John Healey raised taxes on banks and landlords to fund a £100 winter handout for 20 million families as official forecasts made clear there is no end in sight for the cost of living crisis.
In his first budget, the chancellor blamed “global economic storms” for the grim outlook, as the war in Iran drives up oil and gas prices.
Beyoncé and Jay-Z have built a six-figure portfolio of real estate properties.
Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images
Beyoncé and Jay-Z purchased a home that set a record for the priciest home in California in 2023.
The $190 million Malibu mansion is just one of the many properties they own around the country.
Here are the homes they're linked to, from a former church in New Orleans to a Hamptons estate.
Beyoncé and Jay-Z break music records — and real-estate records.
The couple, whose combined net worth is nearly $4 billion as of publication, according to Forbes, is linked to numerous partnerships and deals, including Jay-Z's upcoming Super Bowl halftime performance, as well as several multimillion-dollar homes across the United States.
In 2023, they bought a 42,000-square-foot Malibu estate with a minimalist concrete aesthetic, designed by famed Japanese architect Tadao Ando. The price? $190 million — one of the largest sums in California history.
In New Orleans, the "Cowboy Carter" singer and the rapper-turned-entrepreneur have been linked to a former Presbyterian church that has been transformed into a mansion.
Beyoncé and Jay-Z's impressive property portfolio also includes another mansion in the Los Angeles area and several homes in New York. They are also reportedly in talks to purchase a 58-acre plot of land in the Cotswolds that they plan to develop in the future.
Take a look at Beyoncé and Jay-Z's homes across the country.
Beyoncé came from humble beginnings in Houston.
One of Beyonce's Houston area childhood homes.
Houston Chronicle/Hearst Newspapers via Getty Images
Beyoncé's rise to stardom began in a modest, middle-class neighborhood in Houston's Third Ward.
2414 Rosedale Street has three bedrooms and three bathrooms over 8,640 square feet, according to the listing from 2019.
According to the Associated Press, the Knowles family purchased the home in 1982, not long after Beyoncé was born, and moved out when she was about 5.
In 2019, the home was listed for sale for about $500,000. Because Texas is a non-disclosure state, it's unclear how much it sold for.
Beyoncé was spotted taking photos of the home in September 2023 during the Houston stop of her Renaissance World Tour, the AP reported.
The couple is linked to a Tribeca penthouse, where they married in 2008.
Jay-Z made one of his first large real estate purchases at 195 Hudson Street.
Business Insider/Julie Zeveloff
In September 2004, Jay-Z, who voiced his aspirations for success in his hit rap song 'Big Pimpin', made one of his first big real-estate purchases.
The native New Yorker, who was about 34 at the time, spent $6.85 million on a penthouse at 195 Hudson Street in the downtown Manhattan neighborhood of Tribeca.
Architectural Digest reported that the 8,000-square-foot apartment has an additional 3,000 square feet of outdoor terrace space. It's in a 27-unit building that was converted from a 1929 brick warehouse in 1999, real-estate listings site StreetEasy reported.
In 2008, he and Beyoncé held an intimate wedding ceremony at the penthouse, with 40 people in attendance. Architectural Digest reported in 2024 that the couple is believed to still own the home.
The couple rented out a Los Angeles mansion for $150,000 a month
Los Angeles.
Michelle Smith/Getty Images
In 2014, the Carters house-hunted on the East Coast, considering several properties. One was an eight-bedroom, 15-bathroom Beverly Hills mansion that they were outbid for by Markus Persson, the billionaire creator of the video game Minecraft. (Persson listed the mansion for sale in October 2026 for $70 million.)
After being outbid on several other properties, the couple decided to rent a home in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Holmby Hills, Architectural Digest reported. The 20,000-square-foot estate was valued at $4 million in 2015, according to Realtor.com. At the time, the couple paid a whopping $150,000 a month in rent. When the property was eventually sold in 2015, they moved on.
Beyoncé and Jay-Z are also linked to a home in New Orleans that used to be a church.
