‘Uncategorized’

Creditors’ Rights & Commercial Litigation
Jay Nussbaum
Berlandi Nussbaum & Reitzas LLP

Legislatures nationwide have been seeking ways to make it harder for community associations to foreclose on members who owe money to the association. Because of a few high-profile cases, the political climate is such that many of these state legislatures may succeed. But your association still needs to collect assessments, fines, and late fees in order to operate. So what can you do to collect without having to resort to the drastic measure of foreclosure? One thing you can do if

Creditors’ Rights & Commercial Litigation
How to Avoid Violating Fair Debt Collection Practices Act When Trying to Collect Member Debts
Jay Nussbaum
Berlandi Nussbaum & Reitzas LLP

When a member doesn’t pay her monthly assessment or other money she owes the association, it’s often up to the manager to try to collect what’s owed. But a manager can inadvertently run into trouble when trying to collect a member debt. A federal law- the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (the Act)-govems what a manager may legally do. And it’s easy to violate the Act

Employment & Labor Law
Follow Federal Guidelines When Asking Job Applicants About Drug and Alcohol Use
INSIDER’S COMPLETE GUIDE TO MANAGING COMMUNITY ASSOCIATIONS
Jay Nussbaum
Berlandi Nussbaum & Reitzas LLP

What can you ask a job applicant about drug and alcohol use without facing a discrimination lawsuit? You must be very careful if you have 15 or more employees. (The law doesn’t apply to companies with fewer than 15 employees.) While you want a workplace free of drug- and alcohol-related problems, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) bars companies with 15 or more employees from

Commercial Real Estate, Mortgage Financing, Law
Jay Nussbaum
Berlandi Nussbaum & Reitzas LLP

Anecdotally at least, there seem to be a lot of commercial real estate investors, developers, etc., who finally like where prices are, like the way returns are penciling out, and are eager to move forward, but haven’t ripped off their warm-ups and gotten into the game because they don’t know where to access mortgage financing.

I’m thinking about this today because I just represented a very aggressive lender on a nice $5.5M loan secured by a 600-unit apartment building in the

Commercial Real Estate, Mortgage Financing, Law
Jay Nussbaum
Berlandi Nussbaum & Reitzas LLP

Mortgage Lender Error

When boxing promoter Don King used to crow, “Only in America,” it was a hopeful, if self-serving, proclamation that anything is possible in America for those dedicated to improving their stations in life. Unfortunately, in today’s America, in the wake of the historic mortgage industry implosion of 2008 that served to tear the mask off the banking industry only to reveal a well-capitalized Barney Fife running things, that same statement serves as a grim warning that can, and