One day in January, Dana Cremo was on her front porch hanging a vintage screen door when two city employees walked up.”You can’t park on your driveway,” they said.”Why?” she asked. “Because somebody filed a complaint,” they said.Five days later, an investigator notified Dana and her husband, Larry, that they had violated city codes by […]
Category Archives: Legal
How has a Singer Island mansion dodged water bills for 6 years?
The waterfront house at 2765 Lake Drive is the ninth most valuable in Riviera Beach, its worth estimated by the county at nearly $2.2 million.Yet, despite its lush lawn, dock and swimming pool on Singer Island alongside the Intracoastal Waterway, five bedrooms and four full baths, utility bills obtained by The Palm Beach Post indicate […]
Wall Street and single-family rental homes
Jennifer Paul St. Denis thought she had found the perfect landlord. A mother of two from Marietta, Georgia, St. Denis had been looking for a new home last summer after separating from her husband. Her search didn’t take her far. After spotting an ad from a company called Waypoint, she discovered they had a “super-cute” […]
Does association need to levy a special assessment for Irma damage?
There has been some very heavy Hurricane Irma cleanup and repair costs for many Southwest Florida condominiums and neighborhoods. Of course none of these unexpected costs were in the association’s budget for this year. So, how are associations going to pay the Irma damage and repair bills coming due?There are basically three ways to pay these bills: Borrow […]
The Mortgage Professor: Does it make sense to take a reverse mortgage on a $1M home?
If you own a home worth $1 million, would it ever make sense to take out a reverse mortgage?The question arises because the maximum amounts that can be drawn on a home equity conversion mortgage – the type of reverse mortgage program available through the federal government – are based on the lower of appraised […]
The beauty of trusts for real estate investing clients
A starting point with high-net-worth clients — especially those exploring real estate investments — is to emphasize that irrevocable trusts are an essential part of estate planning. This is not affected by the recent discussion of the possible elimination of all federal estate taxes. Even if irrevocable trusts are no longer created for tax reasons, […]