One of the quieter selling points of a condo is that somebody else handles the roof. That is true, and it leads a lot of new owners to a conclusion that is not: that maintenance is now somebody else’s problem generally.
It is not. The list is shorter than a detached house, and it is genuinely different, but the items left on your side of the line are the ones most likely to cause expensive damage to other people’s property. That is the part worth getting right.
The general rule, and why you cannot rely on it
The common shorthand is “studs in”. The association maintains the structure, roof, exterior walls, and common areas. The owner maintains everything inward from the interior surface of the walls.
That is a decent starting model and a poor authority. The document that actually governs is your association’s CC&Rs, usually with a maintenance responsibility chart somewhere in the middle. Associations differ substantially on windows, balconies, patios, exterior doors and HVAC condensers, and those are exactly the items people argue about.
Townhouses vary even more. A townhouse can be a condominium legally, in which case studs-in roughly applies. It can also be fee-simple, in which case you own the land under it, the roof over it, and the walls around it, and the HOA fee is buying landscaping and a shared parking area rather than a roof. The building looks identical from the street either way.
Read the chart once. Write down which side each major system falls on. It takes twenty minutes and it settles a question you will otherwise re-litigate every time something breaks.
What is almost always yours
Regardless of how your documents are written, these tend to land with the owner.
HVAC serving only your unit. Filters monthly to quarterly, and an annual service. If there is a condenser on a balcony or roof pad assigned to you, its coils and clearance are usually yours too.
The water heater. If it is inside your unit, it is nearly always yours, including the temperature and pressure relief valve and, in many buildings, a required drain pan and sensor.
Plumbing beyond the shutoff. Supply lines to sinks, toilets and dishwashers. Angle stops. The braided hose behind the washing machine.
Appliances, including the dryer vent run within your unit.
Interior fixtures and finishes. Caulk and grout in wet areas, which matters far more here than in a detached house.
Smoke and CO detectors inside the unit.
The condo-specific risk nobody warns you about
In a detached house, a supply line failure damages your floor. In a stacked building, it damages the unit below, and possibly the two below that.
This changes the maintenance calculus. The cheap, boring, five-minute items become the high-value ones, because their failure mode is other people’s property and a deductible conversation with your association.
The short list of things worth being genuinely diligent about:
- Braided steel washing machine hoses, replaced roughly every five years. A burst hose delivers water at full main pressure for as long as it takes someone to notice.
- Dishwasher and refrigerator supply lines, checked annually.
- Water heater age. Know it. A tank that fails in a top-floor unit is a very bad day for the whole stack.
- Caulk and grout in showers, particularly on upper floors. Slow leaks through a failed shower pan are one of the most common inter-unit claims there is.
- Toilet supply lines and wax rings.
None of these cost much. All of them are on you, in every set of association documents I have ever read.
Insurance sits on the same line
Your association carries a master policy. It typically covers the building and common areas, and it typically does not cover your unit’s interior, your belongings, or your liability for damage originating in your unit.
That gap is what an HO-6 condo policy is for. Two things to check: whether the master policy is “bare walls” or “all-in”, which changes how much interior your own policy needs to cover, and what the association’s deductible is, because a large master deductible can be passed through to the owner responsible for a claim.
A realistic condo maintenance rhythm
Monthly. HVAC filter if the unit has its own air handler. Look under every sink for the ninety seconds it takes.
Quarterly. Test detectors. Run water in any unused fixtures so the traps do not dry out and let sewer gas in, which is a genuine and common issue in guest bathrooms.
Twice a year. Check caulk and grout in wet areas. Clear the dryer vent run.
Annually. HVAC service. Check the water heater and its relief valve. Inspect washing machine hoses and note their age.
Once, at purchase. Read the CC&Rs maintenance chart and record the age of everything mechanical in the unit.
That last one is the highest-leverage item on the list and the one most people skip. Recording each system once, with its age and who is responsible for it, means you never have to reconstruct it during a leak. Recurring reminders in Roots are free and uncapped, which is enough for a condo’s whole schedule.
The takeaway
Find the maintenance responsibility chart in your CC&Rs this week and read it once. Then set a five-year reminder to replace your washing machine hoses. Those two actions cover most of the difference between condo owners who never have an incident and condo owners who end up in a conversation with their downstairs neighbour’s insurer.