Homeowner's Associations in Colombia - one person's story

Anyone have stories about their homeowners’ associations and their annual meetings or “asambleas de propiedad horizontal ?��? I have owned an apartment in a building in Cartagena for over 2 years. I am the only American in a group of about 15 people who want to see a change in the leadership and administration of the building. This building has 466 apartments, about 40 locales (storefront businesses) and a lot of parking spaces. Most of the apartments are short term rentals and this has proven very lucrative for the owners. And… also for the people who are on the Consejo (the homeowners’ board) and and who are the hired Administrators.

It is so lucrative that the selection process every two years for the new board and administration has been fought for and manipulated by a few individuals for at least the last 10 years so that there will be no change. Why? Why would people fight so hard to retain what would normally be a volunteer position and a 2,000,000 peso per month (a little over U$S1000)? I will let you answer that question. At this moment, there are at least 10 criminal demandas (charges) in the fiscalia’s (District Attorney’s) office here and other civil demandas that have been “pending��? or rejected for incorrect documents or other technicalities. There are some for which one judge has ruled in favor of the planitiffs and then have been funneled to another judge only to be sent back for more information or rejected for whatever reason.

The building takes in over 800,000,000 pesos per year in monthly administration fees and more revenue from parking spaces (illegally built), rental fees from communication towers, and a registration fee charged by the building whenever an apartment is rented. This equates to over 1,000,000,000 pesos annually that are available to operate and improve the building.
There have been at least two instances where a member of the consejo (who is also illegally a member) has taken over apartments where the owners were absent (or recently deceased) and rented them out for personal profit. There have been countless incidences of confiscation of apartments by the administration and consejo for back homeowners dues (sometimes for only 1-2 million pesos in arrears) and then the purchase of those apartments by the same people (or members of their families) for ridiculously low prices (try 30 million for an apartment that would sell for 80 million). Also, the people who are consejo members and are also administrators of apts neglect to pay the administration on those apartments which puts the apartments into a position to be taken over by the same people or members of their families.

I have met and discussed these takeovers from people who have been victimized by this process, seen the documents and demandas that they have filed to reverse the process, only to have them lost, or put at the bottom of an ever growing pile. How can this happen?

One man is at the center of all this. Over the past 10 years or so, a lot of the other players have changed. Only he and a very few others have been constant in the equation. He is mentioned as a suspect in almost all of the demandas. I do not want to mention any names. If DAS and other Colombian agencies indeed read this site, they either already know who these folks are or, can easily find out.

Right now, these folks believe themselves essentially untouchable because of the inaction by the authorities here. They have also bought cars, houses, businesses, farms and land with no visible means of the income necessary to do so.

The annual finance reports are a joke. No backup data for some of the things and the rest of the backup data doesn’t jive with the line item it is supposed to support. Also, the items that they have purported to spend money on are obviously inflated by 20-40 per cent based on comparable contracts for other buildings.

So, what are we doing about this? We have done a lot of research into totally understanding Ley 675, 2001 (law that covers homeowner's associations) and our homeowners regulations and have found that the people who are currently on the board are not homeowners and have no legal right to be there. We can quote and demonstrate the laws and regulations for all to see. By the same token, we have researched the city records and found that the daughter of the Administrator, the Accountant, the Lawyer and the (supposedly) Independent Auditor (Revisor Fiscal) have a registered business together – a clearly illegal conflict of interest. We are also bringing to light that the powers of attorney from absent homeowners that the current regime is using to re-elect itself are mostly bogus and illegally assigned according to the law and the homeowner’s regulations. We now have a website that will reach homeowners all over the country. In other words, we are shining a bright light on all of the misdeeds for all of the property owners to see, because the only way we are going to get these guys outta here is to vote them out, shame them out or make it so apparent that they are blatantly breaking the law that the authorities won’t dare not do something to them.

