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View Full Version : Community quota calculated incorrectly in our apartment in Spain



Andy
02-04-2009, 03:25 AM
My wife and I own a new build apartment on a golf course we found out at our first AGM what our community charges were ours is 2050euros per annum. everyone else in our block pays about 500euro less. We have found that our quota has been calculated wrong by the developer and there architects. They have our unground parking space down as 35m2 when it actually measures 15.8m2 This also affects eight other blocks on the resort that are the same style. The developer is refusing to do anything about it. what are our rights and our best course of action.

Lawbird Lawyer
02-04-2009, 02:36 PM
My wife and I own a new build apartment on a golf course we found out at our first AGM what our community charges were ours is 2050euros per annum. everyone else in our block pays about 500euro less. We have found that our quota has been calculated wrong by the developer and there architects. They have our unground parking space down as 35m2 when it actually measures 15.8m2 This also affects eight other blocks on the resort that are the same style. The developer is refusing to do anything about it. what are our rights and our best course of action.

Dear Sir,

Following art 16 of theCommonhold law (http://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Privado/lph.html) on the next AGM you may request to have the wrongly assigned quota amended.

Following art 5 regarding the modification of the Communities Statutes or Bylaws require the same rules as for their constitution (unanimity).

Following art 17 such a modification will require unanimity of all fellow communers. Any dissident vote will disallow this modification.

If your fellow communers do not vote unanimously this amendment in the assigned quotas, following art 18 c) you will then be able to initiate a legal process requesting from a judge that the quotas be correctly assigned.

Sarah
02-20-2009, 03:33 AM
Just following on from Andy's query about the assessment cuota. We live in a small community of 14 apartments, all the lower floor apartments cuotas are 8% and above (to 12.33%) and the upper apartments are all 4.73%.

Lower apartments have gardens ranging from 36m2 to 90m2, upper apartments have a driveway of 36m2 plus a 20m2 roof solarium.

The local conveyancing lawyer (who did all of our properties) has looked at our Master Deed (we don't have statutes as we are small) and our Escrituras to determine if the cuotas were correct as the upper apartments have bigger advantages over some the lower apartments with smaller gardens.

He concluded that the cuota's are incorrect and that all apartments should have the same cuota as they are all the same size and that under the Horizontal Property Law, gardens should not be included as part of the assessment. Would you agree with this statement? I seem to be getting conflicting information from all different sources.

We have tried to equalise the fees last year but we did not achieve unanimity, we have another meeting very soon where the opinion of our lawyer is made to everyone in the hope of achieving unanimity but we're not confident that this will still happen.

Thanks

Lawbird Lawyer
02-20-2009, 12:08 PM
Dear Madam,

Frankly conflicting advice doesn't really surprise me in the least. You may ask five lawyers on the same matter and they will all give you five perfectly plausible explanations and according advice. Thre are always many angles to a matter.

In my opinion, and judging only from what you've written, the lower apartments have exclusive gardens which are not communal as they are only accessible and enjoyed by the lower flats. Therefore these gardens must be included, as it stands to logic, on the assigned quota of the ground floors. Likewise, and following the same logic, the solariums on the higher blocks are also privative elements that can only be enjoyed by them so they should also form part exclusively of the higher blocks as they are not communal.

Regarding on the driveway I'm unsure, I would need to see it to give you an opinion.

Frankly I would be very surprised if all flats have the same assigned quota, this seldom happens. The sum of all quotas must tally 100%, as it's logical. Art 5 of the Commonhold Law describes the process of assigning quotas.

Sarah
02-23-2009, 03:27 PM
Thanks for your reply, to clarify the position of the driveways, these are for the exclusive use of the upper apartment owners and one at least has tiled and installed a store cupboard on theirs. The lower apartments gardens are deemed to include parking as they have double gates to allow a vehicle through.

