Urgent works by the manager and ratification at the meeting

As a rule, the manager cannot order major maintenance works without a resolution of the owners' meeting. Article 1135 of the Italian Civil Code provides an exception: when the works are urgent, the manager may order them, but must report on them at the first available meeting. It is an exceptional power, justified by the need to avoid immediate damage, that does not turn the manager into the sole decision-maker on extraordinary spending. At the first meeting the assembly takes note of the intervention, assesses the cost and ratifies it, resolving on the coverage and allocation among owners.

The limit of Article 1135

The rule sets a clear boundary between ordinary and extraordinary management. Major maintenance works require the meeting's decision, which must also set up the special fund equal to the amount of the works. The only exception is urgency: if waiting for the meeting would entail danger or worsening damage, the manager acts at once. A generic opportunity or convenience is not enough; a genuine, non-deferrable necessity is needed, such as a leak flooding the floors below or an unstable element threatening safety.

• Rule: major maintenance is for the meeting
• Exception: urgency allows the manager's immediate intervention
• Urgency must be real and non-deferrable, not mere convenience
• Duty to report at the first available meeting

What urgent character means

Urgency exists when the intervention cannot be postponed without harm to the common parts or to people's safety. A cornice coming loose, a burst pipe causing flooding, an electrical fault exposing people to risk: these are situations in which waiting for meeting timelines would worsen the damage. The manager must limit action to what is necessary to contain the emergency, without extending the intervention to further works that can await the collective decision. The measure of the urgency is also the measure of the power.

The duty to report and ratification

Having ordered the urgent work, the manager must bring it to the meeting's attention at the first available session. There the manager sets out what was done, why it was urgent, how much it cost and with which suppliers. The meeting takes note and resolves on the expense: ratification allows the intervention to be traced back to the collective will, its cost approved and its allocation among owners established according to the relevant criteria. The minutes must account both for the urgency and for the meeting's decision, so as to make the whole matter transparent.

Ratification is not a mere formality: the meeting may discuss the appropriateness of the expense, ask for clarifications and, in borderline cases, challenge the manager's conduct if it considers that urgency did not exist or that the intervention was excessively disproportionate.

If there was no urgency

When the manager orders non-urgent major works without a resolution, they act beyond their powers. In that case the meeting may refuse ratification and the manager risks having to answer for the unauthorized expense, which may not be charged to the condominium. It is a delicate situation: a manager who abuses the urgency exception exposes themselves to liability and possible disputes. For this reason the assessment of urgency must be made prudently and documented, keeping photos, technical reports and quotes that prove the necessity of the intervention.

The individual owner and Article 1134

The manager's power must be distinguished from the position of an individual owner who advances urgent expenses. Article 1134 provides that an owner who has taken over the management of the common parts without authorization is entitled to reimbursement only if it is an urgent expense. It is a different rule, concerning the owner who acted on their own initiative, and it confirms the central role of the urgency requirement for obtaining reimbursement outside meeting decisions.

• Document the urgency with photos, reports and quotes
• Limit the intervention to what is necessary
• Report precisely at the meeting for ratification
• Distinguish the manager's power from the owner's reimbursement under Article 1134

Tracking interventions and ratifications

Managing an urgent work means gathering evidence, costs and suppliers and then presenting everything to the meeting in an orderly way. With AmministraPro the manager archives documents and quotes, records the extraordinary expense and allocates it after ratification, keeping a clear trail from the emergency to the resolution. The accounting and document archiving features are described at /funzioni, while the plans can be viewed at /prezzi.