 Good afternoon and welcome to another episode of condo insider on think tech Hawaii. My name is Jane Sugimura, and I'm your host today. And we're going to be talking about, you know, I've had, this is my second show about resources for condominium owners and people who work and serve condominiums, working condominiums to serve, serve them. Anyway, there's an agency government agency in Hawaii, called the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs. And there's a division in that the department called the real estate branch. And by statute, and I'm talking about the HR Hawaii revised statute by 14b, which is the condominium Hawaii condominium statute that creates condominiums and basically regulates them. The real estate branch of the DCCA is the regulatory agency that does that has oversight over condominiums in the state of Hawaii. So those of you who aren't familiar with the DCCA real estate branch, you need to you know, become familiar with them, mainly because they do have oversight. And if you have a question, you can call them, and, and they have people called condominium specialists, and, and they will, you know, answer the phone and, and, and answer questions that you may have about condominium issues, and, and they have a website. And we should be, it should be scrolling. There it is, www.hawaii.gov slash high rec. That's Hawaii real estate commission, and that's their website. And if you go to that website, and you'll you'll see me and they regulate everything having to do with real estate in Hawaii. So you have to look for condominiums. And they have, they have like a menu on the right hand side of the website, and just look for condominiums. And, and it's a terrific resource for people who have issues, questions about condominium, because this is this is the agency that basically has oversight over condominium so that if you call in and talk to somebody there. I mean they have to make a report to the legislature every year so if there's an issue. Like, I know one issue that they get a lot of comments on is they get comments from owners complaining about their boards of directors, saying that the boards, you know, are mean. They, you know, or they're not fair. And, you know, somehow, you know, the legislature should pass laws that will allow the boards to change. Unfortunately, the legislature will not do things like that, because the statute, the law has embedded in it. There's a policy about self governance. Self governance means that if you live in a condominium, and you're unhappy with your board. Guess what, you have to ban you have to talk to your neighbors, and the other owners in the association. And you have to remove those directors that you don't like. And that's what self governance is all about it means that you don't like your government, and you have to auto elect them, just like you do, you know, with the governor and your state representatives and the people you send to Congress. If you don't like them, then you got to vote, you got to vote them out of office and put somebody in that is going to help you. And that's the same thing with condominiums. And so, you know, you, you, you, you should be, you know, become very familiar with the real estate commission. But you know, if you go into the website, and, and they have all these different topics that that you know you may have you may want to do on me. Let's say you have a complaint. And so the question be where do I go. If I want to, if I have a complaint about my board of directors. What happens if my board is not enforcing the rules. Fairly, then, or they're picking on me or they're harassing me what do I do. And then so, and, or you know if you. Oh, I want to put a I want to put improvements in my unit. How do I know what to do I mean what improvements do I have to get board approval for, and those kinds of questions you can call. I mean, the service is free. They're not going to charge you. And if you do have a complaint, they will tell you, there is a government agency that's related to that's in the same department, I guess, as the DCCA real estate branch, and it's called government. It's the regulatory agency complaint office. And so, so any industry like condominiums that are regulated by the state of Hawaii can you can file a complaint against them by going to this state agency. And the complaint forms, and the procedures are online, and it's free. And the complaint form is something that you can download and file with the state of Hawaii, and they will investigate and get back to you. But you know, one of the things about the real estate branch is they have all of these. You know, maybe I guess you would call them essays. I mean, if you want to know about budget and reserves. You can go and click on that and find out all the everything about budget and reserves. If you want if you have a dispute. You might have a dispute with your board. It's like, Well, what do I do. What can I do. Are there any remedies available to me. And under the statute, you can either do mediation or arbitration, and some mediation is subsidized by the state of Hawaii. And so you can find out which types of mediation and arbitration are subsidized, you go on the website and find out exactly, you know how that's implemented. And you might figure out you might say, Well, geez, you know, where's this money coming from that they can subsidize dispute resolution. I mean, you, you want to do a meat, you want to do a mediation. And the mediators in town, some of them are, you know, retired judges, I mean, and the mediators get paid. And they're hourly rate is something around $400. And so the some types of mediation are subsidized by the state of Hawaii, you can go to the real estate branch and go into their website and find get that information. And in fact, it tells you how