Having read through the Master Deed again, someone helpfully jotted a note on the front of it of the square metre of all the properties and driveways and I was able to establish from this that the upper apartments were only calculated on their apartment size and the lower apartments were calculated on the plot size (to include the garden belonging to them).

On this, would you say that the driveways should be included?

Thanks

Lawbird Lawyer
02-23-2009, 03:30 PM
I would say yes, they ought to be included only for the quota of the upper apartments as they seem to be of exclusive use to them.

Unregistered
03-01-2009, 03:11 PM
Can someone please advise.

I would like to know how community charges are calculated on a mixed golf resort? This does not include the direct costs just the general resort costs. These figures are in my deeds. I am just trying to find out how I can confirm if my community fees are calculated correctly.

Our budget for the year is 3,000,000.00 (general resort budget)

Our Parcela cuota is 2,044019 %

Our cuota de partisipation is 11,204674 %

My apartment cuota is 4,307176 %

We have been told by our administrator that the fees are being calculated by this method:

there are two types of shares: one is the sub-
Community quota (based on the surface of the plot that a given sub-Community
occupies within the General Community); and another based on the square metres of the
property itself (living area).

In 2006, only the plot quota was used since most of the Resort was not completed yet. A
quota that still did not exist could not be used yet. However, the specific expenses for
the apartment blocks were assigned to each block, as it had to be done according to
Law.

At any rate, any comparison must use the same parameters. You cannot compare the
apartment surface with plot surface of the villas. There are expenses distributed
according to the plot quota, and others according to the property surface quota.

Six weeks ago, This document related the calculus of the shares with a document from the
Town Council, and this was like that because they coincide. However, our calculus is
not based on the Town Council documents but rather on the property deeds, where the
same square metres are collected as in the Town Council documents.


With regards to the sharing of the cost, I would like to a paragraph from article 5.2 of
the Spanish Law of Horizontal Property, which reads as follows:

“The quota of participation will be based taking into account the usable surface of each
property or unit in relation to the total of the building, its location interior or exterior,
and its location in relation to the rational use expected of the common services and
elements".

This Administrator has made an interpretation with respect to the Administration fees,
thus dividing them on equal shares to all, and this has been done for the following
reasons:

1.- Because it is already anticipated in the Law since the rational use of the
administration services is the same for an apartment and for a villa.
2.- Because the Law that applies to Official Boards of Community Administrators (the
sole profession specialized in Community of Property Owners administration) speaks
of one same price per property.
3.- Because this has also been established by rulings of the Spanish Superior Courts of
Justice.
4.- And most important of all: Because no one would accept that a villa would pay
eight times more than an apartment for the same 20 page letter issued by this
Administration, or for an invoice sent to the bank, or for a reply to an email

Sorry its a long posting, but can anyone help with this?



Thanks

Ian

Lawbird Lawyer
03-13-2009, 11:58 AM
Is this a Polaris World resort you are writing of?

Unregistered
03-14-2009, 06:34 PM
Yes,

Have you heard about it? Could you please give some advise.

We now have mini community AGM's in the next week, we have asked for contracts, quotes received and the administrator will not provide it, how can we vote on something we have not been able to see?

Owners have even been told to leave their proxy forms blank and the administrator will always act in their best interest.

We can't even change our administrator for our mini-community as they have distributed the administration fees equally by each owner @ 8.70 each per month, can you please help, we are being run by a committee and an administrator that block every door, is their a quick fix?

I thank you for your time and hope you can please help

Lawbird Lawyer
03-16-2009, 05:24 PM
We have received like over 40 queries on PW within the last weeks. Always on the same point.- how they've changed the process of calculating the Community quotas.

In our opinion you should all group together and appoint a law firm to have the Community quotas correctly calculated and upheld before a law court if neccessary.

Everyone cannot pay the same, that's just not possible nor fair. Each of you will have to pay in proportion to your share in the Commonhold.

We have the suspicion that the rules have been amended so as to benefit the developer which still has a large number of units to offload.

