Resident concerned about trees behind unit
Q: The association board of my building wants to take down basic pine trees behind my unit. The trees are healthy and provide no danger to the building. These trees provide privacy, shade and comfort to my unit. It is one of the main reasons I purchased the unit. Do I have any recourse?
A: We can understand your frustration. Have you talked to the board to find out why they are taking down the trees? Are the trees infected with something you can’t see? Are they harboring pests of some sort? Is the board planning on replacing the pine trees with other trees, or is their plan to leave the area clear of all trees?
In any event, most association boards have wide latitude in governing their associations. Boards can decide how to decorate hallways, choose landscaping for common areas and can even decide to make improvements to common areas. An association board has broad authority to handle the affairs of the association. Unfortunately, association boards will not make the best decisions at all times and, in some cases, may make poor decisions.
In your case, the association likely has the right to take down the pine trees behind the unit, and they can decide whether to put something new up (or not) without consulting the owners. At this point, your best bet is to talk to other owners in the association and see if they would prefer to keep the trees. If the trees are still standing and enough owners would prefer to have the trees than have them cut down, the association board may change its mind.
However, if you talk to your neighbors about the tree issue and find that most of your neighbors either
don’t care or don’t like the trees, your only option then is to persuade the board (perhaps by rallying your neighbors) to replace the trees with others that will grow in and give you the privacy and shade that you like. It may never be the same for you with the pine trees gone, but if you can get replacement trees and landscaping put in, you might end up OK.
Finally, in terms of recourse, that’s a tricky question. With the information you’ve sent us, we can’t tell if anything was done inappropriately by the association that would give you any legal recourse. Given that, your best bet is to quickly figure out what the association is planning to do, and why, and then get your neigh
bors together so that the end product meets the needs and desires of most owners in the association.
Q: I live in Florida and have a living trust, which was amended in 2006. My daughter is my only heir and has now married. I have moved and purchased two homes that I now use as rentals. Can I just amend my trust to update it? Would the document be an “Amendment”?
A: The good news is you may not need to amend your living trust. But you will need to review it to see what it says.
Just about every living trust will have a statement in it as to what should be done with the property
owned by the trust. Not only that, the document almost always provides for a replacement trustee, should you die or become incapacitated.
We’ll assume that the ownership of your home in Florida was held in the living trust, that your daughter is the successor trustee to you and that she would receive the properties held in the trust at the time of your death.
Now that your daughter is married, the question for you is whether your daughter is (and will continue to be) the successor beneficiary to you and whether you want her to get everything in the trust when you die. If the answer to those questions is yes, then you may not need to amend your
trust.
If, on the other hand, you want to change the successor trustee or designate that your properties go to different people, we would encourage you to take a look at amending it. You should know, however, that many estate attorneys might prefer to amend and restate the trust in its entirety. This means that you would end up with a whole new trust document — at a greater cost.
It’s understandable that one whole new document will be clearer than a trust document that may have various amendments over time. Another advantage of a whole new document is that the old trust document and the new amendment won’t get separated. The worst thing that can happen is that you die and someone finds the trust document without the amendment and your real instructions are not followed.
When you amend and restate the trust, you can void all old copies so that people recognize that the amended and restated trust document is the one that should be followed. Having said all that, please talk to the attorney that helped you with the original trust document or the attorney you have selected for the changes to your trust.