Are management fees still owed after you sell your apartment

12 Aug 2011

In our lawyer practice in Varna and Black Sea region we face various types of property management contracts. Some of them are drafted professionally by other lawyers and others are done pretty bad by the property developers themselves. Generally there are two types of property management contracts:

  1. Property management contract for the common areas of the condominium and
  2. Property management contract for the individual apartment or other commercial premises in the building

The first type of contract (#1 above) has to be signed by the Management Committee or the Manager of the condominium. The Condominium Management Act stipulates that contracts for management of the common parts of the building are signed by the representative of the condominium BUT ONLY after the contracting party is approved by the General Meeting of the condominium. In case of such contract all owners of apartments and other individual premises in the building are obliged to mind the General Meeting’s resolution. Also in this case “the management contract follows the ownership of the apartment” i.e. if you sell your property the new owner will be obliged to pay any outstanding management fees.

In the second type of contract (#2 above), the legal theory is diverse. The prevailing lawyer’s opinion is that property management of individual apartment is contracted by the owner as individual and therefore any outstanding payments for the management company should be paid by the person who was owner at the moment of signing the contract. This type of management agreement is not considered as part of the ownership, but rather than a separate service rendered to the person.