La Casa de Castille was previously a Presbyterian church before being transformed into a residence decades later.
IMAGE VIA TIMES-PICAYUNE ARCHIVE"
Louisiana is where Beyoncé's mother, fashion designer Tina Knowles, was born and raised.
In 2015, multiple news outlets reported that the couple purchased a Spanish Baroque-style mansion in New Orleans' Garden District.The house on Harmony Street, locally known as La Casa de Castille, was listed for $2.6 million at the time of its purchase, but the exact sales purchase price remains a mystery due to Louisiana's non-disclosure policy.
NOLA.com outlined how the church became a residence: In the 1920s, Westminster Presbyterian Church built it, and 38 members of the Ku Klux Klan allegedly attended its groundbreaking ceremony. Following years of vacancy, dancer Harvey Hysell transformed it into a ballet theater in 1977. Finally, in the early 2000s, it was purchased and extensively renovated.
According to the old Zillow listing, it still has 16-foot ceilings and stained-glass windows. The 13,300-square-foot, three-story property, made up of a main residence and three separate apartments, has a total of seven bedrooms, eight bathrooms, and a rooftop garden.
In 2021, there was a fire on the property, and it was listed for sale shortly after at $3.5 million, later increased to $4.45 million, TMZ reported. However, it was later taken off the market, according to Architectural Digest.
On Google Maps' Street View, La Casa de Castille is blurred, suggesting that it may still be a private residence.
Beyoncé and Jay-Z own a home in the Hamptons.
Jeffrey Collé
Beyoncé and Jay-Z have a New York state of mind when it comes to real estate.
In addition to the Tribeca penthouse and a midtown Manhattan condo — which Beyoncé owned prior to their marriage and sold in 2017 for $10 million — they have rented and owned several homes in the Hamptons.
In 2012, the year their daughter Blue Ivy was born, they leased a 31,000-square-foot vacation home in Bridgehampton for $400,000 a month.
Beyond the standard luxuries like a bar, a pool, and a tennis court, that mansion also featured a bowling alley, rock climbing wall, and skateboard half-pipe, according to Architectural Digest.
In 2017, the couple purchased the Pond House in East Hampton for $26 million.
Located at 81 Briar Patch Road, the 12,000-square-foot mansion with seven bedrooms, seven bathrooms, and a separate cottage was designed by architect Stanford White, whose work includes the arch in Washington Square Park.
The couple's waterfront property sits across from Georgica Pond and a 17-acre meadow preserve, offering unparalleled privacy.
Beyoncé and Jay-Z purchased a 34,000-square-foot estate in Bel Air in 2017.
An aerial view of Beyoncé and Jay-Z's Bel Air mansion, pictured in the center of the image with the round driveway, just above the semicircular construction site.
The sale set a record at the time for the most expensive property transaction in California. It was also the largest residential sale nationwide that year.
The estate's record-breaking price tag is attributed in part to its high-pedigree design and extensive array of amenities.
According to Architectural Digest, it took the previous owners, art collectors Bill Bell and his wife Maria Bell, a decade and a half to complete the building.
Spanning more than 8 acres, the compound is designed in the Japanese minimalist style for which its architect, Tadao Ando, is known.
According to E! News, the main residence has 8 bedrooms and 11 bathrooms, while its living room features custom-made fixtures imported from Italy. Outside, there are four separate pools, a bar, and a private helipad.
The couple is reportedly in talks to purchase a 58-acre plot of land in the Cotswolds in England.
The Cotswolds.
by Marc Guitard/Getty Images
The Cotswolds, a picturesque region spanning parts of southwestern and south-central England, is known for its rolling green hills, centuries-old villages, and historic estates.
With luxury properties often commanding multimillion-pound prices, the area has earned the nickname "the Hamptons of England." It has long attracted prominent British residents, including David and Victoria Beckham, actress Elizabeth Hurley, and supermodel Kate Moss.
More recently, the Cotswolds have also attracted wealthy Americans. Beyoncé and Jay-Z are reportedly among them, The Times reported in September.
