Resort AGM

I simply want to know if a resort or community has voted to distribute fees other than by cuota are individuals or whole communities entitled to insist their fees are calculated according to the cuota in their deeds? 

I am simply asking questions.

I do own a town house.

I am not knocking the resort, only the bully tactics of a small group.

This is one of the reasons a large group wrote in to protest against the conduct on the resort website forum, where posts were deleted and edited if by chance someone spoke out about certain issues.

Town house fees were not altered significantly. It was the villa owners fees that were massively altered.

There are presidents on the resort who have now got legal authority from their communities in the recent AGM's to sue the resort in the name of the community; this is hardly something to ignore. This is hardly isolated individuals and this most certainly is not me.

I want to know what my position would be. Time and again the law has been ignored if it did not suit. It is common sense to ask because I do not trust the answers I get from the administrator.

So why the antagonism?  It is a free country to ask questions.

Why do you want to prevent people asking questions?

Your position if you are indeed an townhouse owner and these groups win any legal action is that townhouse and villa owners would probably be debited as their fees had been decreased since this change in fees, apartment owners would no doubt see a significant credit

 Yes so all the more reason to know.

I am not afraid of this, we have already had extra fees added as we have been told the town houses were undercharged last year.

I do not want to be taken by surprise again.  If a few owners/communities are entitled to go by the cuota we will have to sort this as if it comes.  It is about time all this ducking and diving ended. It needs to be sorted out for good so that we don't have this hanging over us any longer.

As you seem so well informed already, why do you feel the need to tell the world about our resort politics

Anyway you crack on stressing and dragging the place down while the rest of us enjoy our homes in the sun and keep our blood pressure down, I wont say any more.

ps close the door when you leave wont you theres a nice lady

This message was last edited by Not 2 Worried An Owner on 24/04/2010.

 Dear Worried Owner,

You posted:

"I do not want to be taken by surprise again.  If a few owners/communities are entitled to go by the cuota we will have to sort this as if it comes.  It is about time all this ducking and diving ended. It needs to be sorted out for good so that we don't have this hanging over us any longer".

Do not worry you will not be it has been legally voted on by all owners at their AGMs and that is that. The Fat lady has well and truly burst into song on this issue.

As we are in a world cup year I would also add:

They think it is all over it is now!

By the way I think it was Frank Bruno that did all the ducking and diving Harry!

Finally this is not Spam I am a CP at the resort that cannot be named and as with you I am entitled to post on this and any other forum. I think it is you and you co-conspirators that wish to gag free speech.

worried owner, You are not a townhouse owner, i live in your apt block stop pi--ing people off and let us get on with our lives, i always new i would pay about 100 euros a month for my apt. If you dont like the fees sell up and move on, same goes for you mates ( the villa wanabes )

 That is what the majority of owners feel we just want to enjoy the community and move on. 

The fees we pay are fair and we have all voted on them.

Apartments are paying around 110€ a month including their lifts, cleaning lighting etc.

Townhouses are paying between 120€ and 145€ per month.

Villas are paying between 150€ to 230€ a month.

So despite having no lifts, cleaning and lighting the villas and townhouses are still paying more than the apartments. 

Its as fair as it can be under the law in Spain so stop moaning and lets get on with the big issues we all face, rising water costs, high Basura costs and the current downturn in Spanish property prices.

We have a great resort, one of the best and we need to work together to keep it at the top. Try to join in it is much more rewarding!

I have just been informed that somebody  is posting and using my name in this thread.  I can absolutely confirm that I have not made any postings on this thread and request that my name is removed from the posting,

It would be amazing for me to have posted after spending 6 hours in A&E with my son yesterday afternoon.

Thank you

Must have missed the part of Spain where there is the AGM problem. 

The fees seem expensive to me.  I've got a 15 year old, 2/3 bed end of terrace house and my community charge is €118 a quarter, I have the benefit of two community pools; all the maintenances etc etc.

Yes the fees are very high indeed.

There is no really good reason for this.  

The admin charges are as I have put which I am told are very, very high and this on a resort with 2700 properties.  There are huge economies of scale, I mean how much more time does it take to arrange cleaning of 13 pools over 1?Not much more time, not 13X the time and charge 20X a reasonable rate.

We get charged more for everything.  

It really does make me think where all the money is going and who is profiting from it.  

A lot of the owners just aren't aware of the charges in the rest of Spain so think it is normal but it isn't.