We believe your administrators, appointed by PW themselves, are acting in the best interests of...PW.

Unregistered
03-17-2009, 08:54 PM
Thank you again.

I will explain:-

Fistly Polaris were running the community with their chosen administrator No 1, they didn't perform, so administrator No 2 came in, they did perform, but the villa owners fees went up with administrator No 2, so they got with administrator No 1 and got themselves (villa owners mostly) voted on the committee and the administrator No1 was voted back in, along with the new commmittee (not Polaris)

Then in September this year, well it took them from April to September to work out how they could try and reduce their fees (villa owners), but the apartment owners fees went up and the villa owners fees went down, but they were didn't get that some apartment owners noticed that they were not distrubting the fees correctly as per their deeds.

The administrator will not provide by law the calculation of their fees requested by burofax within 10 days, they have chosen to not reply, but they can't reply as they have't been calculated as per the deeds, we have clear % cuota's and they have worked out to their advantage some odd method, using surface area, plot size, and then funny enough they have used the correct calculation for the direct apartment cost, using the % cuota.

So, can you tell me is it the administrator and president that we take to court not the community, how long could court action take, and can the apartment owners get compensation and their fees backdated correctly? Can the administrator be struck off the College of Administrators?

Thanks again for your assistance in this matter

Ian

Lawbird Lawyer
03-18-2009, 05:46 PM
Dear Sir,

You will have to take legal action.

How long does it take?

It will depend if you reach an out-of-court settlement or not, if the First ruling is appealed or not etc.

On average at least 2-3 years until the ruling is final (can no longer be appealed).

can the apartment owners get compensation and their fees backdated correctly?

Regarding claiming compensation, I'm unsure. The whole point is to readjust the shares and have them calculated as they should as well as removing the current admninistrator from his post. This will depend on the judge and how long has this been going. As far as I know from the other queries it's only been like this only for the last 2 or 3 months.

I refer you to one of our articles (point 8).- 10 Reasons Why Your Case Against a Spanish Developer May be Thrown Out of Court (http://www.marbella-lawyers.com/articles/showArticle/10-reasons-case-against-spanish-developer-may-be-thrown-out)

Unregistered
03-24-2009, 12:10 PM
Administrator no.1 was sacked by PW because they disputed bills being presented by PW and refused to pay them. Administrator No.2 were then appointed and signed everything off, i guess that is performing with the best interests of the community. PW then held an AGM behind closed doors, approved the accounts and the following years budget. Under admin no.2 community fees were 30-50€ a month for apartments and 400-500€ a month for villas, very fair, not, therefore the owners got together formed an owners association, open to all, held mini agms, open to all, and voted Admin No.1 back in.
The Mini community presidents then voted in the committee, this included aparment mini-presidents, so to say the villa/townhouse owners rigged it all is rubbish. All the owners are guilty of is mobilising the community to the fact we were being ripped off, from then on EVERYONE had a vote.

Since last April Admin No.2 has managed to decrease the budget by over 1,000,000€ per annum and are again disputing bills from PW. i would say that was performing.

Admin No.2 went to the college of administrators to check that the interpretation of the act they were proposing was legal before implimenting it.

Is it really reasonable to expect one resident to pay 10 times more than another?

Lawbird Lawyer :-The PW serving Administators were replaced last year on our PW resort

Unregistered
03-24-2009, 12:14 PM
Administrator no.1 was sacked by PW because they disputed bills being presented by PW and refused to pay them. Administrator No.2 were then appointed and signed everything off, i guess that is performing with the best interests of the community. PW then held an AGM behind closed doors, approved the accounts and the following years budget. Under admin no.2 community fees were 30-50€ a month for apartments and 400-500€ a month for villas, very fair, not, therefore the owners got together formed an owners association, open to all, held mini agms, open to all, and voted Admin No.1 back in.
The Mini community presidents then voted in the committee, this included aparment mini-presidents, so to say the villa/townhouse owners rigged it all is rubbish. All the owners are guilty of is mobilising the community to the fact we were being ripped off, from then on EVERYONE had a vote.