to do the mediation, who you call, and how much is going to be subsidized. I think it's eight hours, eight hours worth of mediation services. And if, if the mediator feels that, you know, that they can resolve it, they can ask the state for more time. And the state will subsidize it. And you're thinking to yourself, Well, geez, that's a lot of money, where are they getting it from. It's coming from you. If you live in a condominium, you, your condominium has to pay to this to the state of Hawaii, the CCA, every two years, it's a biennial charge. And it started off about 30 years ago, it started off a dollar and a quarter per unit every two years. As of last year, it's almost $10. So if you have a 300 unit building, the building actually gets a bill from the state of Hawaii for $3,000, because it's $10 per unit, 300 units, $3,000, and they actually get a bill. And the association has to write a check, and that goes to the DCCA, and it goes to pay for, you know, the services that are offered. Because the policy, the legislators determined a long time ago that the, that one of the things that they want to see subsidize is dispute resolution, because when people have disputes, and you live in a condominium, and those of you who live in a condominium will know this, you have a fight with your neighbor. You don't want to go to court. I mean, court, you know, even if you do a small claims court and you don't get an attorney, it's still time out of your life, and it's stressful. And you got to go before a judge. And so, you know, the mediation is usually, you know, before a professional mediator and most of them, and many of them are retired judges. And, but, you know, it's not free. It's not free. And, and now with COVID, I mean they're doing the mediation by zoo. You know, so that means you can sit in your home and participate by computer, or, you know, by telephone, but you know, the, the legislators determined that one of the things that should be subsidized is dispute resolution. That's why the mediations are paid for they don't want you to go to court. They don't want you to take your disputes to the courtroom. Rather having the, you know, have it resolved by a mediator, and the state will subsidize another thing that another service that these fees that you are charged pay for is education. And that's, you know, one of the, one of the benefits that you as a consumer are, you know, can get when you go onto the website because, like I said, there are all of these reports is essays that tell you on, you know, how, you know, if you want to do repairs. How do you go about doing that. Which ones do you have to get your board to approve. And, you know, what's the process. And, you know, how, you know, how do I remove it if I don't like my board. How do I get rid of it. How do I remove my board of directors, or, you know, if I want to sit out if I want to run for the board how do I run for the board. All of these, they have little essays that tell you how to. And what we're going to be talking and and and like I said they have this dispute resolution, they have sections regarding mediation arbitration, and how you can take advantage of those programs. But right now, the DCCA real estate branch has come out with these new, this new program, and it's called Hawaii condo living guide of video series. And what what they've done is they've made these videos, there's 15 of them to start with. And they're three to five minutes. And let me just tell you what they, what the topics are, and they're professionally produced videos, and they cover a number of common condominium issues. And the first one would be purchasing a condominium new condominium owner. Owners rights and responsibilities. Order directors. Common governance issues. A dispute resolution. Governing documents what's a governing documents. Meetings association me what's the difference between an association meeting and a board of directors meeting. And how can you participate. Association records. In other words, if you're an owner, you're entitled to get records. And if you want border if you want minutes, or the declaration or the bylaws, a lot of associations. They belong, they're managed by professional property management companies, and a lot of these companies create websites for associations and on the website will be posted your governing documents, your declaration, your bylaws, your house rules. And if you have standards for altering your, if you have building standards or carpet standards in other words, you know, there, there are rules about, you know, let's say carpet, you know, you know what quality did doesn't have to be. Maybe there are certain times that you can have your installer come in and, and so it's the access to the building. But anyway, all of those, all of those rules would be included there. And, and the issue of association records is, it will tell you which records you can get, which records you can get for free, which records you can get to, you know, if you want copies of them. You know, what's it going to cost you per page, and some some records, you are allowed to review them, you can go down to your site manager's office or your resident manager's office like board minutes. And with board minutes, a lot of them are putting them on the website. And also, so if you have a website it might be there. But you know these records are owners records that you are entitled to see. And, and the law says that you can see them. You do need to pay a reasonable charge if you want your own copies of them. You have to pay the copying charges. You want to pay the copying charges, you can go down to the property manager's office and, and read them there and order copies if you decide you want them later. Another video is on budget and reserves funding and that's very complicated. It