Coop will not respond - what should I do?

We purchased an apartment on the top floor of a 12 story Clinton Hill Coop in 2008. It was fairly dilapidated at the time, having been poorly maintained, and apparently water damaged as a result of a previously leaky roof (which had been repaired a few years before we moved in. The floors were damaged, several (non-structural) walls were unstable, and the bathroom was a mess. We had hoped to... [more]

We purchased an apartment on the top floor of a 12 story Clinton Hill Coop in 2008. It was fairly dilapidated at the time, having been poorly maintained, and apparently water damaged as a result of a previously leaky roof (which had been repaired a few years before we moved in. The floors were damaged, several (non-structural) walls were unstable, and the bathroom was a mess. We had hoped to renovate the apartment completely before moving in, but the seller was in foreclosure, and she refused to move out. When she finally was forced to leave, we only had time to repaint and clean up a few minor things, and were forced to live with the apartment in this state. Due to the onerous requirements of our jobs, we have not had the time to undertake a large renovation, and have simply made do. But this summer, it became clear that we needed to renovate whether or not we had the time: the kitchen cabinets were collapsing, as was the bathroom wall around the shower. Apparently one of the previous owners had simply covered over a water leak with more tile, and the buckling tile wall eventually started to disintegrate. That is when we went through the long process of finding a contractor and planning the necessary renovation. During this process, one of the contractors asked about a small crack on one of the ceilings structural beams. We had always thought it was simply paint chipping off, but when he gently troweled at it, it became obvious that there was actually a major crack in the structural beam. I brought this to the Coop's attention, and - to their credit - they sent someone to look at it and eventually the Coop Board decided that it should be repaired. However, we still needed to renovate the kitchen and bathroom, given their dilapidated state, and had moved ahead with the formal requests. We filed all the necessary licenses with Management, and submitted the Scope of Work to the Property Manager, who reviewed it with the building manager and engineer, and deemed it to be satisfactory. Excited by finally passing all of the hurdles, my wife moved in with relatives, taking our cats, while I intended to stay on as long as possible to make sure everything was getting done correctly, before renting a small place in Long Island. Yet seemingly ready to begin, everything suddenly came to a grinding halt. I asked when we could start the desperately needed plumbing work, and we were told we needed to wait. We waited a week, and heard nothing. Repeated requests produced nothing. At this point, I cannot get anyone to explain to me WHY we are not being permitted to go ahead, or WHEN we can expect that decision to be made, or even WHO is responsible for making that decision. We were given a list of instructions, and we fulfilled our end of the obligation. I've asked, nicely, over and over and over again - I've gone to the office over and over and tried to be nice, and apologize profusely for bothering them, saying I don't want to be a nag, pleading to be told what I can do to help. I said, look, if there's anything that's questionable about the renovation that's holding it up, we can just get rid of that. I don't care. I don't want to cause a fuss. I don't want to insist on anything. Just tell us what we can do, and we'll just do that. "If you need any additional paperwork or licenses or signed statements or anything, just tell me, and I'll get them immediately," I said. But I am told nothing. I have not even been given a timeline for when a decision MIGHT be made. I just don't think this is reasonable, given that we have approximately $80,000 (our entire life savings) wrapped up in this renovation, and we got all the approvals, we got the licenses, and everything seemed like a done deal. I am currently living in the bedroom with all our furniture and 40 boxes of books crammed in, and have been doing so for 2 weeks. It think I should at least be given some sense of how long I have to wait for a decision, and why, especially given that the Scope of Work has already been approved. The contractor and subcontractors keep calling me to tell them what's happening, and I have nothing to tell them, because no one will tell me anything. We've spent a large part of our savings in preparing for this, and it's all coming precariously close to going down the drain. I really feel, that this is just unreasonable, and I have no idea what else I'm supposed to do at this point. Obviously the Coop will have some high priced lawyer if I were to go that route. But what else can I do? I've asked other coop members on the internal email listserv and everyone also seems outraged, but no one knows what to do. [less]