A deeper look into town home joint maintenance agreements…
Reba Haas on 08 9, 2007
In a previous post I wrote about concerns for townhomes that were sold over the past several years that didn’t have clear joint maintenance agreements. A recent deal I closed brought into focus exactly why my concerns are realistic and valid. Buyers need to be aware that it is their responsibility to read all the documents involved with their purchase and to understand the content of those documents – it is essential for making good purchasing decisions.
In the instance I refer to here a couple was buying a townhome built in 1997, the joint maintenance agreement was almost non-existent and if you didn’t look closely at the title report you might not notice the 2 small elements that had been recorded a year or so after the completion of the project. The only items noted in the joint maintenance agreement were that:
1. All owners of the development would be financially responsible for the driveway used by all the owners, and
2. Painting decisions had to be agreed to by the unit owners that were adjacent to each other.
That was it. No discussion of common walls, nor damage caused by negligence, or roofing or siding replacement timelines or guidelines, etc. One of the issues that was discovered in this property purchase was a siding defect that is under recall by Weyerhaeuser. The seller had a pending claim that we researched to discover if it was transferrable or not. In the end, we found our clients could file their own claim after closing and release the seller from the claim – which would make everyone’s life easier. For us it was important to find out if my clients could replace the damaged siding with a new material or not.
Since the impacted siding was on a balcony my clients preferred to rip the old siding off and instead place a metal or glass railing system – this meant we had to review if the joint maintenance agreement would allow for a different balcony railing than what the original design had put in place. Thankfully for my clients it looks like they can replace the poorly designed railing material with something that they find much more aesthetically pleasing. Another item they’ll be fixing right away is the 2-3 feet of organic material growing in the townhome’s gutters on the top floor roofline. This is a source of possible water infiltration to the roofing area and walls so they’ll be getting that done ASAP to try and limit any additional water based damage issues.
I’m looking forward to the remodel they’ll be completing on this home, both inside and out, I’m sure it will be an enormous difference from its current condition!
About the Author: Rebecca Haas
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4 Responses to “A deeper look into town home joint maintenance agreements…”
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As a former townhome owner, I can only agree. These zero-lot-line setups are powderkegs waiting to blow. Give it about 5 more years, and this will really start to rear its ugly head.
The biggest worry I had was that my other three neighbors spent every penny the earned. If a maintenance issue came up, I am almost certain it would have been 100% on my shoulders. Tack on to this that the days of high appreciation are gone for good, so for many, tapping into equity to pay for maintenance will not be possible.
I agree, fooman, this is a sub-topic that we discuss with our clients to remind them that even if they are fiscally responsible it doesn’t mean their neighbor will be. A lot of people that buy the new townhomes don’t usually think they’ll live there longer than 5 or so years so they just hope that problems won’t come up during their residency. They’re planning on someone down the line having to pick up the slack, if any. It will be even more interesting another 10 years from now when many of these places start needing new roofs, etc. that are big ticket items. Dealing with the purchase and sale negotiations then will have a whole new twist especially if the roof needs replaced.
I can’t believe with all the townhomes going up no one has yet had to even bring up (i.e. litigate) issues like roof repair, common walls, etc.
Is it just a function of the new-ness (so that no one has had to replace their roofs, plumbing in a shared wall, etc)?
I’ll admit that when I was looking for my first home back in 1997 the townhomes looked good (ended up buying a small standalone in-fill home instead) and I didn’t even think about things like common maintenance. But since then that type of housing has exploded in popularity (look at ballard and greenwood, for examples) and that explosion of popularity usually comes along with increased scrutiny.
my guess is that there likely have been some issues which is why a lot of the townhomes I see now (new and on market) are better about listing JMA’s or CC&R’s.