According to the publication, the Carters are considering a £7.5 million ($8.54 million) 58-acre property in Wigginton, a village with fewer than 200 residents. Owain Jones, who is handling the sale, told The Times that their plans to develop the land could bring the project's total cost to about £18 million (or about $20. 5 million).
Should the Carters move forward with the purchase, they would not be far from the Beckhams and Simon Cowell, who reportedly own homes in the nearby village of Great Tew.
However, the proposed construction has upset some Wigginton residents, who are concerned about preserving the village's peace and quiet, House & Garden reported.
I moved from Hawaii to the continental US and have experienced some culture shocks along the way.
Jana Soli
I lived in Hawaii for 13 years and moved to the continental United States in 2021.
Life on the mainland has come with many surprises, from heavier traffic to more air conditioning.
Hawaii doesn't observe daylight-saving time, so the time change has taken some getting used to.
After living in Hawaii for 13 years — my entire adult life — I decided to move to North Carolina in 2021 for my MBA. While in school, I met my husband, and together, we relocated to Atlanta to pursue our careers.
However, after spending so much time in Hawaii, moving to the mainland came with some surprises. Here are eight of the biggest culture shocks I've experienced.
On the mainland, I spend much more time in my car.
Barry Williams/Getty Images
When I lived on the Big Island of Hawaii, I rarely had to drive more than 30 minutes at a time. Everything from work to the grocery store to the beach was just a short car ride away. A trip across the island felt like a journey.
So, it took me some time to adjust to the longer commutes in mainland cities. Rush-hour traffic is now a regular occurrence, rather than something I see in movies. And now, driving an hour to work or to visit friends is standard where I live.
Even though driving isn't always my favorite activity, I love that I can get in my car and head to another state in just a few hours. It's given my husband and me a lot of fun weekend road trips.
Daylight-saving time is new for me.
Jana Soli
Hawaii doesn't follow daylight-saving time, and instead stays on Hawaii Standard Time all year long. So when I first came to the mainland, the time changes twice a year really confused me.
I still have to look up when daylight-saving time begins and ends, especially when I'm referencing what time it is back in Hawaii. Thankfully, I keep a list of cities on my clock app to keep track of the time difference.
Experiencing four distinct seasons has changed how I observe time passing.
Sean Davis/Getty Images
Moving to a place with seasons meant buying winter clothing and seeing the leaves bursting into bright oranges and reds in the fall.
This is different from the islands, where the seasons are largely the rainy season and dry season. I now look forward to seasonal transitions and the festivities that come with each one.
Air conditioning is much more common on the mainland.
Jana Soli
Many homes in Hawaii, including the one where I lived, use the trade winds for cooling. My home had jalousie windows with horizontal glass slats that let the breeze pass through.
In contrast, buildings here in the Southeast are typically climate-controlled using air conditioning and heating units.
If I'm being honest, I still have to carry a sweater around to keep warm when the air conditioning is strong. However, dependable air conditioning is especially nice during hot, humid summers.
Locally grown fruit is now a summer staple.
Jana Soli
In Hawaii, because the climate is pretty mild year-round, many fruits have multiple or continuous growing seasons. Plus, I always knew someone who was giving fruits away from their backyard.
Here in the Southeast, though, fresh fruits feel more seasonal. I now get excited for peach season and the long lines at local farmers markets.
On the mainland, the weather is harder to predict.
Jana Soli
Where I lived in Hawaii, I'd look out over the ocean and be able to predict the next few hours of weather pretty accurately.
After years of living there, I understood the patterns of the clouds and wind, and could typically gauge the amount of time I needed to make it home from a run or the beach before the weather turned.
However, I have a much tougher time guessing what the weather will be like on the mainland. I now rely a lot more on weather forecasts to know what to expect.
The billboards took me by surprise.
Jana Soli
Billboards aren't allowed in Hawaii, so when I first moved to the Southeast, I couldn't believe how many huge signs dotted the skylines.
