Sponsor owned apartment has ruined my renovated bathroom!!!!

I don't but I've had very good answers to questions that I've posted on the board below . . .

http://www.tenant.net/phpBB2/

Sponsor as in coop? Shouldn't you be dealing with the board? I'm curious did the plumber break your ceiling and attempt to trace the leak?

Idlewild wrote: Sponsor as in coop? Shouldn't you be dealing with the board? I'm curious did the plumber break your ceiling and attempt to trace the leak?

Yeah, try that route. In our joint the sponsor or the building would be paying for your damages, depending on the ultimate source. But that plumber should be talking to someone about opening up the wall if the source of the leak is not evident.

If you think it's the grouting, a good interim measure is a shower curtain liner next to the leaky wall. We had to do this for awhile until we had our place patched up.

You're getting into legal issues now. I'm going to play armchair lawyer and say that you could hire your own plumber, pay him and deduct the bill from your maintanence. However, you might want to check your prospectus and such and see if they're responsible for compensation. If the board and management is passing the buck in a circle you may have to litigate. Unfortunately for some coops it's how they operate. On the leak side. It could be anything from a busted riser/waste line to the toilet seating (the base) being defective and allowing water to seep underneath. My guess is that any plumber you call will want to get upstairs in the other apartment so he can run water tests.

as i said, call your insurance company because they may be able to handle the whole thing for you. they will come and find out what's what and, if need be, contact your building's insurance company for the $$ to fix the whole problem. the board might start listening once that happens.

kosherdave wrote: [quote=brooklynpotter]as i said, call your insurance company because they may be able to handle the whole thing for you. they will come and find out what's what and, if need be, contact your building's insurance company for the $$ to fix the whole problem. the board might start listening once that happens.

That's a good point. I'd assume the insurance company would be there in a heartbeat if you filed a claim. And they are not going to take crap from some run around coop board. They'll want to get to the source if for nothing else, so they don't have to pay you as much!

yup, and that's one of the reasons you pay them in the first place. a: to cover $$ expenses when something goes wrong, and b: to handle the whole mess. (and the cost of the building's insurance is factored into your maintenance, btw)

roux42 wrote: The sponsor is Slope Realty and they hired the the plumber...

Slope Realty – oh, my friend, I'm SO sorry. They are the sponsor of about half the units in our building, and their motto is clearly, "Do the least possible, at all times." We've had several problems with leaks from Slope apts. into owner apts., House Rules being violated (by tenants) that we can't get Slope to correct, etc. I'm the president of my coop board.

I think when Park Slope/Prospect Heights joined the coop boom in the '80s, Slope Realty swept in and sponsored a slew of buildings. Our own management company (Goldin – not the greatest, but they're apparently way better than yours) can't stand dealing with them, but they have to because they're in a number of buildings.

FWIW, remember the golden coop rule: In the walls is the coop's responsibility. Leaks are a gray area, because of course the leak starts with negligence in one apartment. But if the leak is some intractable problem with a pipe buried in the walls, both you and those bastards Slope might be off the hook, legally. I'm being a bit of a traitor to my fellow coop board members by suggesting this, but it sounds like your board isn't as attentive as ours (usually) is. So screw 'em.

roux42 wrote: 'know any good management companies?

oh, i wish. ours bites. i mean, they're not just the typical "do nothing" company, they actually do things like pay a 7k electric bill--wrong, of course--TWICE. or, my favorite, we have a very difficult section 8 tenant leftover from when the building when coop. the city stopped paying her $$ because they wanted to inspect the apartment. somehow, the management company didn't understand this, decided she was XX months behind on her rent, and sent an eviction notice without even telling the board--we only found out when her lawyer called our lawyer and she was screaming in the hallways.

sadly, we are a tiny building and finding a management company we can afford is impossible

8 units. we own the building, but there are still three tenants leftover from the coop switch. so, really, it's a cost split between 5 people.

none of us know anything about tenant laws, and i'm the only one with real any knowledge of buildings and infrastructure...so, we need someone/a company. but these guys are on their last leg with us

Idlewild wrote: You could do the maintanence yourself. Or hire an outside super. How often does anything breakdown? As far as landlord/tenant laws go go to www.nolo.com They have excellent books specifically for NYC l&t laws. I say this only if you cannot find a decent management company.

we're about an inch from doing this, and we already have a separate super who we also pay to clean and do garbage. i just don't like the idea of dealing with rent stabilization/tenants/finances/insurance/anything else we don't know about, not to mention what would happen if the furnace broke in the middle of the night. we're a rather incohesive group, in regard to working together, so i think that having someone handle things is best. but right now the management company is making it worse.

no, they are handling it. (badly, but handling it). but i fear we will be running blind if we self manage, because none of us knows enough about building operation/laws/managing/taxes, etc.

and, the tenant issue is tricky, and we'd like to put some distance bwteeen us and the tenants, so we're more like neighbors and less like landlords.

Idlewild wrote: My guess is that the tenants are rent stabilized and fall under stabilization laws. I'm also guessing that the five coop owners are the landlords and have to carry them equally in terms of maintanence. The tenant laws is whatever the City Council, DHCPR (whatever the intitials are), and NYS say they are, which for the most part say that if they're not behind in rent cannot evict. As far as insurance and taxes are concerned you get insurance with a decent liabiltiy policy and pay the water and property tax on time. You should take in consideration that most management companies just want to get the job of running a building done in a fast manner. And that doesn't neccassarily mean finding the best insurance carrier, investigating l&t laws or spending a little more for products that might last a long time. Alot of coops and condo buildings are probably being lead blindly in exchange for not having to deal with the City and the laws. I.E. I think you'd be suprised how well you all could do if you took the job on yourself.

i think that if we had a cohesive board, who agreed on things and could work together equally we could self manage. at this point, i think the only thing we all agree upon is that our management company sucks. hell, it took us 6 months to decide we needed new garbage cans and to figure out who would buy them.

i'm not putting down your knowledge or ideas, i think they're fantastic. i just think we need to put the managing of this building into someone else's hands.

Idlewild wrote: Well, whatever you decide remember too keep on top of it/them. Remember, it's not the management company that the NYC Finance or the lawyers go after (in regards to the tenants and any liability/damage cases) it's the owner/s of said block and lot. Luck to ya!

oh, i know this. trust me.

Ben wrote: [quote=brooklynpotter]8 units. we own the building, but there are still three tenants leftover from the coop switch. so, really, it's a cost split between 5 people.

none of us know anything about tenant laws, and i'm the only one with real any knowledge of buildings and infrastructure...so, we need someone/a company. but these guys are on their last leg with us

So who owns those 3 units? Are these sponsor owned? Each unit should pay it's share and that share should be paid by whoever is collecting the rent from these people.

If they are owned by the coop and the 5 of you are the only ones with shares in the coop you may want to consider selling the units to someone else. This way you won't have to deal with any LL/tenant issues as you won't be the LL anymore. This will also raise capital for the building that can be used to pay down the underlying mortgage, make improvements, etc.

we own them, and they have rent stabilized tenants in them. we could sell them--if anyone would buy them, and i don't know why they would because these tenants aren't going anywhere. yes, we've offered the tenants large sums of $$ to move out. and even if someone bought them, they that person becomes the largest shareholder.