tells you, you know, this tells you how associations determine, you know what your maintenance fees are going to be on an annual basis. You know that your maintenance fee calculation determination is based on what you spent last year, and how much is it, you know how much are those costs going to increase. Maybe we all know with the border water supply they said for the next 20 years. This was about five or six years ago. They said for the next 20 years, it's going to go up 10% per annum, because we got to replace all the pipes in a while. Okay, so you know that. But anyway, you know, every budget season, and those who sit on the board know this, the property managers will give you a spreadsheet, and they'll say okay, your employment costs are going up this much. And your insurance is going up 12%, because we had the condor collapse in Florida, and we have all the wildfires, you know, burning in California. And so you know the insurance companies, you have to pay out a lot of money. And therefore, that affects us in Hawaii, because we are somehow in the same risk pool as I mean the people in Florida, and the people who are involved with wildfires in California. And all the other things that are happening, that insurance companies have to pay for. And so if you see things that happen, like the condor collapse, and you know that that's going to cost some insurance company a pretty penny. And it's going to come and affect us because we're in the same insurance pool through the reinsurance. And therefore our insurance is going to go up because of that incident. Let me see another video is on maintenance fee and special assessments. And I'm pretty sure that this video will tell you how the boards have to deal with certain factors to figure out what your maintenance fees. What you're seeing on the screen right now is the second page of a flyer regarding this program. And there are two links on this page. This is where you would go to see these videos. And what I suggest you do is maybe just, you know, go into your browser and type in real estate branch. And then once you get to the real estate branch go to the condo living guide. That's what these new three, three to five minute videos are. And but the first link is HTTPS, Poland backslash backslash CCA dot Hawaii dot gov slash r e b slash Hawaii, Poland condo hyphen living guide backslash. If you if you go to the website, the website will have the links. That's the real estate branch of the DCCA go to their website, or you go to YouTube. And you and what you're looking for is the condo living guide. And oh, there's four more, four more videos. There's one on insurance. You know, there's a master for those of you, you know, who live in condos, you know that the association has a master policy. Okay. And, and, and because the buildings are getting older. The deductibles have gone up. So that's why a lot of buildings require all unit owners to have their own homeowners policy, which is an 806 policy. And this insurance video will will will probably focus on the master policy. This is the one that covers the building that is paid for by your maintenance fees. And the next video would be on leaks and water damage. And with building owners, I mean with older buildings, when you have your pipes, you know, and we all know now we all we all unfortunately know that, you know, plumbing does not and we used to think that plumbing would last us 75 years. And now we know that that's not true. So associations have to budget to replace their piping, which is a huge amount. That's why, you know, we have to include it now in our budgets, so that we can sock away money every year for a 20 year period. So that we buy it by the end of the 20 year period, we will have enough money without doing a special assessment. And that's the whole, that's the whole purpose behind budget doing the budget, and setting up reserves is that you have to, and you have you hire somebody. And I guess, I don't know what the technical term is we all call them reserve specialists. And what they do is, you know, they, they, they come to your building, and they look at your building and they look at all your components. And they look at that in the look at your budget what what is it that you do on a regular basis, you have to paint the building. Okay, so before you paint the building, you have to do all your spa repairs. You know, because you can't paint the building the building is cracking you got to fix the cracks first, then you do your building, and then things like, you have to replace the carpeting in the building, you have to paint the interior. You have to replace your pool furniture, you have to replace your heat pumps. And so, and every building is different. So you have, you know, the reserve specialist has a list, and it will, they will go around and check off their list, every component in your building, and how often you have to do it. And, and then. So, they will determine a useful life for each, each item. And so let's say you're carpeting last 10 years. So they will. And so there's a way that, you know, they, they can calculate how much money you have to sock away today. And you will have enough money, 10 years from now to replace that carpet, without doing a special assessment. And that's the whole thing with the budget and reserves, they do that with every component. And so it's a long report because, you know, you have to, you know, fix your pipes you have, you have your, your, your garage. The garage has got to be painted it's there's got to be small repairs. There's got to be plumbing repairs there's got to be electrical repairs, and you might have some automatic gates, let you into the garage and those components all have to be, you know, put into the report. And inside your building you have to. You have the trash