guest blog by Deborah Goonan
Members of a recent Urban Land Institute (ULI) panel are reporting high demand for urban housing, both within existing city cores and in densely populated “instant cities” (HOAs), created by developers in suburban locations near mass transit.
The attached article highlights how the major players in American housing policy and the real estate industry are not all on the same page.
Housing policy makers still push home ownership as the endgame, while NAR and CAI lobby Congress to pass FHFA proposals to relax mortgage standards. Meanwhile, developers and investors are shying away from less profitable, more risky condominiums, and engaging in new construction and redevelopment for the rental market.
Housing is becoming less affordable, across the board, as cities become more and more gentrified. If left unchecked, the majority of Americans will left with few housing choices: rent for the long-term in an apartment community, or buy or rent a single family home in a private, corporate-governed HOA.
(link to Urban Land Magazine: Changing Face of Residential)
(link to Urban Land Institute – mission and priorities)
Frightening, isn’t it! So, the true owners of residential real estate will be the rental corporation, or the HOA/COA/POA (HOA) corporation. The invisible and often abused arbitrary powers of many of the HOAs is unthinkable to most and many times criminal. Property predators move in and force innocent longtime homeowners from their homes with a range of abuses, harassment, terrorizing and property damages, so they can assist in the theft of their property. Some HOA boards and HOA attorneys are only to willing to assist because of the financial benefit of these crimes and the victims have no place to turn. In many locales courts ignore rights, deeds, due process, or any other homeowner protection under the law for the sole benefit of the perpetrators of these crimes. Until those who make the rules are victimized in this discrimination, property theft and legal abuse, these crimes against innocent homeowners will just continue!