From News10.net:
Early Buyers Feel Condo Conversion Sting
Owners who bought “luxury” condo conversions at the peak of the market now complain their complexes still feel like apartments.
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Signs and banners in front of the complex advertise “luxury” condominiums for sale from $190,000. But ads in housing rental publications offer the same units as apartments from $925 per month.Property records show just 13 of the 280 units at Somerfield have been sold since sales began last December.
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retired painter from Southern California was the eighth owner to buy at Somerfield and told News10 the sales staff was upfront about the difficult housing market.“They explained they’re trying very hard to sell but they still need revenue, so they’re still renting them out,” said Bill Bearss.
But owners at another former apartment complex converted by the same developer are not so understanding.
“They were hoping to have this place fill up within about four months,” said Jim Colvin, who was among the first to buy at Rollingwood in Fair Oaks in October 2005.
Property records show sales started strong at Rollingwood with 76 units sold in October, November and December of 2005.
But sales dropped off in 2006, with just 45 condominiums sold the entire year. The last condo sold was in January, the only sale at Rollingwood in 2007.
Apparently anticipating strong sales, Pismo Beach developer Al Nevis moved tenants out of the former apartment complex during the conversion.
Now more than half of the 272 units are vacant and Nevis’ company, Rollingwood North LLC, has stopped paying dues to the homeowners association.
The homeowners association has begun foreclosure proceedings to try to collect the more than $600,000 in unpaid dues and penalties.