[The new laws took into effect July 1. Because last week was slow-week..posting is pushed back.]
Virginia has this thing about date for a new law to take into effect July 1 (last week). The new legislation was supposed to resolved complaints filed on condominium and property owners' association resale packet process. What's added to the new law is the requirement for licensing individuals who manage properties.
There's a lot in the details to cover in this post. I'm just going to round up the most important part of the laws. If you're selling or thinking about putting your property on the market, you want to read the following.
SUMMARY of HB 516 (house bill) /SB 301 (senate bill). [h/t NVAR]
- The resale certificate must disclose any post-closing fees charged by management company and copies of 6 months association minutes.
- Two copies of certificate or packet will be provided in electronic or hard copy format. There should not be fees to access management companies electronic system.
- Association and/or management company will have to disclose to sellers the scheduled fees. There's a cap on how much management companies can charge. For example: $100 for inspection. $150 for hard copies or $125 for electronic.
- Cost can only be collected at settlement (before this law, it's collected when you made the request).
- Packet expiration: 12 months from issue date. Updates must be delivered within the 10 days limit.
The rest of the two bills dealing with licensing requirement for community managers (or property managers).
A House bill deals with predatory lending (HB 408) and Senate bill (SB 797) foreclosure prevention also passed. The House bill prohibits predatory for-profit foreclosure help services those are defined as services with upfront fees to apply homeowner payments to property lien or offer repurchase - unless - it's spell out in the contract. The Senate bill requires high-risk mortgage lenders and servicers to provide notice and additional time before starting foreclosure proceeding.
In this market, the last thing a bank wants is another foreclosure in the books.
Other things real estate related laws.
- On property management (HB 264) requires an out-of-state rental owners to have in-state resident agent for their property.
- On environment and energy efficiencies, there are three bills passed. 1) dealing with expansion of green buildings certification (HB 239), 2) locality tree ordinances (HB 1427/SB 710) and 3) removes the requirement of the only method to certify green buildings (to exceed 30% of state requirement) to include other certifications: LEED, Green Globes, EarthCraft and Energy Star.
For other legislations real estate related, summary read here or dig GA info here.