Since last April Admin No.2 has managed to decrease the budget by over 1,000,000€ per annum and are again disputing bills from PW. i would say that was performing.

Admin No.2 went to the college of administrators to check that the interpretation of the act they were proposing was legal before implimenting it.

Is it really reasonable to expect one resident to pay 10 times more than another?

Lawbird Lawyer :-The PW serving Administators were replaced last year on our PW resort

oops, that should read Admin No.1 went to the college of administrators, and admin No.1 saved 1 000 000€ per annum.

Unregistered
03-25-2009, 03:39 PM
I and my family own several apartments on this resort And we too are very concerned as to how the fees are being distributed.
The following are probably the main points of which I have taken from the resort forum.

There are 455 villa owners on the resort who collectively share 47% 0f the resort vote.

There are 1729 apartment owners who only share 17% of the vote while currently contributing to more than 50% of the budget

The statutes seem to speak of fee distribution by cuota and clearly state that the salaries of those employed by the community should be distributed as per cuota.

The administrator in an open letter posted on the forum stated that he has made an interpretation regarding his fees and that they would be distributed equally amongst all owners as this has already been established in law, approved by the college of administrators, and much fairer as we all benefit equally from this service

In his open letter he also states that he has taken from the deeds the same square meters used by the council to calculate taxes, and from this seems to have developed his own cuota in which to distribute what he calls general resort expenses

All that I have written is directly from the resort forum and therefore I cannot verify it's truth, but if true may I ask a lawyer is it your opinion either of these deviations from cuota distribution are legal?

(I can confirm that no vote has ever been taken regarding a change of fee distribution)

Unregistered
04-10-2009, 10:34 PM
We have received like over 40 queries on PW within the last weeks. Always on the same point.- how they've changed the process of calculating the Community quotas.

In our opinion you should all group together and appoint a law firm to have the Community quotas correctly calculated and upheld before a law court if neccessary.

Everyone cannot pay the same, that's just not possible nor fair. Each of you will have to pay in proportion to your share in the Commonhold.

We have the suspicion that the rules have been amended so as to benefit the developer which still has a large number of units to offload.

We believe your administrators, appointed by PW themselves, are acting in the best interests of...PW.

The Administrators have been appointed by the Community of Owners - NOT PW.

These '40' posters, are part of the Community of Owners - who appointed the Administrator.!!

Therefore, these posters are looking at a legal process whereby they can sue themselves.

How can this be possible?

Thank you

Lawbird Lawyer
04-13-2009, 10:18 AM
The Administrators have been appointed by the Community of Owners - NOT PW.

These '40' posters, are part of the Community of Owners - who appointed the Administrator.!!

Therefore, these posters are looking at a legal process whereby they can sue themselves.

How can this be possible?

Thank you

Dear Sir/Madam,

The feedback we've received is that PW still owns a sizesable stock of property and that the appointed administrators have changed the rules of calculating the quota to benefit the developer so he pays less community fees and so the difference is shared among the other owners.

I have no idea who appointed the administrators. But what seems clear enough is that they seem to be favouring the developer from the queries we've received. It's up to the communers to group and remove the administrator/s and have the quotas correctly calculated.

Unregistered
04-13-2009, 11:45 PM
I am an apartment owner on La torre and I have been following this thread. What has happened here is that Polaris and their architects originally set up these quotas, in their own interests and to their own benefit. The result of that was that the town centre, owned by polaris including the hotel, the conference centre and the golf club were allocated a quota of 10%, the apartment owners had 17% and the villa and town houses the rest.

