Category: Q&A

Q. Our building currently has a couple of improvement projects underway - so do some of our residents. Should we immediately stop all such work because of the corona pandemic? A. According to Manhattan-based law firm Armstrong Teasdale, "…

Q. There is a situation with mice in my co-op complex. A shareholder on the first floor contacted the super that she has been seeing mice in her unit. He said he was going to call a pest control company, but they never showed up. The shar…

Q. The 40-year-old, chain smoking, son of a shareholder lives with his parents and is not allowed to smoke in his apartment or in our co-op. Instead, he loiters directly below my apartment windows, and only below my window, and smokes alm…

Q. If unit-owner insurance policies are supposed to be approved by a co-op board, what assurances are there that the individual board members have the necessary technical background in this area to assess each policy? As a practical matte…

Q. We have a board made up of five members. All five members agreed that switching to new building management was warranted. Research was conducted for seven management companies. Two were selected, and one out of the two was voted on by …

Q. My sister lived in Co-Op City in the Bronx. She passed away in July 2017, and I became voluntary executor of her estate. She kept this apartment spotless, and did not make any changes, except adding a light shine-coat to the living roo…

Q. We want to terminate a contract with a general contractor (GC). We have experienced payment issues with this GC since day one of a project. Every single pay application we send in, they manipulate it without discussing with us, submit …

Q. My 88-year-old mother has just moved into a co-op on Staten Island where I am also a shareholder with a legal parking spot in the building’s garage. My four sisters and I are her daily caregivers. She is unable to walk securely to any …

Q. For more than 30 years, my condominium building has had a resident-managed fund that collects cash gifts for the staff at holiday time. This has worked very well and was always 100 percent independent of the condominium board and the m…

Q. I live in a Housing Development Fund Corporation (HDFC) building in the Bronx. My building has no meetings or elections, and shareholders are not informed of our financial status at all. The treasurer’s son has taken complete control a…