We have been getting a tremendous response from all of you thanks to this website. We have helped many Florida Condo Owners and Homeowners with water damage cases, mold contamination, pet restrictions, selective enforcement, illegal budgets and harassment by overzealous board members. For those of you new to the site we offer a Free Case Evaluation to anybody that has a problem with their Condo Association or Homeowners Association. Unfortunately, while many of you contact us because you are in need of an experienced Condo Attorney that specializes in representing condo owners and homeowners, we get a lot of calls from people who simply want to get some free legal advice. As much as we would like to help you there are several reasons why we can’t give you legal advice based upon just a phone call. First of all, this is a business and we have to charge for our services but, more importantly, it is impossible for us to give legal advice without reading all the relevant materials which includes the Governing Documents of your Association.
So what is a Free Case Evaluation then you ask? Based upon the facts and issues you relay to us during our initial phone conversation we evaluate your case and tell you whether our legal expertise will help you to resolve your matter. If we believe we can help you the next step is for you to retain us. We require you to deposit a Retainer into our Trust Account before we can start reviewing documents. The amount of the retainer varies and depends on how much work we will be required to do as we bill by the hour for our time. Once the retainer is received we go through all of the relevant documents and applicable laws and discuss with you the best course of action for us to proceed. If we are able to resolve your case under the retainer you are refunded the un-billed balance. If the case requires more work you will receive an itemized statement showing what we did and how much time we spent on your case. You may then be asked to replenish the retainer so we have adequate funds in trust to continue the case. In most cases if we are successful we can recover the attorneys fees and costs that you paid in addition to your damages so you are made whole. Remember, the Retainer is not the fee and you will only be charged for the time spent on your case. Some things you will need to consider are the costs or expenses involved. Litigation requires us to pay a filing to a fee to the clerk of courts which is approximately $400. In addition we may need to hire Experts to help us prove our case. Experts usually need to be paid for their time as well. All these costs are recoverable if we prevail and will usually be discussed with you in advance.
Whether you have a case that requires litigation or you need us to send a strongly worded legal letter to your Association we encourage all of you to fill out our Free Case Evaluation Form or to contact us to discuss your case. In many cases the fact that you have retained an experienced Trial Attorney (over 20 years in practice) can be enough to convince your Association to concede to your demands.