Now I get a kick out of reading them and analyzing the marketing, but it's always interesting returning to Hawaii and seeing how open the landscape is without them.
Fast-food restaurants on the mainland are missing Spam.
Jana Soli
Chicken and burgers are staples of fast-food restaurants on the mainland, but Hawaii's famous chains often feature rice and Spam.
Now, when I visit my favorite chains, I miss getting Spam musubi — Spam wrapped in rice and seaweed.
Yolanda Williams met another single mom on Threads. Now they have a "momune."
Andrea Morales for BI
Yolanda Williams, 46, bought 3 acres in Arkansas and moved there with her daughter.
She invited another single mom she met online to live on the property with her two kids.
They now share expenses, childcare, and emotional support in what they call a "mommune."
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Yolanda Williams, 46, who lives in central Arkansas with her 9-year-old daughter on a farm with another single mom and her two kids. They help each other with childcare, mental support, and more. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
In 2021, after my daughter Gia and I got COVID, we decided to take a drive one day. I came across this one little road that I fell in love with.
We kept coming back, driving around this neighborhood in Arkansas, and it became our Sunday thing. We'd get in the car and get ourselves a sweet treat — me a coffee and her a cinnamon roll — and drive around for an hour looking at all the different farms and houses and really just visualizing the life we wanted.
Yolanda Williams bought land in Arkansas and hopes to build a house before she's 50.
Andrea Morales for BI
We did that for two years before I found our 3.19-acre land in rural Arkansas. After visiting it, I purchased the land in 2023 on Facebook Marketplace, For-Sale-By-Owner. It cost $40,000 to buy, and I put down $12,000.
It was fully forested raw land, so I could only see part of it, but I used a real estate agent for the process. At the end of 2024, I secured a grant to help pay for the infrastructure, and I spent 2025 getting the land ready to move into. We didn't move until March 2026 because the land needed clearing and practical things such as a driveway and utilities.
The process was expensive because I didn't have much money left to build anything on the land. We got an RV as a place to stay, stash money, and build in the next five years.
Before I'm 50, I would like to have a permanent home built on the land
I'm from Southern California, and when I left in 2017, I was paying $600 to rent a guest room from my friend. Now, I pay $485 for my land mortgage and $400 for my RV payment a month. So, all in all, for me to be on this land, it's around $885 per month. Utilities run about $150 to $200 a month in the summer, and then $100 for water. It's exponentially cheaper to live like this, especially in Arkansas.
Yolanda Williams says living in her land has positively impacted her health.
Andrea Morales for BI
Here we have the freedom to roam and to be outside. I'm always in the garden. I've actually lost 30lbs since March because I move so much, and I didn't even realize it. I'm getting a lot more sun and exercise — so is my daughter. I feel more content, I feel more at peace.
However, this move has turned into so much more than that for us. I've been a single mom since my daughter Gia was born. She's 9 now, and I've never truly felt what it's like to have support, to have someone around all the time. By chance, that all changed this year.
I'm not sure who followed who first, but I met a single mom called Sunnie on Threads
Yolanda Williams met Sunnie on threads.
Andrea Morales for BI
She posted on the social media app Threads about wanting to buy land, and I commented back that she should consider Arkansas. I explained to her that land is cheap out here, and I gave her a bunch of information.
A few months later, I randomly saw her posting on Threads that she was in Arkansas with her two kids, who were 11 and 5 years old, looking for land, so I slipped into her DMs, and we exchanged numbers. I texted her to arrange a meet-up and to show her my land. Mind you, this was before I had actually moved onto the property.
The first time we met, we had pizza with the kids. They had a look around, and the kids played really well together. Gia likes the pizza crust but not the actual pizza, and one of Sunnie's kids likes the pizza but not the crust, so it worked out perfectly.
Yolanda Williams daughter and Sunnie's kids got along immediately.
Andrea Morales for BI
They helped me around the property as I was in the main stretch of getting everything ready for me to move on to. That's when we got to talking about her potentially living here while she searched for her own land.