Tomorrow night is the 2nd take of the annual meeting. The junta usually sets it up so that there’s not a quorum at the 1st take. We have invited the police, mayor’s office, and other government entities, and we don’t know if they will come, or if they do come if they will be fair. In this meeting, there will be lots of drama, surprise revelations, and maybe even a fight or two. Probably ending with us walking out and refusing to agree and support the decisions coming out of the crooked process. Hopefully, there will be no more than that. I will film as much as I can with my camera and put it on YouTube.

I probably would not be involved in this if my wife weren't, although I was involved in the removal of a corrupt administrator from another building. That was also an interesting process. Even though she got caught stealing and paying her absent mother a salary, no one wanted to prosecute her because she was a single mother. They even paid her severance pay. After two years here, I realize that there's is still a lot to understand about this culture. I would be curious to know if any other extranjeros in Colombia have had similar problems and what did you do about it?

By Bluesdude on Mar 26, 2008, 18:30 in Friendly Talkzone.

miamimike says on Mar 26, 2008, 19:49:

Eso me huele a tumbe LOL Being on our board of directors here at our Condo Bldg in North Miami, what you wrote does not surprise me one iota.

"Wait a minute. What did you just say? You're predicting $4-a-gallon gas? That's interesting. I hadn't heard that." -- Feb. 28, 2008 --George W. Bush, Washington, D.C.

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pedro says on Mar 26, 2008, 20:31:

Have you considered inviting the press? You could provide them a brief with facts and references and see if they are interested.

BTW: That's a s**tload of apartments in the one complex. A quick Google search to confirm and I now know exactly which building you're referring to,

que nota!

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Cheers Terry says on Mar 26, 2008, 20:55:

Good luck.

Fight the good fight...

Cheers,
Terry

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tomtom33 says on Mar 27, 2008, 02:59:

At least you have had the experience of what we did at the other building. Of course I am assuming that you are who I think you are.

I am so pleased with my house in Medellín. No more of that shit.

Buen suerte, amigo.

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jack_jason says on Mar 27, 2008, 06:31:

I worked for several years as a client accountant for a very known property management company in UK. All of we know is that the service charge account is a not profitable account. That why, every year there should be a service charge year end where the expenditure and income should be put together and then based on the apportionment, every tenant should receive a year end charge or a year end credit. it depends of the apportionable expenditure and the income raised on every tenant. Now, have the owners of the building received the annual service charge year end?. You should look for an auditor to review every year end. I believe, there are several property management companies through Colombia where you can ask for the accounts to be audited. After you get the prove, you can start a demand against the administrators. Just take care with who you are against of.

This is just spanglish, please do not correct me

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robi666 says on Mar 27, 2008, 07:40:

Horror stories like that are pretty common on the coast. Something similar on a smaller scale is happening to me in Santa Marta. The problem is mostly related to absent owners.
I decided not to fight, to be an absent owner and let the Colombians sort it out. My life quality is worth more than that.

"I am a citizen of the most beautiful nation on earth. A nation whose laws are harsh yet simple, a nation that never cheats, which is immense and without borders, where life is lived in the present."

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jack_jason says on Mar 27, 2008, 09:39:

I will tell you what they are doing. The administrator agrees with any supplier (friend supplier, some time some one from his/her family) to get long term contracts. The supplier charges twice the amount and the invoice is paid from the service charge account. Then, the supplier is paid and passes some cash to the administrator as agreed. Then, it is difficul to realise a missconduct on the way the property is administrated. How ever, there should be several quotations from several suppliers on any job to do.

This is just spanglish, please do not correct me

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Lowell says on Mar 27, 2008, 10:54:

I understand you position. I too have had way too much abuse in my 2.5 yrs here. Family included. I'm chaukling it up to paying my dues here. There's a lot of practices here that are way out of wak in Colombia. I figure that I've been bit for about 15-20K USD in all my endeavors. Won't be making many of ther same mistakes again. If you stir up enough dirt, you, wifie and others, can end up missing. Be carefull. Life's cheap here.

