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Bill Sarille, a Miami Beach condo owner, reflects on the rising fees, property taxes and insurance costs that may force him to leave his home, on Monday, July 28, 2025.<\/p>\n
Carl Juste<\/p>\n
cjuste@miamiherald.com<\/p>\n
Five years ago, Florida\u2019s millions of condo dwellers awoke to a new reality.<\/p>\n
The Champlain Towers South building in Surfside had collapsed in the pre-dawn hours of June 24, 2021 \u2014 a generational tragedy that claimed 98 lives and forced anyone living in a large condo building to confront an existential question: What if mine\u2019s next?<\/p>\n
Such disasters needed to be prevented, and the Florida Legislature\u2019s answer was to require<\/a> condo associations to complete inspections, calculate what they\u2019d need to save for future repairs, actually save that money rather than defer building up their financial reserves \u2014 as many associations had long done \u2014 and complete necessary maintenance.<\/p>\n The legislation marked a massive shift in how condos are regulated, making the Surfside collapse \u201cthis generation\u2019s Hurricane Andrew,\u201d said local condo market analyst Peter Zalewski, referring to the deadly 1992 hurricane that occasioned an overhaul of Florida\u2019s building codes.<\/p>\n Suddenly, the bill for decades of can-kicking by condo associations on reserve savings and structural repair spending came due \u2014 in some cases, in as little as two years.<\/p>\n Condo owners, particularly those in older buildings, quickly felt the impact.<\/a> The party was over in the Condo Capital of the World, and the economic hangover was beginning to set in.<\/p>\n READ MORE: Trapped by high costs and buyer\u2019s market, South Florida condo owners are hurting<\/a><\/p>\n Long a homeownership rite of passage for many Floridians and snowbirds \u2014 condos had been an affordable route to homeownership, especially for fixed-income retirees \u2014 many people\u2019s homes quickly became all-consuming money pits to be escaped as soon as possible.<\/p>\n \u201cSurfside changed everything,\u201d said Zalewski.<\/p>\n What changed?<\/p>\n Multimillion-dollar special assessments, mandatory reserve spending and dizzying association fees have defined the nauseating last half-decade for many Florida condo owners.<\/p>\n The Legislature passed a landmark bill in 2022 that slapped sweeping requirements on condo buildings that were at least three stories tall. Upon turning 30 \u2014 or 25, if within 5 miles of the coast \u2014 all such structures were obliged to complete safety inspections.<\/p>\n That applied to most of the local condo stock. As of 2023, three-quarters of South Florida condos \u2014 in Miami-Dade, Broward or Palm Beach counties \u2014 were built in or before 1993, according to estimates from the University of Florida\u2019s Warrington College of Business.<\/p>\n Inspections are now mandatory every decade for all buildings, meaning condo owners can probably expect decennial special assessments, said Zalewski.<\/p>\n Though originally slotted for the end of 2024, structural integrity reserve studies \u2014 estimates of how much condo associations would need to save to pay for critical repairs in the future \u2014 were slightly postponed for most associations.<\/p>\n And while they were implemented in the name of structural safety, those requirements have driven up monthly costs for owners. Median association fees for condos in Miami-Dade have increased by more than 70% since 2016, according to Florida International University\u2019s Metropolitan Center. Between the start of 2022 and 2025 alone, association fees for condos with at least three stories increased by 42%, the Center estimates.<\/p>\n The Miami metro area now claims the most expensive homeowners association fees in the country, according to an analysis<\/a> by Realtor.com. Those fees \u2014 the median of which was $617 in greater Miami last year \u2014 amount to roughly 27% of the typical mortgage payment. And of the 10 U.S. metropolitan areas with the costliest HOA fees, seven are in Florida, Realtor.com\u2019s study shows.<\/p>\n Part of what\u2019s driving up those association fees are insurance costs. The Metropolitan Center compiled data from the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation and found that, for condo associations in Miami-Dade, commercial multi-peril premiums \u2014 insurance that condo associations pay to cover physical damage and liability \u2014 cost $175,000, on average, at the start of 2021. That figure jumped to $462,000 by the end of 2024, a 164% increase.<\/p>\n And that doesn\u2019t include the rising cost of homeowners insurance policies that individual owners usually need to take out in order to qualify for financing. Those premium averages hit $2,300 at the end of 2024, up from $1,600 three years prior \u2014 a 44% spike.<\/p>\n All that \u201chas fundamentally changed the math for buyers,\u201d said Nick Miceli, Southeast Metro regional president at TD Bank. For many owners and would-be buyers, a condo\u2019s sticker price is no longer the biggest concern, Miceli said; it\u2019s whether they can afford the monthly fees, insurance and the risk of future assessments.<\/p>\n The aftermath<\/p>\n And so some condo owners have found themselves trapped between struggling to afford the rising cost of staying in their home and not being able to absorb the price cut that would be necessary to offload their unit.<\/p>\n Still, some are trying \u2014 and many to no avail.<\/p>\n As of May, there was about 12 months of condo inventory on the market \u2014 meaning it would take roughly a year to sell all available condos at the current pace of sales. Basically, there\u2019s a supply glut. A balanced market typically has six to nine months of inventory.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, median sale prices were down 3.5% on the year, according to the Miami Association of Realtors<\/a>.<\/p>\n All that is to say, the Miami condo market currently favors the buyer. And Zalewski, the market analyst, estimates it won\u2019t fully correct until 2030, or perhaps even 2032.<\/p>\n What\u2019s next?<\/p>\n Viewed more holistically, the condo cost issue is another straw on the back of a local economy struggling under the weight of a burgeoning affordability crisis<\/a>.<\/p>\n
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