Milestone Inspections and Reserve Studies: What a Condo Agent Must Know

Updated August 2026 · Reviewed by Adams, Cameron & Co.

If you sell condominiums anywhere near the water in this county, two statutes now decide more about a transaction than the unit itself does. Agents who have not read them are quoting fees that are about to move and reassuring buyers about assessments they cannot see.

These are separate requirements with separate triggers, and they are constantly conflated. Here they are apart.

The milestone inspection

Under F.S. 553.899, a condominium association under chapter 718, and a cooperative association under chapter 719, must have a milestone inspection performed for each building three stories or more in height.

The deadline is December 31 of the year in which the building reaches 30 years of age, measured from the date the certificate of occupancy was issued, and every ten years after that.

Then the clause that matters here more than anywhere else in Florida: if the building is located within 3 miles of a coastline, the inspection is due by December 31 of the year the building reaches 25 years of age, and every ten years thereafter.

Look at a map of Volusia and Flagler and consider how much of the condominium stock that captures. Daytona Beach Shores, the beachside of Daytona and Ormond, New Smyrna Beach, Flagler Beach: a very large share of the buildings an agent here works in are on the 25 year clock, not the 30 year one. Five years is the difference between a building that has been inspected and one that has not.

Phase one and phase two

The statute splits the inspection in two, and the distinction decides how worried anyone should be.

• Phase one is a visual examination of habitable and nonhabitable areas including the major structural components, producing a qualitative assessment. If no substantial deterioration is found, phase two is not required.
• Phase two is performed only where substantial deterioration was identified in phase one. It may involve destructive or nondestructive testing to assess the areas of structural distress properly.

So the existence of a phase two report is itself information. A building that completed phase one and stopped is in a different position from one that went to phase two, and an agent should know which they are standing in.

The two deadlines that follow

Two numbers are worth memorizing because they tell you where a building is in the process:

• 45 days. The association must distribute the inspector prepared summary to unit owners, by United States mail or personal delivery, and electronically to those who consented, and post it conspicuously. Where required, the full report and summary go on the association website.
• 365 days. Repairs for substantial structural deterioration must be commenced within 365 days after receiving the phase two report.

That second one is the practical clock. A phase two report received nine months ago means a building with three months to begin work, and work of that kind is funded by somebody.

The reserve study, which is the money half

A structural integrity reserve study under F.S. 718.112(2)(g) is a financial document rather than a safety one. Based on a visual inspection, it identifies the components that will need maintenance or replacement, estimates their remaining useful life and cost, and recommends annual reserve funding.

It must examine, at minimum:

• Roof
• Structure, including load bearing walls and primary structural systems
• Fireproofing and fire protection systems
• Plumbing
• Electrical systems
• Waterproofing and exterior painting
• Windows and exterior doors
• Any other item with a replacement cost exceeding $25,000, adjusted for inflation, that affects the items above

It is required at least every ten years for residential condominiums with buildings three habitable stories or higher. Associations in existence before July 1, 2022 had to complete a first study by December 31, 2025, or 2026 where it was combined with the milestone inspection, which the statute expressly permits.

The rule that actually changed the market

Here is the sentence that explains the fee increases people keep asking about.

For budgets adopted after December 31, 2024, unit-owner-controlled associations may not determine to provide no reserves, or less reserves than required, for the items in the structural integrity reserve study. The statute allows a narrow exception for multicondominium associations using an alternative funding method approved by the division.

For decades an association could vote to waive or reduce reserves, and many did, because it kept monthly fees attractive. That option is gone for the structural components. The consequence is arithmetic rather than politics: the deferred cost has to appear somewhere, and it appears in the fee or in an assessment.

Which is why a buyer asking whether the fees are likely to rise deserves a better answer than an opinion.

What an agent should actually ask for

Four documents, and the dates on them tell most of the story:

• The milestone inspection report, phase one and, if it exists, phase two. If it does not exist and the building is old enough, that absence is the finding.
• The certificate of occupancy date, because it is what the 25 or 30 year clock runs from, not the year somebody thinks the building went up.
• The structural integrity reserve study, and the current budget, so you can see whether the reserve line matches what the study requires.
• Board minutes and any assessment history, which is where an approaching special assessment shows up before it is announced.

Distance from the coastline is worth checking rather than assuming, in the same way flood zones in Volusia and Flagler reward looking rather than guessing. Three miles inland goes further than it sounds.

Where the boundary sits for you

You can obtain these documents, point at the dates, and make sure your buyer has them in time to read them. What you cannot do is interpret an engineering report or tell somebody whether a reserve balance is adequate. That is the line described in what a Florida agent can fill in without practicing law, and the same instinct applies to a structural document as to a contract clause.

The related disclosure question, about what a seller must volunteer, sits in Florida seller property disclosure requirements, and a known structural finding is exactly the sort of thing that conversation is about.

Why this belongs in a brokerage conversation

An agent selling coastal condominiums without this material is guessing at the single largest variable in the transaction. Ask any firm you are considering how it keeps agents current on it, and whether anybody there actually reads the reserve studies. It sits with the rest of the infrastructure questions worth asking, and in this market it may be the most valuable one.

The short version

Three stories or more, 30 years, or 25 within three miles of the coastline. Phase one is visual, phase two only if something was found, summary out in 45 days, repairs begun within 365. Reserves for the structural components can no longer be voted down for budgets adopted after the end of 2024. Ask for four documents and read the dates.