This state of affairs resulted in some villas paying 10 times more than apartment owners so the villa owners did not pay their fees. These villa and town house owners then got together and ousted the administrator and without any vote or consultation created their own method of fee calculation, which reduced their fees and more than doubled the apartment owners fees. Unfortunately this resulted in the apartment owners paying 50% of what the administrator terms general resort costs, 30% of the gardening costs and the majority of the administrators fees.The apartment owners still have only 17% of the vote. The apartment owners then stopped paying their fees. We now have a debt of 1.5 million euros on our community fees.

However this new method of calculation we have been advised is illegal. No unanimous vote has been obtained and no court order obtained to change the method of fee calculation legally.

Is it correct that these debts will not be able to be legally collected or enforced because they are illegally calculated?

If we took this to court would a judge be able under Spanish law to change this original quota distribution and apportion it fairly, including imposing greater charges on the commercial buildings?

Lawbird Lawyer
04-14-2009, 11:40 AM
Dea Sir/Madam,

As you correctly write in your post, Spain's Commonhold law (Ley de Propiedad Horizontal (http://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Privado/lph.html)) requires as per its arts 5 and 17 unanimity to change the assigned quotas. Any amendment to the quotas which hasn't been approved unanimously by all communers would not be legal.

If you were to take this matter to a Spanish judge he would assign fairly the quotas, yes, if they are blatantly unfair as it seem they are now to some of the communers. Art 18 rules this matter of challenging illegal agreements in commonholds before a judge.

Unregistered
04-14-2009, 05:45 PM
Dea Sir/Madam,

As you correctly write in your post, Spain's Commonhold law (Ley de Propiedad Horizontal (http://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Privado/lph.html)) requires as per its arts 5 and 17 unanimity to change the assigned quotas. Any amendment to the quotas which hasn't been approved unanimously by all communers would not be legal.

If you were to take this matter to a Spanish judge he would assign fairly the quotas, yes, if they are blatantly unfair as it seem they are now to some of the communers. Art 18 rules this matter of challenging illegal agreements in commonholds before a judge.


The administrator advised apartment owners that they have interpreted the HPA. We are talking of a villa with a very large plot of 450 m2, now only paying for 144m2 because the administrator now calculates the community charge using the The Superficie Construida, reducing the amount that villa owners have to pay.

Unregistered
04-15-2009, 06:52 PM
Well let’s have some facts shall we. Firstly I thought lawyers only gave opinions when they knew all the facts, not in this case obviously. Secondly the current administrators did not change the cuotas or arrange the calculation in favour of the Villa and Townhouse owners. What they did was to use the guidance from the college of administrators to look at how the fees should be divided fairly amongst the owners on a mixed urbanization such as this one where you have a range of property types. Indeed there have been rulings on this issue in the High court in Madrid. Please also see this link which covers the issue of mixed urbanizations. Have a look at the figures quoted in this article for community fees.

eyeonspain.com/spain-magazine/communities-in-spain.aspx


Using just the cuota for our resort results in Villas paying some 400€ a month, townhouses paying up to 270€ per month and apartments paying 50€ per month despite having lifts, communal lighting, cleaning, underground parking etc. Totally unfair and not acceptable.

The committee is made up of a range of owners including Apartments, town houses and Villas. The majority of owners are happy with the current fees as they are fair and reasonable. In addition the current committee has reduced the budget by 1.5 Million Euros compared to when PW were in charge and set aside some 1.5Million Euros in disputed bills. A good result for all owners.

The current fees range from 86€ to 110€ Apartments, 96€ to 131€ for townhouse and from 131€ to 250€ for villas. So the villa and townhouse owners are still paying considerably more into the community than the apartment owners despite not having Lifts, cleaning etc. The apartment owners also have direct access to the 24 communal swimming pools.

Out of the apartment costs around 33€ per month is for the direct costs, i.e. lifts etc, leaving their contribution to the general resort as low as 53€. The direct costs for a villa are much lower (Back lawns only) meaning the majority of their 131€ to 250€ per month goes toward the general resort costs and the same for townhouses who have little or no direct costs. The general resort costs are made up of swimming pools, communal gardens, security, fountains, road cleaning, administration etc which all owners benefit from equally but apparently some feel that they should not pay their fair share.

