17 W. 67TH STREET

Want to ensure a quorum at your next annual meeting? Do a lousy job throughout the year.

"That's the irony," notes attorney Phyllis H. Weisberg, a partner at Montgomery McCracken Walker & Rhoads. "When everything is running smoothly and everybody's happy, it's harder to get a quorum."

"People come from far and wide if there are contentious issues," agrees longtime co-op board member Grant Varga, of the 57-unit 17 West 67th Street in Manhattan. "But when everything is going smoothly, people say, ‘What's my motivation to go?' So we work hard to convince them to show up." So how do you ensure that your building has the required quorum to make the annual meeting legit?

As regular readers of Board Talk can well attest, that forum is fraught with unhappy co-op / condo residents and board members alike charging dishonest tactics at the annual meeting where shareholders and unit-owners vote to elect a board. How are you going to assure everyone that the election isn't rigged? Although attorneys and managing agents swear fraud is rare, homeowners need assurance that everything is on the up and up. Here are ways to help make that happen.

Many people spend their weekends working with real estate brokers, scouring the city for the "right" apartment in the "right" building. I took a different route: I found the "right" woman, with the "right" apartment, in the "right" building, and married into our co-op 27 years ago.