I could go on and on but I just wanted to ask a question about whether owners and communities can insist they pay their fees according to the cuota and reject a system voted on by other owners.

Then the gang of thugs are alerted and pile in as usual with personal insults and this is not the person/people they assume it is.  I do own a town house and the basis of the question is not what they think it is.

It really does not matter what property you own the fact is you are trying to bring our resort into disrepute with incorrect information.

When you use language like "gang of thugs" you show your true motives. What you are saying is that if someone disagrees with you they are bullies and thugs. So no one else is allowed an opinion but you.

As for the costs, we have a 5* resort one of the best in the region not some small development with a few pools. As for the money we spend, the accounts were agreed at the AGM as was the budget. If you think its high then come up with ideas to reduce it while mainrtaining standards at the resort. I expect we will get a deafening silence on that one!

There is no star rating for resorts so it is impossible to have a 5 star resort.  There is a 5 star hotel there.

The 5 star resort is something put out by Polaris sales.

I came to the forum to ask a question.

But there are those who feel it necessary to try to prevent people asking a question or two.  

I did not do any more than that and all the information I have given here is correct. Please state any information given that is untrue.  I asked for the case law that was mentioned - It never appears.

I did not drag anything into the gutter.  Then a group of usernames appear to attack the asking of a question, who start making it personal.

You are the sort that bring a place into disrepute.  This is bully tactics.

I was asking the opinion of the solicitor just that.

I will get the opinion of a solicitor even if it is not here.

It is only when people fear the truth that they behave like this, or maybe this is how some people are all the time.

I Have not got the time to go through all of your posts but here is one which is incorrect:

"The current fee distribution completely ignores the parcela cuotas and community cuotas as the fees are being distributed resort wide by comparing surface areas of properties, by plot size of properties and by equal distribution, therefore the resort (as far as the fees are concerned) is being treated as one community"  

As I posted previously it does not. Each community is a seperate legal entity and the Cuota set in their deeds is used to calculate the split of their direct costs. You must know that as you seem to know everything else about the resort so you deliberatly posted this information to suit your argument that all the Cuotas are being ignored.

As for case law, again as you know so much you must know that at the AGM in 2009 the legal opinion from the lawyers used by the community was given and it clearly quoted case law.

If you truly had the best interests of the resort at heart you would not post on open forums like this. You would join the managing committee and work with all the owners to make our resort work for all.

Please do get the opinion of a solicitor, but remember it will only be an opinion and not fact. The community has voted on this issue and you should except that and become part of the community rather than stand on the side causing problems for those of us who have stepped forwards to help make the resort even better than it is now.

 The majority of costs in the resort in question stem from community property held by the resort.

There is little in the way of sub community property excepting garages and apartment block lift areas.

All the pools and most of the gardens/town centre are held in the resort community property even when they are all in the middle of apartment communities.

Resort fees do not follow the cuota distribution.  This is where the bulk of fees are.  

There has been very little dispute over the sub community fee distribution except an occasional owner saying one town house has more garden than them but has slightly lower fees.

The dispute has been about the distribution of resort costs.

As you say the majority of communities voted to have the distribution of fees based on a formula at the heart of which was surface area in the town hall records.

Fair enough.  

However there were several communities rejected this and wanted to have the cuota.  They have objected for a long time since the illegal imposition of the non cuota system.

At least one of the communities has voted on suing the resort about this and this motion was passed in March 2010.  The process is moving forward rather than anyone walking away.  There were 10 communities voted against the surface area system.

I have read in more than one place and told by an administrator that if an owner or community does not want to adopt a fee distribution system that is not based on the cuota system, as described in the Horizontal Property Act, despite other owners voting for this, they have a right to demand their fees are on the basis of cuota.  Just like the rest of Spain.

That is all I came to ask.  I will get the answer and it will be fact not opinion.

There is opinion where the law is grey but many times it is quite clear.  

The law will either allow this or not.  If the law allows this, then there is no opinion in it, only the law.

The case law dug up by the administrator applied to a case where the dispute centred on voting rights and cuota.  It did not involve fees.  

It may have been the legal opinion that this could be extrapolated to the fee situation and was being used to justify using the surface area as the basis of the new fee distribution.  It would be a valid argument and there is much to recommend it. v There is the issue of town house and villa gardens which would complicate matters but it is a useful basis to move forward with.