As for the debt that has been quoted on this site this is because some owners have never paid their fees and is not because of the additional fees that the apartment owners are now paying most of whom realize that they are getting very good value for money.

If the fees were to go back to the range we had before then I am afraid the services would undoubtedly suffer as the fees of up to 400€ per month were plainly unaffordable.

So Lawbird lawyers now you have some more facts perhaps you would like to comment again.

Unregistered
04-15-2009, 09:51 PM
Just to complete the facts as posted above.The voting rights in this development are as follows:

All villas = 455 Have 47% of the vote

All townhouses = 518 Have 23% of the vote

All apartments = 1729 Have 17% of the vote

Town centre = 10% of the vote


These voting rights have remained the same despite the fact that apartment owners are now collectively paying 50% of the costs described by the administrator as general resort costs.

The administrators fees are now spread equally across all owners. The apartment owners also pay administrative costs in their direct costs.

The committee does have apartment owners on it. They also happen to be villa owners.


The community fees paid by the hotel, the golf club, the conference centre, the bars, restaurants, supermarket, shops – all commercial buildings, all owned by Polaris, are unknown since the administrator and president refuse to answer the question. Whether the new system of Sq meterage has been applied to these entities is unknown.I do know that in all other situations such commercial entities would pay far more than domestic and would pay business rates.

Unregistered
04-16-2009, 09:07 AM
This from the eyes on Spain article referred to above. "The percentage of the budget that each property pays is set in the Title Deeds (escritura) as this is determined by the developer."

To say the administrator did not change the cuotas and then go on to say he took guidance from the college of administrators in order to divide the fees fairly is a contradiction, he either used the cuotas or he didn't.
Spanish law dictates that community fees be distributed as per the cuota written in title deeds, what is being suggested is that this law has been overruled by the high court of Madrid and that for a mixed urbanisation fee distribution need not be distributed as per cuota and that a different set of rules could apply. And yet the statutes of La Torre state that fees be distributed as per cuota.

I would think it unlikely that any high court ruling would give an administrator who is a servant of the community the authority to implement such a shift in fee distribution without the communities approval, even if approved by the college of administrators

Unregistered
04-16-2009, 09:41 AM
The administrator advised apartment owners that they have interpreted the HPA. We are talking of a villa with a very large plot of 450 m2, now only paying for 144m2 because the administrator now calculates the community charge using the The Superficie Construida, reducing the amount that villa owners have to pay.

Further to my posting yesterday, i would like to provide you with the cuota for the large villa. The formula i believe would be budget x Parchela / 100 gives you the parchela cuota. Parchela cuota x villa cuota/100 is the amount that this property would pay in community fees.

Budget 2,874.500.53

Parchela cuota 2.47635

Villa cuota 5.727705

By using Superficie Construida, you will see they are only paying for 144m2 of there 450m2 plot.

Unregistered
04-17-2009, 07:55 PM
Dear Sir/Madam,

The feedback we've received is that PW still owns a sizesable stock of property and that the appointed administrators have changed the rules of calculating the quota to benefit the developer so he pays less community fees and so the difference is shared among the other owners.

I have no idea who appointed the administrators. But what seems clear enough is that they seem to be favouring the developer from the queries we've received. It's up to the communers to group and remove the administrator/s and have the quotas correctly calculated.

It was the Community themselves, who appointed the Administrators. The Community consists of Villa, Townhouse and Apartment owners.

So, how can a sub-Community of Apartment owners, sue themselves?

Thank you

Unregistered
04-18-2009, 10:48 AM
It is now interesting that this subject is gaining pace, I posted nearly two months ago, and I am now aware of many apartment owners who have tried to get their fees calculated legally by cuota stated in their escritura.

