When a person buys a condo do they pay their home ownership fees monthly or yearly?

Question

I've been thinking about buying a condo and looking on realtor.com and when a realtor advertises the HOA fees but doesn't tell whether it's a monthly or yearly rate which is it?

Answer 1

You will need to verify the information.

The fess can be billed monthly, quarterly, half-yearly or annually. Hence there is no way to know in advance without asking about the specific HOA details. If the listing is correctly entered into the local RMLS you would expect the interval to be noted. The forms for where I am selling a condo provide room to specify (the data input forms for the RMLS in the area).

In this case you will likely have to contact the owner, the Realtor or the HOA. Do assume that some of the time people get confused so a letter from the HOA is better than just what an agent or seller says. In my case I did not even know as my wife pays the bills so I could have easily said the wrong thing until the records were checked.

Note that you can make an assumption when screening properties. If all the others are monthly or the figure looks to be 12 times the average then maybe it is a yearly number. If you are only screening out properties not worth looking at then you can quickly build a list and then verify the HOA as one of the first question you ask.

Answer 2

With condos, the HOA fees are usually monthly. Because condos pay a lot of bills and provide maintenance for you, they must have a regular stream of income.

Answer 3

Typically it's monthly.