Condo owners must cover fees for deadbeats

Island Escape is a nice little condo complex with what has become a big problem throughout Florida: an owner who isn't paying his condo fees. The occupant of Unit 110 is nearly $7,500 in arrears, forcing the other nine owners — some of them on fixed incomes — to pay his share of maintenance costs as well as their own. Adding to their pique is the fact that the tardy owner also hasn't paid his mortgage in two years, meaning he has been enjoying the waterfront life for free. "Here's a classic case of somebody using and abusing the system,'' says Wesley "Skip'' Shepherd, president of the condo association. "We're paying the insurance, the water, the sewer, the taxes on his place and the guy's living there for nothing." As the economy staggers along, more associations face that problem.

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