With reponse to the last posting, I think that you will find that the President acts as a legal representative of the community in action. He himself can be sued by the community if the members feel his actions have prejudiced their interests, which in this case they have.

Whould the lawyers be able to tell us if the incorrect calculation of community fees continures into a new president's role would also this new president be legally responsible if this is brought to his attention?

We now have a copy of the legal statutes when the community was legally constituted which were set up by Polaris from the registry, and it clearly states that the fees should be distruibted by participation share cuota's, not this new method of surface area and plot size. As artcile 5 of the Horizonal Property Act, please confirm that this can only be changed by unanimous vote of ALL MEMBERS?

It is clear that every door is being blocked by the Administrators (who is not an elected officer of the community) and the Committee, We as owners have requested an item on the above to be added to the agenda on the main AGM in a week's time, could you please confirm if the President is obliged to add this to the agenda for a vote?

Thank you for your advice and I look forward to seeing your reply.

six gun
08-15-2009, 04:18 PM
The issue in this case on La Torre Golf Resort (I am going to say the name) is nothing to do with changing cuotas it is about fee redistribution and creation of multiple cuotas.

The properties in this 100+ community resort have the same cuota as ever they did.
The cuotas on their deeds are ok.

The problem is the size of the cuota each mini community has in the master community. Most the community property on the resort is in the master community. The bills for the master community are bigger than the bill properties have to pay to their own community.

These cuotas were calculated on plot size. So a community of 12 villas covers a plot as big as 140 apartments.
The average villa ended up with cuotas in the master community 12 x that of the average apartment.

There are roughly 1800 apartments : 450 villas
The sum of apartment cuotas in the master community is 17%
That of villas is 50%

Do the sums and villa cuotas are 12X bigger per property.

This can't be right. But this is what Polaris World left us with

The problem is the master community committee got too big for its boots and just changed the fee distribution without consultation with anyone. Not one vote was cast. The cuotas stayed the same, so villas still have 50% votes in the master community but only pay 20% of the fees.

The administrator Adminburgos were creative and has come up with two different cuotas - one is plot size when comparing properties within a community and the other is built floor area when comparing communities.
Indeed in fee distribution there are four methods used!

What is in the master deeds is plot size. As villas have big gardens their plots are huge compared with apartments stacked one on each other. Even the gardens of apartments are not their own as they hold the pools which everyone in the resort can use.

So not surprisingly based on plot size, villas get 12x cuota.

This is heading towards court as the committee will not accept they did wrong in ignoring section 24 of the HPA where matters must be taken to the mini communities first for approval. I suspect they knew it would not get approval so they did not bother.

The court case is over before it is begun really - simply because the committee was too arrogant or too ignorant - or too lazy to do it properly. No consultation - nothing in the mini community agm's and no votes taken.
They did put a vote to the master community agm almost a year after the event. They quotes case law in disputes about participation share between mini communities - pity they didn't quote s24.3(b) HPA - funnily enough they seem to have forgotten the statute law.

It is all a mess - they are even voting things through in "any other business" - and they believe this is OK!

All the inter-community cuotas need to be reassessed. Monetary value of the mini communities would be the most equitable and legal way to assess how one community compares with another for cuota purposes.

There will be a lot of blood and tears before this is sorted. This is an excellent example where a developer assessed cuotas in a mixed development in a way that would always create problems and a committee who thought they were too clever to bother with the law.:eek:

Unregistered
09-30-2009, 10:39 PM
The issue in this case on La Torre Golf Resort (I am going to say the name) is nothing to do with changing cuotas it is about fee redistribution and creation of multiple cuotas.

The properties in this 100+ community resort have the same cuota as ever they did.
The cuotas on their deeds are ok.

The problem is the size of the cuota each mini community has in the master community. Most the community property on the resort is in the master community. The bills for the master community are bigger than the bill properties have to pay to their own community.