shoot. You know that goes through the entire building. And that has to be maintained, and it has to be repaired. And, you know, you might have certain plumbing fixtures now we have to put in pipes replacement of pipes to, to, to be included in that renovation of your elevators, upgrading your fire alarm systems, all of this stuff is is put into this report. And, and a useful life and is determined for each component. And then they calculate how much money you have to sock away today to have that money, by the time you have to replace it. And theoretically, if you do it correctly, that means you never have to do a special assessment. Right, because that means that you're sucking away money every month. And that means that when something has to be done. You have money in your reserves in your reserve account to pay for those reserves, I mean to pay for that repair, or that replacement. And the reason why this is important is many, many years ago, I'd say back in the early 90s. The legislators were getting complaints. Somebody would buy into a condo. And they would get a special assessment for $10,000 for a new roof. And it's like, wait a minute, I just moved in I just bought this unit. How come I got to pay $10,000 what happened to the people who were here, 20 years ago, how come they didn't suck away money every month that I did? I hear I am a brand new owner. And you're special assessing me $10,000 for brand new roof. That's not fair. And so that's what the whole theory behind budget and reserves is, is that all the owners from, you know, you know, you're paying for what is called deferred maintenance maintenance that may not happen for a couple of years down the road and you might not even be living there if you sell your unit. But, you know, it's only fair that, you know, since you live there, that you contribute something to this reserve account, so that when the repair has to be done, that the current, the owners at that time don't have to pay a special assessment to make sure. And usually the, you know, the amount is not small, usually a big amount. And so, you know, it's not fair for them to have to, you know, pay that cost all together. And oh, there's two more, there's two more agents, agents of the association. And this one is about people who service the association. So that would be your site managers, your property managers, and exactly what their roles are. And the last one on here is condominium resources. And condominium resources is something that is really, we're finding out it's really important because you as a condominium owner, if you have an issue, it's, what we're hearing is, you don't know where to go, you don't know where to go to find a solution. And so I'm suggesting that this website is one of your resources and you should go there first. It's free, you can get to it from any device. And like I said, it's a, you know, a very convenient website because it has all of these informational essays that talk to you or that teach you about condominium living and different components that affect your life as a condominium owner. And now you've got these educational videos under the condominium living guide video series. So you can also get access to these videos and they're three to five minutes. And you know who doesn't have time to view a three to five minute video. And so, you know, I encourage you to take advantage of this website. It is a resource, it's free. That's the best thing about it, it's free, and it's available from any device. And so, and we'll have more programs on other resources, but the state of Hawaii website and educational videos is a terrific resource, and it's something that you're paying for. Like I said, you know, you as a condominium owner are special, you know, you get assessed every two years, you may, and it's paid through your maintenance fees. I mean, they don't, you never see the bill. But take my word for it, I know, because I'm an association president I've signed the checks to the state of Hawaii for the invoice that gets sent to my building. So you are paying for it. You should take advantage of it. And if you, you know, there's something there that that just doesn't seem to address what your concern is, Paul, the DCCA real estate branch, and they will have a condominium specialist that you can talk to. And then he or she will direct you to, you know, some place where you know you can find your answer. And so I hope I've given you some information, some good information that's useful. And, you know, I think we're going to be doing maybe two or three more shows about condominium resources, so that you know you will have a place to go to. If you have a question or concern, so that you can get the information that you need to deal with those concerns. And I appreciate you, you know, watching our show. And please tune in next week. And it will be Raylene Tenno, who will be doing the show and I think I think I'm going to be her guest I'm pretty sure I'm going to be her guest, because we're going to be talking about the fire safety fire safety ordinance. I remember Fuku Naga is arranging for a panel discussion between a bunch of condo people. And there's there's a bunch that we've been talking to over the last couple of weeks. And we're going to be meeting with the fire department and trying to see if, you know, they can address the concerns from condominium owners who have completed their life safety evaluations, and just found out how expensive it's going to be for them to comply with this ordinance, and they have a lot of concerns. And so we'll be talking to the fire department and Raylene show next week. We'll probably be talking about what happened at that meeting so please tune in. And thank you very much for joining us for this episode of condo insider. Mahalo, and goodbye. Thank you.