Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Illinois
a year and a half ago we purchased a condo. It was disclosed that a special assessment was in the associations future, however, the sellers agreed to pay the special assessment. At the time the sellers told us it was "a few thousand dollars". They put $5000 in escrow and, as per our purchase contract as written by their attorney and agreed to by ourselves at the recommendation of our attorney, if the assessment was less than $5,000 they would be refunded the difference. It also stated if it should be more than $5,000 they would pay the overage. It turns out the special assessment was $12,000. The $5,000 were released from escrow but they refused to pay the remaining $7,000. They say that it was never supposed to be that much and some additional work had to have been added after they sold us the condo. A cost of the project and resident responsibility was not released until September of this year, therefore they could not have known how much their share would have been. I checked with the management company and obtained the original evaluation done for work needed which was done prior to our purchase. It indicated areas of the building in which necessary work was to be done. That work was done, maybe even less but no more work than was originally planned. Would this be worth pursuing further legal action?
1 Answer from Attorneys
It's your $7000, so is it worth pursuing? Can't say for sure. Any attorney would have to review the contract and related paperwork, first to find out if you're right about the obligation to pay, and potentially more importantly to make sure it was drafted in a way that "survived" closing (normally unfulilled contract obligations don't unless specifically drafted that way or clearly intended to remain in effect after closing). Assuming you had an attorney represent you on the purchase, he or she should be the first person to go back to, since that attorney most likely had a hand in helping to draft the wording. If you had no attorney, or the attorney is not available, feel free to email me.
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