The Condominium Process

The Condominium Process

The“Condominium” process here in WA state allows the owner of a property with a legal AADU or DADU to separate the property into units for individual ownership. It’s a cool mechanism that gives the property owner the flexibility to sell their AADU or DADU if so desired.

The name of the process is a little misleading because when you think of a condo, you think of a large building with ‘apartment’ style units that can be owned, not something that looks like a single-family home. But, when you think of it in the terms of how WA state defines a condominium, you can see why it does make sense: “A common interest community in which portions of the real estate are designated for separate ownership and the remainder of the real estate is designated for common ownership solely by the owners of those portions”.

You might ask, how is the condo process better or different than just subdividing a lot? Well, in order to subdivide a lot, the lot must be at least 5,000 sqft and the review & permitting process with the city is very involved (lots of time and money). Whereas with the condo process, once your permitted ADU has been built or approved with the city, the city is out of the equation and a surveyor and an attorney are brought it to complete the process.

Just like creating an ADU on your property provides flexibility, separating your property and selling the ‘units’ affords a different kind of flexibility.

We are now seeing may new construction projects fall under the condominium process – rather than subdividing a lot, builders are creating condo “units” on the property with areas of the property that are established as “shared” spaces.

If you’d like to know more about the condominium process or want to see if it would make sense for you, give me a call.