These cuotas were calculated on plot size. So a community of 12 villas covers a plot as big as 140 apartments.
The average villa ended up with cuotas in the master community 12 x that of the average apartment.

There are roughly 1800 apartments : 450 villas
The sum of apartment cuotas in the master community is 17%
That of villas is 50%

Do the sums and villa cuotas are 12X bigger per property.

This can't be right. But this is what Polaris World left us with

The problem is the master community committee got too big for its boots and just changed the fee distribution without consultation with anyone. Not one vote was cast. The cuotas stayed the same, so villas still have 50% votes in the master community but only pay 20% of the fees.

The administrator Adminburgos were creative and has come up with two different cuotas - one is plot size when comparing properties within a community and the other is built floor area when comparing communities.
Indeed in fee distribution there are four methods used!

What is in the master deeds is plot size. As villas have big gardens their plots are huge compared with apartments stacked one on each other. Even the gardens of apartments are not their own as they hold the pools which everyone in the resort can use.

So not surprisingly based on plot size, villas get 12x cuota.

This is heading towards court as the committee will not accept they did wrong in ignoring section 24 of the HPA where matters must be taken to the mini communities first for approval. I suspect they knew it would not get approval so they did not bother.

The court case is over before it is begun really - simply because the committee was too arrogant or too ignorant - or too lazy to do it properly. No consultation - nothing in the mini community agm's and no votes taken.
They did put a vote to the master community agm almost a year after the event. They quotes case law in disputes about participation share between mini communities - pity they didn't quote s24.3(b) HPA - funnily enough they seem to have forgotten the statute law.

It is all a mess - they are even voting things through in "any other business" - and they believe this is OK!

All the inter-community cuotas need to be reassessed. Monetary value of the mini communities would be the most equitable and legal way to assess how one community compares with another for cuota purposes.

There will be a lot of blood and tears before this is sorted. This is an excellent example where a developer assessed cuotas in a mixed development in a way that would always create problems and a committee who thought they were too clever to bother with the law.:eek:

Well its difficult for everyone to be as clever as you obviously are sixgun. By the way, are you the same sixgun that owed over 8000€ to the La Torre Community last year and one of the biggest debtors. Are you also the same Sixgun who is so clever that when you sent out info to the owners at the resort using info from the owners association that you were not supposed to have (data protection and all that) you used your own personal e-mail address so that everyone could see it was from you which you subsequently denied. That was a bit silly as all the recipients had to do was hit the reply button to see it was from your personal e-mail address. I expect their lawyers will be after you soon.

You of course are so clever I expect you will also be suing the local town hall and Aquagest for issuing the charge for rubbish collection (Basura) on a per property basis and not by cuota. This will also apply to all the other council services like street cleaning etc. Good luck with that one. (they do that by surface area by the way like the fees at the resort for the same services).

You do not have any chance of winning your court case and if you did the owners at the resort would loose as many of the services would be closed down due to lack of community fees. Do you really think the townhouse owners will pay 270€ a month and the villa owners up to 500€ per month with the apartments paying 60€ a month? No they will just vote to cut the services like the pools, communal gardens etc. Who will that hurt the most? Ah yes the very people you purport to represent the apartment owners. Their properties look onto the pools and the gardens. Who would want to buy an apartment that looked onto an empty pool and overgrown grass? The villas have their own pools and gardens so they would be okay as would the townhouses as they look onto the golf course. On the other hand if owners just stopped paying the resort would eventually be forced into bankruptcy and handed over to the town hall. I am sure that will do wonders for the values of the 5 apartments you own.

Finally at the AGM out of the 92 community presidents who attended only 2 voted against the current fees. The other 90 voted in favour and 50 of those were apartment presidents. A little out of touch with the rest of the owners by any chance. You were of course a community president yourself once until the owners you represented voted in a new president. I wonder why they did that!!

Time to wake up and smell the coffee I think.