This post is one of a series about 10 Most Common Misperceptions About Condominium Laws And Operations, which I presented at the Maine Condo Forum and Expo in Portland, Maine, on September 25, 2010.
My survey indicates that condominium associations get burned frequently by contractors hired to do repair or maintenance work because of badly written agreements with the people they hire to do work. Much of the blame goes to the associations themselves for failing to properly investigate their needs, evaluate the reputation of the bidders, and especially enter into a contract which assures completion of what they want done, when they want it done, to the standards they specify, and with adequate financial and other guarantees that the work will be done properly. Contracts provided by the contractor are almost always inadequate in this respect.
The general contracting business is in some respects still the wild west. While there are minimum standards for some types of work, such as plumbing and electrical work, anyone can hang out more info
their shingle and call themselves a contractor.
When asked to bid a contract, many contractors will provide an incomplete description of the materials they will use and the work they will do, making it difficult to evaluate one bid against another.
As one Maine property manager put it:
“There isn’t an association in Maine that knows how to adequately prepare an RFP so that bids are apples to apples. That is why there are so many construction problems. Associations do not always check the insurance of the contractors prior to starting the project.”
Court remedies are almost always impractical because of the cost involved, which is why most contracts have an arbitration clause, which reduces, but does not eliminate costs.
Recommendation: For construction or repair contracts of significant size, get the help of professionals that can help you prepare proper specs and requests for proposals, evaluate the reputations of the bidders, and prepare a contract which protects the association. Have an independent person oversee or check the work for larger projects.