Over the years, multifamily co-op and condominium buildings have been notorious for the plethora of restrictions many impose upon residents, from smoking bans to strict quiet hours to forbidding holiday displays. While many of these restric…

Q. If you live in a co-op and have a roommate, can’t you charge any amount of rent as long as your roommate agrees to it? As an example, if you live in a two-bedroom co-op and your maintenance is $2,500 per month, isn’t it legitimate to c…

Groucho Marx once famously said, “I wouldn’t belong to any club that would have me as a member.” Not so for many in the world of co-ops, condos, and HOAs.  Shared communities often (if not usually) have an application process required for p…

This publication spends a lot of time exploring and explaining the duties and purpose of multifamily boards—the benefits and drawbacks of serving on them, and even the difficulty that many buildings and communities have with motivating owne…

Imagine your dream home. Maybe it’s a beautiful apartment in the sky, or a dramatic townhouse overlooking a lake or golf course. Maybe it includes a state-of-the-art gym or pool—or both—only steps or floors away. In the mood for a movie? Wh…

As the days get longer, warmer, and more full of outdoor activity, multifamily boards and property managers must consider a whole new list of maintenance and preparation tasks to ready their buildings for the approaching summer. It’s finall…

In the world of single-family homes, property owners can do pretty much whatever they want when it comes to the look of their place. They can paint their house bright purple, for instance. Or display Christmas or Halloween decorations that …

Any community looking to create and/or maintain a landscaped area these days ought to consider integrating smarter, greener practices and products to maximize environmental benefits, minimize overuse of resources, and sustainably provide be…

For most households, housing is itself the largest regular expenditure - so the failure of wages to keep up with housing prices can make housing costs even more expensive in real dollars. And since the onset of the pandemic in spring of 202…

Among the more mundane - yet vitally important - amenities in nearly every multifamily community is its mailbox and package delivery system. With the massive increase in deliveries in the Amazon Era, and especially post-pandemic, the design…