Sunnie lived in a different city about an hour from me, and she didn't know anyone in Arkansas. I offered her the chance to stay with us to avoid spending money on hotels and Ubers. Although she wanted to buy her own land, I made it clear that she was welcome to stay with me as long as she wanted to. We now split the mortgage and utility costs in half.
That's how our "mommune" started.
Although we didn't know each other for long, I felt a strong connection and vibe
I loved that she was very much like, "I want to put my gloves on, and I want to help you," when it came to laying the foundations around the property, such as weeding, spraying for ticks, building planters, and sowing seeds. Now we garden together and grow as much as we can — like comfrey, lemon balm, mint, and basil. We even make our own fertilizer.
And you know, that's what's missing. A lot of people want this life, but they don't want to actually roll their sleeves up and get dirty to help one another.
Yolanda Williams and Sunnie garden together.
Andrea Morales for BI
Sunnie was essentially a complete stranger. But what I've been trying to do is listen to myself and trust myself. I really felt a great vibe from Sunnie, and my daughter really took to her. We got along, and it just felt right.
Yes, it's hard to build trust because you can't really trust anyone until you start to be around them all the time, but the whole thing with Sunnie is she came, and we sat, and we had a discussion about money and about expectations and about childcare. You just have to be willing to have the hard conversations in order to build a community, and I want to be around people who understand me.
We're now growing food together and raising wildlings.
This is our matriarchal community
What I always try to tell people is we need to decenter and deprioritize romantic relationships and just focus on relationships in general, whatever that support looks like.
Andrea Morales for BI
Whether that's friendship or family, focus on building that community, and we will get the support we're looking for, but if you're only focused on needing a man or a husband or partner to have security to feel supported, then a lot of people will miss out on invaluable support with friends or other women.
For example, I was having a really hard time this Mother's Day — it's just a hard day for me. Sunnie saw that I wasn't in a good space, so she took the kids and left so I could get some alone time. Having that support and knowing that I can say "hey, I'm having a hard time with motherhood right now" and someone will not only understand but will help me through that by watching my kid for me, taking her to the park, or giving me some space — it has been life-changing. It's the support that I need.
We really just help each other out. When I have to leave and go somewhere, I'll ask her to come inside the RV or to watch Gia play outside, and she does. Vice versa — if she needs me to watch her children, it's really not a big deal. We just ask each other for favors like: "If you're out at the store, can you get me this?"
We communicate really well with each other, and we help each other out any way we need to, and that includes having dinner together sometimes, watching TV together, and I will let her kids come over here so she can have a break and be able to be in her RV by herself, or we'll go to the park so she can be by herself sometimes.
Ever since I met Sunnie, I can just tell there's a change in my nervous system. Having someone here means I can tap out. I'm 46 this year, and I wouldn't trade this mommune we've built for the world.
HOA president was not on the list of titles Lana Martin ever planned to hold, but it's one that's befallen her.
Martin bought a townhouse in a 13-unit complex in Los Angeles in 2022. She quickly realized that the leaders of her homeowners association were ignoring a number of unaddressed issues, including a leaky decades-old roof that was flooding her neighbors' living rooms. Martin, who works for the California state government, decided to join her complex's three-person board to help out.
As the saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished.
The other two board members aren't very involved, so "everything falls on me," Martin says. She handles vendor calls, fields resident complaints, and babysits a low-budget property manager. Residents raised hell about the roof replacement project — they didn't want to stomach the roughly $160,000 cost that meant a painful $13,000 assessment for each unit. Some of them accused the HOA board and management company of acting illegally and threatened to lawyer up. Martin has had to block some of her neighbors' phone numbers.
"They wanted to second guess everything, Monday-morning quarterback everything, rather than just become involved," Martin says.
The reluctance to participate is understandable. It's also part of what's left Martin holding the bag.
