Withholding Maintenance Over a Noisy Neighbor
Q. A shareholder in our co-op is having a problem with an upstairs neighbor whom he accuses of constantly makes disturbing noises. He asked the co-op board to solve the problem, but the board has gotten nowhere. The shareholder has now started putting his maintenance payments into an escrow account he opened, and has sued the board for not resolving the problem. The board has been told it can seize the escrow payments. Is this correct?
A. “The simple answer is that the board cannot seize anything without a court order,†said Stuart M. Saft, a Manhattan lawyer who is the chairman of the Council of New York Cooperatives and Condominiums.
Mr. Saft said that while a co-op board has a great deal of discretion over the operation of the property, the seizure of a shareholder’s bank account, no matter what it’s called, would require a court order. An account with an actual escrow agreement, he noted, would be signed by the shareholder, the co-op corporation, and an “escrow agent†who would have control over the money, and the parties would have to abide by its terms.
READ MORE: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/11/realestate/real-estate-q-a.html?_r=0
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