Given the state of the economy and the real estate market, a novel issue is whether when a bank conducts a foreclosure sale on the shares relating to a cooperative apartment (without a judgment of the court), the successful bidder is su…
Job losses. Bankruptcies. Foreclosures. These are tough times for everyone, but when homeowners fall on hard times, they are often late paying their condo or co-op fees. Some can’t even afford to pay them at all. Add in contractors and …
Q “I have been dealing with a co-op board that appears to have denied a transfer of shares to me in a bad faith manner. The proprietary lease states that the board will transfer shares to a spouse or a "financially responsible member…
For years, people talked about how the housing market in New York City was “recession-proof;” how buyers' desire to live in New York City would always trump any housing problems the rest of the country was experiencing. But as the calend…
Q I am three months behind in my homeowner’s association payments. Can the condominium foreclose on my unit? My mortgage payments are up to date, and I called my lender who said, ‘no, they cannot foreclose.’ What do you say? I wrote a…
Not so very long ago, pretty much any individual or corporate entity could get a loan quickly and easily, with only some cursory paperwork separating borrower from lender. The so-called subprime mortgage crisis put a stop to all that, a…
Fresh from hoisting up the banking and automobile sectors, a newly muscular Uncle Sam is now turning his attention to putting the skids on the real estate meltdown. The Obama Administration earlier this year rolled out two maj…
Q Our 200-unit condo association has seven delinquencies. Six of these cases have been delinquent for over a year. Liens are in place, and all are in the hands of our attorney for collection. Most are mortgaged past fair market value…
Consider the (fictional) couple, Mr. and Mrs. Smith. They love their co-op apartment, and have lived in their comfortable and convenient New York City neighborhood for the last seven years, moving in when Mr. Smith took a job as editor…
Mechanic’s liens are one of the topics I am most often consulted about. This is especially true at the present time with the state of the economy. It is not that the economy brings new kinds of issues, there are just a lot more of the …