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Condo valuation after the milestone era

Since Florida's post-Surfside reforms took hold in 2022, the largest value variable in an older condominium is frequently not the unit. It is the building's paperwork.

What changed

Buildings 25 years and older (30 in some cases) must complete milestone structural inspections, and associations must fund reserves against a structural integrity reserve study rather than waiving them. The era of the artificially low condo fee — subsidised by never saving for the roof — ended on a statutory schedule.

The consequences arrive as special assessments and fee step-ups, and the market prices them the way it prices any liability: immediately, and with a penalty for uncertainty. Two same-sized units in neighbouring towers can now sit a long way apart because one building has passed its milestone with funded reserves and the other is waiting on an engineer's letter.

What that means for an appraisal

A condominium appraisal that stops at the unit — floor, view, finishes, recent sales in the building — is answering last decade's question. The current one adds: What did the milestone report find? What does the SIRS require, and is it funded? What assessments are levied or telegraphed? Are unit sales in this building pre- or post-assessment prices?

Comparable selection follows the same logic. A sale from a building on the other side of its assessment cycle is not comparable without an adjustment nobody can compute from the MLS — it takes the association documents from both buildings.

The record

4,453 condominium assignments sit in our file, from Singer Island's towers — the one market we cover where condominiums outnumber houses — to Hutchinson Island, Highland Beach and the Fort Lauderdale beachfront, including 150 completed since the 2022 reforms under the new documentary reality. We have valued unit-by-unit through entire buildings, which is where you learn what a line, a floor and an exposure are actually worth.

For estates and dissolutions the stakes compound: a retrospective condo valuation now has to establish what was known about the building on the effective date — an assessment announced after a date of death belongs to a different question than one announced before it.

Estate appraisals · Singer Island · What we check before any condo assignment

Matt Thoren, State-Certified Residential Appraiser · 561-853-2129 · Residential only.