The condominium administrator: election, duties and removal

No. 1 of article 1435 is the whole sentence on where the office comes from: the administrator is elected and removed by the assembly. There is no election by agreement among a few owners and none by the builder — and it is the same assembly that can undo what it did.

No. 4 answers three questions at once: the office of administrator may be remunerated and may be held either by one of the owners or by a third party; the term of office is, unless otherwise provided, one year, renewable. One year is the default term — the constitutive title, the regulation or the decision itself may fix another.

And no. 5 avoids the gap between terms: the administrator remains in office until a successor is elected or appointed.

The election is an agenda item like any other: it has to appear in the notice (article 1432, no. 4) and the result of the vote in the minutes (article 1, no. 2, of Decree-Law 268/94).

The law does not allow a condominium without an administrator, and provides two ways out. The first is judicial: if the assembly does not elect one, the administrator is appointed by the court at the request of any of the owners (article 1435, no. 2).

The second is automatic, and it settles most cases. Article 1435-A designates as interim administrator, with no vote at all, the owner whose fraction or fractions represent the largest percentage of the capital invested — unless another owner has expressed a wish to hold the office and communicated that intention to the other owners. The interim administrator ceases as soon as an administrator is elected or appointed by the court, and must hand over all the condominium documents in their keeping (no. 3).

Article 10-A of Decree-Law 268/94 adds a case: where the assembly does not decide what is needed to meet the legal obligations on the regulation, compulsory insurance or the reserve fund, and there is no administrator, any owner may see to those obligations as interim administrator.

No. 1 of article 1436 lists the duties besides any others the assembly may assign — the list is a floor, not a ceiling. Law 8/2022 added four paragraphs to it and rewrote others, and it is that version that applies today.

The old core stands: calling the assembly, drawing up the annual budget, checking the fire insurance and proposing the sum insured, collecting the revenue and making the common expenditure, checking the common reserve fund, demanding each owner's share of the approved expenses — including statutory interest and pecuniary penalties —, carrying out acts of preservation of the common property, rendering accounts and keeping the condominium's documents.

The more recent paragraphs are the ones that make the most work: informing the owners whenever the condominium is served or notified in judicial, arbitral, payment-order, administrative-offence or administrative proceedings; informing them at least every six months on how those proceedings are developing; issuing the owner's debt statement; and stepping in wherever urgency requires it, immediately calling an extraordinary meeting to ratify what was done.

Information about proceedings may be given «in writing or by email» — here email is admitted without the conditions article 1432 imposes on the notice of a meeting.

Some of the article's paragraphs come with a date attached, and they are usually the ones behind a complaint.

Decisions of the assembly that have not been challenged are carried out within a maximum of 15 working days, or within the period the assembly fixes, except where performance is impossible on duly substantiated grounds (paragraph i)). Those are working days, and not calendar days like the 10-day period that paragraph q) gives for issuing the owner's debt statement.

Information on pending proceedings is due «at least every six months», in writing or by email, with an exception for proceedings subject to judicial secrecy (paragraph p)). And before any decision on extraordinary conservation works or works that constitute an innovation, the administrator must present at least three quotes from different sources, unless the regulation or the assembly provides otherwise (no. 2).

«The office of administrator may be remunerated», says no. 4 of article 1435. May be, not must be: the statute allows payment and fixes no amount, no criterion and no frequency. The assembly fixes them, and what it fixes has to be recorded in the minutes. The same rule draws no distinction, as to remuneration, between an owner and a third party holding the office.

On the other side stands the rendering of accounts, imposed as a duty by paragraph l) of article 1436, no. 1. Article 1431, no. 1, sets the moment: the assembly meets in the first fortnight of January, called by the administrator, to discuss and approve the accounts for the last year and approve the budget for the expenses to be made during the year. No. 4, added by Law 8/2022, exceptionally allows it to be held in the first quarter, if the regulation provides for it or if the assembly so decides by majority.

The law fixes no management fee, neither a minimum nor a maximum. Any table going around as «the legal rate» has no rule behind it.

There are two routes, and their requirements differ. The first is the assembly: no. 1 of article 1435 gives it removal on the same terms as election, and requires no grounds at all — it is a decision, with the item on the agenda and the result in the minutes.

The second is the court, and it requires a proven fact: the administrator may be removed by the court, at the request of any owner, where it is shown that they committed irregularities or acted negligently in the exercise of their duties (no. 3). The application comes from a single owner — no majority is needed.

Before either route there is a lighter remedy, in article 1438: an appeal against the acts of the administrator lies to the assembly, which in that case may be called by the appellant. And no. 3 of article 1436 closes the picture: whoever does not perform the duties conferred on them is civilly liable for the omission, without prejudice to any criminal liability, where applicable.

The wording Law 8/2022 gave article 1437 is short and changed a great deal: the condominium is always represented in court by its administrator, and must sue and be sued in the administrator's name. No. 2 adds that the administrator acts in court in the exercise of the duties that fall to them, as representative of the body of owners as a whole or when expressly mandated by the assembly. And no. 3 dispenses with the assembly's authorisation for criminal complaints relating to the common parts.

Outside the Civil Code, Decree-Law 268/94 imposes practical duties: posting at the building's entrance the identification of whoever administers it (article 3, no. 1); keeping the documents on which the constitution of horizontal property was based and making known the notifications addressed to the condominium (article 2); keeping the minutes and letting the owners and third parties holding rights over the fractions consult them (article 1, no. 5); and providing those third parties with a copy of the regulation (article 9).

The amendment to article 1437 was the only part of Law 8/2022 to come into force the day after publication — the rest of the diploma only took effect 90 days later.