he choice was simple for Amanda Brown and Anders Nielsen: Pay some of the highest rents in the nation, or sink that money into a mortgage instead.

The couple chose the latter, buying a one-bedroom northwest condo for $230,000 and marking their first foray into Calgary’s housing market. Now they regret it. Brown, a 22-year-old student, and Nielsen, a 24-year-old oilpatch worker, are among 200plus condo owners hit with a repair bill of up to $10 million for their water-damaged homes.

The owners of units in the 18year-old Edgecliffe Estates, a complex of several three-storey condo buildings in Edgemont, found out last week that a “widespread and systematic failure” in the units’ construction will cost them thousands of dollars.

Brown and Nielsen will have to come up with $16,000 by the end of May — and another $16,000 by the end of May 2009 — to cover their share of the repair bill.

 

 

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