Am I being discriminated against?

When the owners in our block completed on the purchase of their apartments in April 2007 all Habitation Licences, Lift, Plumbing and other snagging problems were resolved and in perfect working order.

When the community voted to adopt our Block in September 2007 the lift in our block was still in perfect working order.

Otis, the lift manufacturer, disconnected the lift in December 2007 because of non payment by the developer and from then until now the owners have had no operational lift.

As the lift was working when the community adopted these blocks, it is felt that it is the communities responsibility to ensure that every effort is made to rectify the present situation and to restore the lift to be fully functional again.

It is unreasonable to expect that owners should suffer indefinitely without a lift to their apartments and our block is probably amongst the most inaccessible in the community.

We have no easy access from the road. 75 steps have to be negotiated outside and there are 39 steps from the garage to the front door of the lowest owned apartment and a further 15 steps to the apartment owned above. Is this in itself a case for discrimination against disabled owners?

All other blocks in the community have fully working lifts.

 As everyone else, owners in our block still pay their share of the community’s lift maintenance charges and it is felt that these owners should not be differentiated or discriminated from the rest of the community.

1)   Has the community a legal responsibility to the owners in our block to restore the lift to full working order?

2)   As the community has adopted these Blocks, who is the legal owner of the lifts?

3)   Is the community legally entitled to commission a third party lift manufacturer to resolve this problem?

Please have answers below in bold green :

What the developer´s payment dafault is about?

1)   Has the community a legal responsibility to the owners in our block to restore the lift to full working order? Yes, lift operation is maintained with the Community of Owners´s fees.

2)   As the community has adopted these Blocks, who is the legal owner of the lifts? The Community of Owners.

3)   Is the community legally entitled to commission a third party lift manufacturer to resolve this problem? Yes, it is. Is actually a right and a duty.

 The developer has defaulted on his payment to the lift company, I assume, through lack of funds.

There are many other unresolved issues with the developer e.g. no security gates, unfinished swimming pools, unfinished paintwork, other uncommissioned lifts and unpaid community fees (250,000 euros) and yet he is still working on blocks above the ones that are 'finished'. The problem is finding the finance to take the developer to court & whether it is worth it if there is no equity left in the unsold apartments, of which there are many.

Many thanks for your response to my initial questions concerning the lift, that was most helpful in getting the community to accept our problem.

Hi Maria

Many thanks for your reply to my question. However at our community agm yesterday the owners present, whilst agreeing with your answers to questions 1 & 3, found it difficult to believe that the community of owners can legally own something that has not been paid for. How can the title of something, in this instance a lift, be passed to someone when it has not been paid for? Can you please quote where in the 'horizontal Property Act' or maybe somewhere else this can be verified?

Many thanks again for your invaluable help in this & other matters.

Willow