you’ll have to pay either a condo fee or a homeowners’ association fee to live in the building. That monthly fee goes toward the maintenance of the building’s common areas and to pay for services such as landscaping and snow removal.
But what if your condo’s roof needs to be replaced or the entire building needs tuckpointing? To pay for a large expense, your condo’s board of directors might have to levy a special assessment; an extra monthly fee that unit owners pay until the building has raised enough money to pay for a large-scale project.
If your board decides your building needs a new garage, you might be paying an extra $200, $300, or more a month for as long as it takes to help pay for the construction.
This extra money, if you’re not prepared for it, could burst your household budget. (See also: What You Need to Know About HOAs)2. You may end up on the board of directors
If you move into a large condo complex, you probably won’t have to serve on the building’s board of directors if you don’t want to. But if you move into a smaller condo building with few residents, you may find yourself needing to take a turn serving…
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