HOAs are easy to hate. They are private mini-governments made up of non-expert volunteers who happen to live in proximity with one another. Across the country, millions of Americans have bought into condos, co-ops, and subdivisions governed by these associations, tethering their largest financial asset to an amateur bureaucracy. Most HOA stories are told from the outside looking in: a beleaguered resident hit with a ridiculous fine over a rogue garden hose or an overgrown lawn. Talk to the people who've ventured into the belly of the beast, and the picture gets gnarlier: You give up a ton of time, don't get paid, and everybody's always a bit mad at you.
And yet, HOA setups are growing. There were 373,000 community associations in the US in 2025, covering 29.6 million housing units and 78.1 million residents. By comparison, there were 222,500 in 2000. These entities collected $124.2 billion in assessments last year — about 1.5 times New York City's total tax revenue for the same year. You can see why things get so heated, and not just about money.
"HOAs are the ultimate pressure cooker environment for human interactions," says A.J. Steigman, a Florida real estate investor who currently sits on two boards. "You can cure cancer, you can pave the place in gold, you can even lower the HOA fees, and yet you're still going to have some elderly couple constantly complain about their flower patch."
Why would anyone in their right mind raise their hand for this?
HOAs typically attract two distinct archetypes, says Evan McKenzie, a political science professor at the University of Illinois Chicago and author of "Privatopia: Homeowner Associations and the Rise of Residential Private Government." On one side are the reluctant pragmatists — people who step up out of civic duty or sheer self-defense. On the other are what McKenzie calls the "condo commando" types who have some pretty strict ideas about how the people next door ought to live. For them, the board is a badge of domestic authority. Once they wind up in the same room, these groups inevitably clash — or, perhaps even worse, they run up against the paralyzing apathy of everyone else.
The paradox of HOA leadership is that the moment an owner displays basic competence, the rest of the community often abdicates. That's how James, a product designer in LA, landed in his current situation. He asked me to withhold his last name in order to protect his privacy — and keep from ruffling feathers among his neighbors.
HOAs are the ultimate pressure cooker environment for human interactions.
Back in 2021, a couple of people in his complex asked him to help out since he works from home and could keep an eye on things. He officially joined the board in 2023 and now acts as an unwitting customer service desk. Residents email the board about petty issues like intercom numbers and rat spottings. One recent Friday night, someone emailed to report a gas leak. "It's like, you need to call 911," James says.
He can't walk around his residence without risking someone coming up to him to pitch an idea or air a grievance. "You're never really off the clock," he says. He wishes he could quit, but no one else will step up.
Olivia Horbowy's story is one of self-preservation. When she bought an older top-floor condo in LA in 2024, the concept of an HOA was quite foreign to her. There were signs something might be amiss when she informed the building's then-leadership of her renovation plans for her new place — demands for extra documentation, a denied in-unit washer-dryer — but she brushed them off. She is an attorney, after all. But after moving into the space in the spring of 2025, she received notice of $15,200 in surprise accumulated fines related to the remodel. "They were convinced they were above the law and could make any decision they wanted," she says. After some legal back-and-forth, she didn't wind up paying.
As a result of the incident, Horbowy also decided to run for the five-person board herself. Victory wasn't entirely sweet, because of one preexisting board member's reaction. In emails, the aggrieved veteran referred to one member as a "kiss ass minion," accused the board president of taking bribes, and called Horbowy a "Russian whore." (She's Polish.) That member eventually resigned.
What makes HOAs and condo boards different from, for example, a corporate board is the question of interest, explains Nadav Shoked, a law professor at Northwestern. In HOA boards, the directors and the people affected by the decisions are often one and the same — and their neighbors. While they all have a common interest — the property — they often have interests that conflict.
People of a certain age, even though they may not be financially insecure, they worry about, will the money run out in my lifetime?
HOA boards contend with all sorts of fault lines. Older residents on fixed incomes tend to prioritize keeping monthly fees lower, while younger families lean toward upping fees for more amenities and construction projects. In situations where some owners live in their residences and others rent them out, boards wind up with a triangle of interests: Landlords want low costs and easy rental terms, full-time residents prioritize day-to-day quality of life, and renters wade through all of it without having a say.
