Paying assessments, late charges, and what happens when you sell

Your community's documents set how often assessments are due, most often monthly or quarterly. Setting up automatic payment, where your association offers it, is the simplest way to stay current.

If a payment is going to be late, tell the manager before the due date. It is a routine conversation for them and it is always easier to arrange something in advance.

Florida law sets the framework, and each community's documents fill in the details. Unpaid assessments carry interest at the rate in the declaration. If the declaration gives no rate, interest accrues at 18 percent per year.

If the declaration or bylaws provide for it, an association may also charge an administrative late fee of up to the greater of $25 or 5 percent of the late installment. The same framework applies to condominiums and to homeowners' associations.

When a payment comes in on a past-due account, the statute sets the order it is applied in: first to interest, then to any late fee, then to collection costs, and then to the assessment itself. That is why paying only the base amount on a late account can leave a small balance.

When a unit or home is sold or refinanced, the title company asks the association for an estoppel certificate. It is a statement of what is owed on that property as of a date, so the closing can settle the account accurately.

The association issues the certificate within 10 business days of a written or electronic request. The statute sets the fee for preparing it, with a higher amount for an expedited request or a delinquent account, and those amounts are adjusted for inflation every five years. The calculator below carries the current figures.

In practice your title company or closing agent requests this for you. It helps to let the manager know a sale is coming so nothing holds up the closing date.