Buying Into Trump Building Leads To Buyer's Remorse For Unit Purchasers; HOA: Trump Used Fine-Print Chicanery To Financially Run Roughshod Over Complex's Operation

In Panama City, Panama, The Associated Press reports:

• The directors of the Trump Ocean Club met July 28 on urgent business. They needed to fire Donald Trump.
  
  The building's residents and condo owners had invested in the namesake, a 70-story waterfront tower along Panama Bay, on the strength of Trump's reputation. But during the four years that Trump Panama Condominium Management LLC had managed the property, Central America's largest building, a team installed by the Trump family was accused of running up more than $2 million in unauthorized debts, paying its executives undisclosed bonuses and withholding basic financial information from owners.
  
  The Trumps had done all of this through fine-print chicanery, the board said. A clause in many residents' purchase agreements prevented them from voting against the Trump company's wishes. That allowed the Trumps to install their top employee as chairman and the residents' representative on the board — even though the Trumps' actual stake in the building's residential area was merely a storage closet on the 15th floor.
  
  The Trump Organization sent its response days later. "Your letter is a complete sham," wrote the Trumps' top lawyer, Alan Garten. He accused the board of ingratitude and criminal trespassing. After refusing to accept being fired, Garten declared that Trump's company was quitting — and demanded a $5 million termination fee.
  
  Whether wheeling and dealing with Wall Street bankers, debating political rivals or running a condo association, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has advanced his interests by leveraging his outsized reputation, canniness and aggression. The Trump Organization's adventures in Panama provide a window into how these traits have filtered into his business empire — and the style of management that could be expected in a Trump White House.
  
  Transparency and close attention to expenses are not strengths. Squeezing the most from contractual language is.

For more, see Condo owners in Panama tell Trump: You're fired!

This isn't the first time Trump has been accused of using the fine print to slip & slide his way out of liability in a case relating to developments bearing his name. See, for example:

• Donald Trump testifies in Broward courtroom (Buyers of hotel condo units thought he was project's developer).

Trump ultimately won this case. See Trump prevails in lawsuit brought by buyers of failed Fort Lauderdale condo-hotel.