These disconnects are why routine governance so frequently devolves into absurdity.
Andrew Simkovsky just wanted an investment property when he bought a condo in South Florida in 2024, but he wound up orchestrating a "hostile takeover" of the board amid concerns over their stewardship of said investment. He's since worked to rebuild the condo's finances and reestablish a budget. Still, the one thing that's surprised him is the hullabaloo over pets. The building's original bylaws from the 1970s officially barred them. In the '80s, there was an amendment allowing pets for owners but not renters, but over the decades, both groups had brought them in. The association's attorney advised them that enforcing the pet ban for tenants could be legally problematic, so Simkovsky decided to bring the building into the 21st century by officially allowing dogs and cats of up to 50 pounds for owners and instituting rules around leashes and cleanup that hadn't previously been in place. (Renters are still technically not allowed to have pets, but the board doesn't enforce that.) Purist residents revolted and wanted pets out. "My response to them was, they're already here, should I evict them?" he says.
Alice Young says she's fine to serve on her board as long as it doesn't cut into her pickleball time,
Courtesy of Alice Young
Alice Young, a retiree in suburban Chicago, says she's fine to serve on her board as long as it doesn't cut into her pickleball time, even though "everything takes so goldarn long to resolve." Among the lengthy items on her agenda are finding a new property management company and convincing a fellow board member to personally confirm a single extension cord has been removed from the basement in order to close out another board member's violation.
The true crisis inside the HOA machine is money. Many boards have kept dues artificially low for decades in order to appease residents and put off pricey updates. Now, aging housing stock is colliding with surging insurance premiums, stricter reserve laws, and tighter safety regulations, and the bill is coming due.
Florida is an especially stark example. It has the second-most community associations of any state, behind only California, with 50,600 such groups covering 4.5 million housing units and 10.9 million residents. Neighbors who live under Florida HOAs kick in over $20 billion to their associations annually. A 2023 Florida Senate analysis found that 912,000 of the state's 1.5 million condo units were at least 30 years old. After the 2021 collapse of the Surfside condominiums that left 98 people dead, the state required qualifying buildings to undergo "milestone" structural inspections after a certain age and changed the rules so owners can't simply vote to underfund reserves for major structural repairs. In 2024, Redfin found double-digit annual increases in condo dues in Tampa, Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, and West Palm Beach.
Paul Vesely joined the board for his Florida second-home condo in 2009
Courtesy of Paul Vesely
This creates a brutal fiduciary burden. When Paul Vesely joined the board for his Florida second-home condo in 2009, the complex's on-site managers warned him against commissioning an engineering inspection, because "they might find something." The association has since taken out over $2 million in loans to pay for various updates and renovations, which translates to thousands of dollars a year for each unit. One owner, who has cancer, is currently delinquent on her payments, and the board will send her to collections if she doesn't pay. "As badly as we may feel about a certain individual, we have to be consistent," he says.
Not everyone shares the same economic clock. Bill Masterson recalls attending a condo meeting in Chicago years ago in which an elderly man pushed back against a $225,000 assessment to put in a parking lot. "Why can't you wait until I die?" the man asked. The board went ahead anyway, and the man lived for another several years. "People of a certain age, even though they may not be financially insecure, they worry about, will the money run out in my lifetime?" he says.
Masterson swore off condo boards when he moved from Chicago to Florida in 2016 and then signed right back up. He admits he's a stickler for the rules, but he's also aware of how silly disputes can break down relationships. One of his neighbors doesn't speak to him because of a long-past disagreement over a speed bump.
"That's OK, because the work gets done," he says. "You never know in a given moment what pressure people are under."
Lana Martin, back in LA, says contending with everything has been a "wild ride." She spoke to me the day roof construction on her complex had finally begun. She's relieved, but there's more work to be done. Next up: writing up a towing policy. "People won't voluntarily just agree, 'Oh yeah, I shouldn't block driveways,'" she says.
Emily Stewart is a senior correspondent at Business Insider, writing about business and the economy.
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