Tag Archives: foreclosure

Want To Do A Guest Blog?

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20,000 people a month are now logging into NeighborsAtWar.com.  I like to keep you up to date on what’s going on in ‘HOA Amerika’, but keeping track of it all is a daunting job. So I want to invite each of you to consider doing a guest blog on situations with which you’re familiar.

Just a warning: I’m a tough taskmaster. After 40 years of investigative reporting and television news editing, I want total control over the final edited product. That’s because I have to take responsibility for what we publish. And I want to make sure each guest blog is short, pithy, to the point, and has punch. It has to be absolutely factual, and whenever possible, it has to link to an original published source.  This helps keep us out of legal hot water.

But I encourage you to join in. From everything I can see, our movement is growing and it’s only through YOUR efforts, NOT MINE, that we can eventually get the whole country educated about the organized crime element that runs through the entire national HOA system.

As I’ve said before, the dozens of indictments produced by the federal investigation of racketeering in Las Vegas Homeowners Associations could probably be reproduced in every city in America. This isn’t just a case of homeowners irritated by covenant restrictions. It’s hard-core violations of RICO statutes aided and abetted by a tort industry willing to violate professional ethics in order to create a massive income stream that comes straight out of the pockets and the equity of homeowners and into the pockets of HOA lawyers and HOA ‘insiders’.

Lastly, each one of us who have Homeowners Rights websites have to work hard to increase our SEO rankings so more homeowners can find us. This means leaving frequent comments on each others sites, and the frequent linking of our sites to one another.

KLOUT score is also becoming a big deal in the cyber-world. Each of us (whether you know it or not) has a KLOUT score, which measures the degree of your influence in the Internet community. Your KLOUT score measures the kind of influence you have over your contacts, your friends and associates. The higher your KLOUT score, the more people will find us. That means creating good content, and bringing as many people as possible into your circle of contacts. 

We used to be powerless as individual homeowners. But the Internet has given each one of us amazing power to attack and correct the wrongdoing of evil or misguided institutions.

You can reach me privately at ward (at)  NeighborsAtWar.com.

Money Grab In Florida Ruled Illegal

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The Supreme Court of Florida has slapped the pinkies of some municipalities that were trying make a little extra money from homeowners by trying to do what Homeowners Associations do all the time. When a homeowner buys a property in an HOA or CID or condo association, the buyer agrees to pay off his HOA dues before he makes a house payment. Thus the HOA actually has more power to punish miscreants by liening and auctioning off the house before the mortgage company gets its take. Thus, HOAs have a super-priority lien over the main lender on the property. The super priority. The ability to have super-priority status is built into the original developer’s Covenants Controls and Restrictions usually because that’s what the local municipality ordered.

The City of Palm Beach, seeing a chance to cash in on struggling homeowners the way Homeowner Associations did, passed local regulations giving themselves the same kinds of super priority status as HOAs. After all, weren’t municipalities charged with enforcing some of the same kinds of codes as the typical HOA?

Not so fast, said the State Supremes. Yes, the Florida Constitution gives broad powers to municipalities to take other people’s stuff…but only as far as what the state legislature allows. Still, this particular legislature has done some pretty goofy things to homeowners over the years. You just can’t predict when these parties will all be back in court over some ‘new’ taxing powers handed to them by lawmakers. “No man’s life, liberty or property are safe when the Legislature’s in session.” -Mark Twain

http://tinyurl.com/mx8b9r3

 

 

 

 

Throw Christians To The Lions!

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Don’t think for a moment your HOA has any sympathy for your religious views. Across the country there’ve been plenty of homeowners who were forced to shut down their Wednesday night Bible studies because it meant one too many cars parked on the street or the driveway.imagesCAKVSB6Y

In Katy, Texas, a young lady named Meagan Schmidt joined a church a few months ago. She says the church changed her life so much that she wanted to tell others. So she put up a small sign in her yard that said, “Journey Church.” But the Highland Creek Village Homeowners Association says it’s a commercial sign and blatantly violates neighborhood covenants.

The young lady is resisting and even tried to explain her side to the board members. They shouted her down. Now it’s fines and liens and pending lawsuits. The HOA has even cancelled pool permits for the family’s kids.

In days of old, Texans would have resorted to six-shooters at sundown. These days it’s all about shaming the kids until the parents submit.

