Elysa D. Bergenfeld

Association’s Receivership and Lease Still Valid After Sheriff’s Sale

In late 2012, our client, Vail Section Condominium, successfully moved to have an empty and abandoned unit placed into receivership. The condominium’s receiver, after having the abandoned unit repaired, made and executed a lease with a tenant. This tenancy (and the condominium’s enjoyment of rental receipts) continued on through 2015. During the course of this tenancy, the particular condominium unit’s lender completed its foreclosure. That lender ultimately purchased the unit at sheriff’s sale, in the fall of 2015. The tenant eventually became delinquent in the payment of rent resulting in the receiver’s eviction complaint. The court – even though the lender’s foreclosure was over, the lender had purchased the unit at sheriff’s sale and even after the sheriff’s deed associated with that sale was recorded by the lender – validated the receivership and the receivership’s lease. To that end, and months and months after the lender’s sheriff’s sale, the court found in favor of the receiver, entered a judgment for possession and ordered that the tenant be evicted. This decision – and condominium/receivership victory – reminds us that those timid and skeptical professionals and owners, who are frightened of the reach and power of lenders, are wrong to consistently shy away from asserting the rights and needs of condominiums and HOAs that continue to suffer from the scourge of abandoned and empty homes.

For more information on AGA’s legal services to cooperatives or condominium and homeowners’ associations, contact Elysa D. Bergenfeld, Esq. at edb@62q.f7d.myftpupload.com or by phone at 609-751-5551.

The above is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Transmission of the materials and information contained herein is not intended to create, and receipt thereof does not constitute formation of, an attorney-client relationship.