I have discovered there has always been the right of owners to decide amongst themselves to vary the distribution of fees in ways other than the cuota.  So there was never any need for case law to justify owners deciding to change the fee distribution.

There is no case law to justify the imposition of a new fee distribution system, which is what had happened.

Now many communities have voted to legally adopt the surface area system, fair enough - but there were several communities - so called independent communities and probably plenty of owners within the other communities who do not want this system.

Are they forced to have a fee system they don't want and costs them significantly more than would be the case if the cuota system in the Horizontal Property Act were to apply?

As I say I found this in a couple of sources and wanted to know if it were true or not.

Sorry for stepping in again but I feel the need to argue worried/concerned owners drivel.

"All the pools and most of the gardens/town centre are held in the resort community property even when they are all in the middle of apartment communities."

So are you saying nobody apart from apartment owners use the pools, is this an attack against apartment owners, are you a resident who wants an exclusive only club?

"At least one of the communities has voted on suing the resort about this and this motion was passed in March 2010.  The process is moving forward rather than anyone walking away."

Do you have absolute knowledge of this moving forward, if so why and how, and prove it by posting detailed facts, if you are not an apartment owner why does it overly concern you if the end result may be you losing money?

If you do not want to pay the fees that are allocated then feel free not to, then the community will happily take the legal action to gain the fees from you and hopefully spur you on to own a property where you will be happier.

ps turn the lights off when you leave dear

 Barmy

The pools are all within the apartment complexes.  An outside observer might presume they were part of the apartment community but they are not.  They are held within the resort community property.

The town centre is an apartment community, but the town centre which one might assume was part of their community is actually owned by the resort community.

I am sure you know all this, but the rest of the world doesn't.

At least one of the communities passed a resolution to give their president authority to sue the resort over the illegal fees.  There were illegal and so could not be legally charged.  Hence no-one has been taken to court over these fees.  If I did know if that community and any other were about to push the button, I surely would not be telling you as you are not 2 worried anyway.

I only want to ask the question as to whether owners or communities who do not agree on a fee distribution system voted for by a majority of other communities/owners are obliged to accept that system or whether have the legal right to insist their fees are by the cuota.

ps Regarding the lights, it would seem that with many of the posters on this thread, the lights are on but no-one is at home.

The more I read your posts the more I am convinced you are not a town house owner but an owner in one of the few apartment communities (2 to be precise) that still want to take legal action over this issue (well their presidents do not sure if all the owners have actually been consulted). Your writing style is very familiar and the arguments you are using are too much like the apartment action group not be coming from them. You even quoted the 30,000€ debtor example which one of the owners from that group recently quoted on the official owners forum.

So please go ahead take legal action and everyone will see you all for what you are, a very selfish bunch of people who do not want to pay their fair share of the community costs but instead want to hide behind the fact that the developer made a mistake when setting up the resort and pay very low fees to the detriment of your fellow owners. None of you have ever contributed to the running of the community and have constantly tried to undermine both the current Managing Committee and the Resort president and the previous committee and president. 

You should be ashamed. 

"I am sure you know all this, but the rest of the world doesn't."

What makes you think the rest of the world wants to know?

"At least one of the communities passed a resolution to give their president authority to sue the resort over the illegal fees.  There were illegal and so could not be legally charged."

Is the above quote regarding legality an opinion or legal fact, if the latter please share where it came from, if you cannot then please do not state your assumptions.

"I only want to ask the question as to whether owners or communities who do not agree on a fee distribution system voted for by a majority of other communities/owners are obliged to accept that system or whether have the legal right to insist their fees are by the cuota"

Ok you have asked the question, if you do not want to pay then dont, simple as, but beware there may be legal consequences to not paying your community fee.

BTW if you dont pay their may not be any lights to switch off when you leave, why dont you just relax and enjoy life?

There appears to be a trend here with regards to this web site hopping and asking questions and ignoring any questions posed back to you!

Do you really think that this forum is an appropriate place to air this situation?

No it is not the place it should be discussed.

This is why the question should not have been put in such a way as to yet again try to undermine the peace we achieved at the resort at the last AGM where the owners were given a vote on this issue and the vast majority voted in favour of the resolution as they can see the current fees are fair to all owners. Its one thing posing a question on legal issues its another to undermine the work done by the volunteers who work so hard on behalf of the resort. 

I am afraid though we have a few owners who are hellbent on bringing the resort down even though it would also hit their own property values. It is utter madness which tells you a lot about the few owners involved in this action group.