Most U.S. municipalities have local laws on their books governing how exterior building façades must be inspected, maintained and repaired. While such legislation is occasionally enacted at the state level, generally these laws are a local …

The rules governing co-op housing in New York City are constantly changing and evolving. One new regulation with major implications for co-op boards is the City Council’s Intro 1120-B, which went into effect in January after bouncing around…

According to a recent item from the National Housing Conference (NHC) in Washington, DC, home prices have surged far faster than local incomes over the past two decades.  According to the NHC, a new analysis from the Federal Reserve Ba…

For decades, New York State’s laws governing cooperatives and condominiums have largely remained the same: co‑op boards make decisions about sales and finances behind closed doors, condos run on their own governance, and residents’ rights b…

In a final legislative onslaught at the end of his term, former Mayor Eric Adams vetoed 19 City Council bills. With Adams now out of office, the Council voted recently to override 17 of these vetoes—three of which affect co-ops and condos: …

Q. If a shareholder's only way of learning what a board is working on is through email communication, do they have a legal right to access board members’ emails, including personal or business accounts that may be used, and are these righ…

As with most questions regarding the functioning of co-op and condo communities, the answer to who can or can’t serve on the board usually lies in the community’s governing documents. To explain that for us today we have Richard Klein, an a…

In the 1980s and early 1990s, Manhattan’s Upper West Side still had many modest prewar co-ops relative to today’s market. Sales records from the mid 1990s show classic wood-floored two-bedroom co-ops in prewar doorman buildings on the UWS s…

The heart of community association governance lies in the network of interactions, responsibilities, and relationships that shape board members’ decisions—many of which can create liability risk. Because these everyday activities can lead t…

Despite their sizable influence, and the fact that their members are residents of the communities they govern, co-op and condominium boards are often misunderstood. What can they do? What can’t they do? Can they approve a request from one r…