Do you own the boat slip at a new Miami condo?

Usually not in the way you own the home. A slip at a Florida condominium is held in one of three ways: as a deeded unit of its own, with a separate description and a separate line on the tax bill; as a limited common element, a piece of the common property the declaration assigns to a particular home, which may or may not travel with the home when it is sold; or as a licence or lease from the association or a marina operator, renewable on the terms the rules set. Above all three sits the state's lease of the submerged land, because the water under a private dock in Florida is often the state's, and the lease sets what the marina may do. On our file Alba Palm Beach publishes a private dock with boat slip access for owners, Olara publishes a private marina with resident slips, and Six Fisher Island publishes a private marina as one of its arrivals; none of the three publishes how a slip is held, so the question is asked, not assumed.

By deed, by assignment or by licence, and the document is different in each case. A deeded slip is a unit in the condominium or in a separate dock condominium, conveyed with its own deed, insured and taxed on its own, and sold separately or with the home as the owner chooses; title insurance is read for it as for the residence. An assigned slip is a limited common element: the declaration or the developer assigns it to a home, the owner has exclusive use but not title, and the declaration says whether the assignment passes automatically with the home, can be reassigned to another owner, or reverts to the association. A licensed slip is a contract: the association or the operator grants the right to moor for a term, at a fee, under rules, with a waiting list when demand exceeds the docks, and the right ends on the terms of the licence rather than at the closing table. The buyer asks the sales team which of the three the building offers and asks for the instrument, because the brochure's word "marina" covers all of them. Read do you own your parking space in a new Miami condo, is the private rooftop deeded and the five sections of the condominium documents.

The water is often not the developer's to sell. Where a dock sits over sovereignty submerged land, the association or the operator holds a lease from the state that sets the number of slips, the uses allowed, whether anyone may live aboard, the term and the rent, and the lease outlives any one owner's slip. A buyer who is promised a slip reads the lease for three things: whether the slip count in the brochure matches the slips the lease permits, whether the lease term runs past the years the buyer means to own, and what happens to the docks if the lease is not renewed. The lease is an association record and a public one, and counsel reads it beside the declaration. Read boats, docks and marinas at Alba, boats, docks and marinas at Olara and boats, docks and marinas at Six Fisher Island.

The rules, and then the dockmaster. A marina's rules set the maximum length, beam and draft a slip takes, the insurance a vessel must carry with the association named, whether crew may sleep aboard, where crew park and enter, fuel and pump-out, and the hours the dock is quiet. The storm rule is the one a buyer reads twice: many Florida marinas require vessels to leave the docks when a named storm is forecast, so the owner needs somewhere for the boat to go and someone to take it there. None of this is in the declaration's summary; it is in the marina rules the developer writes and the operator enforces, and the buyer asks for the current draft. Olara publishes a captained fishing boat and a cruising yacht as amenities, which is the building's own fleet rather than the owner's slip, and the terms of using them are a separate question. Read which new condos in West Palm Beach and Fisher Island have a marina, new Miami condos for a boat owner and what happens to a new Miami condo in a hurricane and who decides.

In the budget, in the licence or on the tax bill, depending on how it is held. A deeded slip carries its own assessment and its own tax; an assigned slip may carry a share of the dock's upkeep as a limited common element charge; a licensed slip carries a fee the operator sets, with electricity, water and pump-out metered or included. The association's budget shows the dock's maintenance, the state lease rent and the insurance on the structure, which every owner funds whether or not they keep a boat, and a buyer without a boat reads that line too. The owner's own policy does not cover the vessel; the boat is insured separately, and the marina's rules say what cover it must carry. Read what it costs to own a condo in Miami each year, Miami condo insurance and how to read the amenity rules before buying a Miami condo.

Seven questions, in writing. How the slip is held, and for the instrument. Whether it passes with the home, and on what terms. The slip's dimensions and depth against the boat's, and the fixed bridges between the dock and the ocean: Alba publishes no fixed bridges to the Atlantic, which is a developer answering the captain's first question in the brochure, and a buyer at any other dock asks it. The state lease's term and slip count. The marina rules, including the storm rule and the crew rule. The slip's cost, in whichever of the three places it sits. And whether there is a waiting list, because a brochure that says marina and a building of 275 homes may not have a slip for every owner. The desk reads the slip's instrument, the lease and the rules with the buyer before the reservation; owner's title insurance on a new Miami condo sets out what a policy covers when the slip is deeded.