Highland Creek Village HOA. Another one to avoid like the plague.

http://tinyurl.com/kkfvta3 

original source:

http://www.myfoxhouston.com/story/22614783/2013/06/17/homeowner-association-tells-tenant-that-church-sign-has-to-go

Home Gardener About To Get Bashed

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I have a lot of sympathy for Chris Gilson, a homeowner in the Brandermill Community Association in Chesterfield County Virginia. But I also have a prediction. He’s about to lose his home and his life savings.3p1[1]

After years of unsuccessful attempts to plant a lawn in his rocky front yard, he planted a vegetable garden, which has grown quickly. Now his HOA is fining him ten bucks a day until he removes it. The HOA says it’s going to assess that fine each day for 90 days. Gilson says he’ll be glad to pay $900 for the privilege of keeping his garden. But the poor fellow just doesn’t get it.

Disobey a mindless demand from your HOA and you’ll be fined, of course. But the HOA doesn’t like being scorned. So what’s waiting for Gilson at the end of those 90 days is a lien on his home, massive new fines, legal fees, debt collection costs, a lawsuit, and eventually the foreclosure and sale of his home at auction. His house, of course, will be auctioned for just a few thousand dollars. The most likely buyer will be a friend of a board member or a buddy of the lawyer that brings the lawsuit.  That ‘buddy’ will then kick back some money to the board member or the lawyer, and the home will quickly be sold and resold through a series of quick transactions. Those quick sale transactions are designed to make it impossible for Gilson to ever get back his home.

It’s the same kind of scam that cost Captain Michael Clauer his home while he was deployed in Iraq. His home was sold and re-sold in several transactions designed to make it impossible for him to get it back. The foreclosure against a serviceman deployed overseas was a blatant violation of federal law. So in Clauer’s case, a judge ordered a secret settlement that allowed Clauer to partially recover what he had lost.

Chris Gilson doesn’t have that kind of protection in the fight over his garden. He will lose. He will lose big time. With a scam as well-entrenched and as profitable as the HOA scam, very few if any people win. The one percent, or so, who actually win in court against an HOA end up with a massive net loss once the legal bills are paid.

Chris Gilson? Get out. Leave the neighborhood. This HOA will forever slander you, harass you, and vandalize you. Your daughters will be tormented by schoolmates. Anonymous calls will be made to your employer demanding that you be fired.

Chris? Are you listening?

Just believe me.

original source:  The Chesterfield Observer    http://tinyurl.com/o6ofhvr

 

 

Trayvon Martin Trial, and the Idiotic Knock-Knock Joke

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images[7]Well, I’ve been predicting for months that George Zimmerman would never get convicted in the murder of Trayvon Martin. At the most, I’ve been predicting a hung jury.

Folks, now I’m not so sure I was right. It turns out that Zimmerman’s defense attorney is dumber than a box of rocks.

From many media sources quoting the opening statements, Zimmerman’s lawyer started with the following knock-knock joke:

“I know how this may sound a bit weird in this context under these circumstances. But I think you’re the perfect audience for it as long as you — if you don’t like it or find it funny or appropriate, that you don’t hold it against Mr. Zimmerman, you can hold it against me. I have your assurance you won’t?  Knock, knock. Who’s there? George Zimmerman. George Zimmerman who?  Alright, good, you’re on the jury.”

The jury didn’t laugh.

Zimmerman, I’m telling you now. Your attorney is the biggest loser on the block. You’re facing second degree murder charges, my friend. You’re facing years in the slammer. The facts may ultimately show that you were actually on your back defending your own life when you fired that gun, killing Trayvon Martin. But the jury won’t remember any of those facts. They will, however, long remember that knock-knock joke. Zimmerman, my man, fire your lawyer and start representing yourself. You couldn’t do much worse.

Homeowners Associations everywhere should be trembling at the thought of the kinds of lawsuits they’re going to be facing. If Zimmerman is convicted, it’ll be a national symbol of the disgrace known as Homeowners Associations. It’ll be a symbol of the reality that people living in those precious gated communities are living under a false pretense of security. Zimmerman’s HOA has already paid out at least a million dollars to settle a wrongful death lawsuit.

If Zimmerman is found not guilty, he’ll have all the excuse in the world to sue his own HOA for not supporting him in his time of need. After all, he was the neighborhood watch captain. If he’s found guilty, then every HOA in the country will become a magnet for lawsuits.

Regardless of the outcome of this case, it’s going to be a grim time to be a member of a Homeowners Association.

Mark my words.