Article Courtesy of The Real Deal

By Katherine Kallergis

Published  May 31, 2024

Attorney Roberto Blanch says Dec. 31, 2024 will be “a date that lives in infamy.”

It’s one of the key deadlines for condo associations to comply with new condo safety laws that could upend the market for older buildings across Florida.

The Miami-based lawyer, a shareholder at Siegfried Rivera, was among six experts who spoke last week at a condo symposium about the “perfect storm” of challenges brewing for unit owners and associations, nearly three years after the Surfside condo collapse killed 98 people.

It’s become more expensive to own a unit in an older condo building, in part because the laws require that associations fund financial reserves that previously could be waived, and require that these buildings be repaired and maintained. On top of that, insurance has doubled or tripled for some complexes in recent years.

The situation is so dire that Florida Rep. Vicki Lopez said she is looking at legislative ways to help condo owners who are forced to make the decision to terminate their association — a legal requirement so that a condominium building could be knocked down and redeveloped, or converted to rental apartments.

“It’s very simple,” she said at the event, held at the Rusty Pelican in Key Biscayne. “If the condo owners cannot afford it, and the building needs structural improvements, their only other option [if] they can’t borrow the money, is to terminate. … I know that’s pretty sinister, but it’s reality, and I want people to understand we have to live in the real world that we now find ourselves in.”

Lopez’s district includes Key Biscayne, Coconut Grove, Shenandoah and other parts of Miami-Dade County.

Laws passed in 2022 and 2023, Senate Bill 4-D and Senate Bill 154, create milestone inspections for condo and co-op buildings that are three stories or taller when they turn 25 or 30 years old, depending on how close to the coastline they are. They also require all associations to complete structural integrity reserve studies (SIRS) every decade, and fully fund those reserves, among other new mandatory reserve rules.

The reserve study must be completed by Dec. 31 of this year.

Separately, the milestone inspection deadline is Dec. 31, 2025. This is a structural inspection of a building, its load-bearing walls and other structural elements, by a licensed architect or engineer, according to the statute. If a building was 30 years old before July 1, 2022, then the inspection must be performed before the end of 2024. If it turns 30 between July 1, 2022 and the end of 2024, the inspection has to be completed before Dec. 31, 2025.

Confusion has abounded over these deadlines, whether some properties are exempted, and how it will all be enforced.

Any budget adopted on Jan. 1, 2025 or later must fund the SIRS reserves, Lopez said. And the mandatory reserves for SIRS can never be waived.

On enforcement, Blanch said that before the collapse of Champlain Towers South in 2021, “some municipalities and counties were getting a bad rap.”

“I do, to their credit, believe they’ve become a lot more strict on this,” he said. “So I caution a lot of our clients to be on top of these deadlines.”