Alfred E. Newman. "What. Me Worry?"

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Bluesdude says on Mar 27, 2008, 11:46:

Thanks all for the comments and advice. We must be getting close or we have struck a nerve. The person who has been behind all of this has now (today) filed a 600 million peso demanda against the Administration and homeowner's association, who are his minions. This is for the impediment to his life because of all the demandas that are filed against him. The way I figure it, they could help him to "win", then split the money later. Of course all of the owners would have to pay the assessments from the damages awarded in the demandas. Hope my "Affectacion a Vivienda Familiar" (kind of a "homestead" status for property here) protects us. We were supposed to be able to review the powers of attorney that support them last night, then this morning, then this afternoon. Guess what? We are getting close to the point where there won't be any time to review them prior to the meeting. Also, one of their attorneys has been using a false credential number, one that is registered to a government attorney in Bogota. What will happen to him? I 'm betting on nothing. I am glad I am not the Captain of this ship, but I realize that collateral damage is possible. The only alternative I have is to abandon my wife, which is not gonna happen. If only the choice to "just pay my dues" was viable. More later.

Bluesdude No Mas Gringas Por La Vida

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Bluesdude says on Mar 29, 2008, 09:53:

UPDATE -- Well, no one got shot or beat up at the annual meeting which started at 9pm and finished at 4:30 am. As usual, the current regime loaded the meeting with enough of their friends and families (not residents nor property owners) to shout down any opposition that the process they were using to authorize voters was illegal or any other opposition. According to the regulations, nonproperty owners may not receive powers of attorney to vote in the annual meeting, although other buildings permit this. Maybe there is enough precedent in past rulings of the courts to overrule the regulation. Anyway, what the law really is doesn't matter.

Also, when it was announced that the independent (not!) auditor had a business relationship with the daughter of the administrator and the son-in-law of the administrator (who is also the building's attorney), a clear conflict of interest, everyone just accepted the auditor's explanation that this was an old, inactive business and chastized the person who brought it up. We are not done with that one yet. The falsification of attorney credentials by one of the board members claiming to be an attorney and using that to get dinero from someone (who is on our side) 8-9 months ago was also not brought up - a work in process.

What took the cake is that the puppeteer who controls the administrator and the board has filed a lawsuit against the building for 600,000,000 pesos for perjuicios morales (damage to his character?) and that one of his friends in the meeting proposed just writing a check for a lesser amount to settle his lawsuit - then guess what he will do with the money. I think this comes under conspiracy, extortion or something like that but probably nothing will come of it except less money in our pockets. Interesting. The jefe has had two criminal charges against him with overwhelming supporting evidence against him decided in his favor, one by "preclusion" by the DA and the other terminado in favor de los denunciados (defendants) by the court. This is in the annual documents delivered to the homeowners by the administration. And, there are still questions about the amounts spent for contracts with "outside" companies.

So, so far, status quo, but I think the battle isn't over yet. One way to fight this is to communicate what is happening to as many property owners as possible, which will be done on the opposition's website and in the newspapers. Sure wish we had an honest investigator at the federal level who was willing to uncover this BS. If the former Mayor of Cartagena can be convicted and sent to prison for corruption, so can these guys. In the meantime, life goes on in Cartagena. Being an extranjero with marginal spanish, I am more of an observer than anything else. It is frustrating, however, to watch people do nothing more than stir up a hornet's nest, although I do think that the vigiliance has made the administration more wary and to perform better in the way of services and improvements to the building. Maybe that's the best we can hope for. To have an everpresent vigiliance that will have some positive effect on what otherwise would be blatant extortion and thievery.

Bluesdude No Mas Gringas Por La Vida

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tomtom33 says on Mar 29, 2008, 11:13:

And I thought that our 4- and 5-hour meetings were interminable.

Thanks for the update.

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