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Community of owners: What to do if someone refuses to pay their community fees in Spain
What should the board of members do when faced with late payments in communities of owners?
In a community of owners in Spain, each member of the community or homeowner in the urbanisation or apartment block must pay a monthly stipend towards the running costs of the community as a whole.
These are known as ‘gastos de la comunidad’ or ‘community fees’ and must be paid on time every month.
However, as anyone who has ever tried to collect money from a group of people for any purpose will know, not everyone is always willing to pay on time. So how can you make people pay their community fees on time?
The legal experts in community administration in Spain, Resortalia, explains that Spanish law 10/2022, of June 14, on the urgent measures to promote building rehabilitation activity in the context of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, actually includes a battery of legal measures aimed at preventing and punishing the late payment of gastos de la comunidad in communities of owners.
One tool the community can use is the ability to fine anyone who does not pay, based on the percentage of interest of the amount they owe. They can also temporarily deprive anyone who doesn’t pay of the right of use and enjoy the community facilities and common areas.
That said, the law is hazy on what specifically a community of owners may or may not do. For example, the courts have, as a general rule, been declaring valid surcharges to the defaulting community member of up to 20% interest, but the law limits itself to declaring that “the board of owners may agree dissuasive measures against delinquency for the time in which it remains in said situation,” without specifying what majorities are required.
As in any co-habitation situation, disputes between members can often be drawn-out affairs that create animosity and awkwardness over the long term. For that reason, the responsibility for many such decisions over dispute resolution are delegated to the management company for the community of owners, which remains as a sort of neutral arbitrator in community affairs.
Resortalia community administrators are experienced experts who run the day-to-day minutiae of many multilingual communities on the Costa Blanca and Costa Cálida. Contact them for advice and help with your community’s needs, management and conflict resolution:
