Yep, it’s a question a lot of us have been asking: With The Donald being such a high-powered real estate developer, what does he think about owner associations? After all, he creates the covenants for all the condos he sells.
His take, linked below, is extremely interesting.
(link to Virginia blog on Trump and condo associations)
I should charge money for psychic readings! It was four or five years ago that I began predicting the advent of drones and that they would eventually be cheap enough for the boards of Homeowners Associations to start using them to inspect the most private part of your property. Your nude sunbathing or hot tub trysts could be played on the TV set at the HOA clubhouse and you probably wouldn’t win a legal case.
Well, so far I’m batting about 90% so far. The drones are here. They cost as little a four hundred bucks. And they’re popping up in thousands and thousands of places. Realtors are using them to advertise homes and neighborhoods. Terrorists are using them to interfere with commercial aircraft. Voyeurs are using them to videotape you and your lover on the backyard blanket. The FAA only controls drones in airspace over 1000 feet.
Privacy? Fugeddaboutit!
There’ve been a number of cases where homeowners have shot drones out of the air. The shooters usually end up being arrested and jailed. But it’s a whole new area of developing law and will probably take a decade or more to resolve. In the meantime even if a jury finds you not guilty you will have expended hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal fees.
(link to shoot a drone, go to jail, do not collect $200. It ain’t Monopoly money, folks!)
The Boulder Weekly is not really known as a bastion of fine journalism. An example is linked below where the reporter could really have done some better research.
The story is about Knollwood Village Homeowners Association, a tiny HOA just a five minute walk from the University of Washington Campus. The CC&Rs say renting a home in the HOA is limited to a single married couple only and immediate family members.
Well, since this year’s Supreme Court ruling the definition of ‘marriage’ no longer exists. The definition of ‘family’ no longer exists. Whether right or wrong that’s the functional result of the ruling. So a marriage or a family is anything a person, or his partner, or his or her multiple partners are say it is.
Yes, this HOA restriction against unmarried people living in Knollwood is illegal. No, the HOA can’t do anything about it. The City of Boulder is giving the complaint about three minutes worth of lip service. But anti-discrimination laws are the same under Boulder ordinances as they are in federal law and federal court decisions.
Knollwood Village? You lose.
(link to story in Boulder Weekly)
This one is huge, and it’s developing right now in Colorado.
A Homeowners Association in Vail is being sued because one of the supervisors in the management company was a jerk who was mistreating female Mexican workers. The Feds are now suing both the management company and the condo association.
I’ve owned two ski condos in that same area and I never had a clue who the management company was. I did get dinged a couple of times when I tried to change the locks on my doors. The management company bored through the locks, changed the door handle and charged me for their work. Yes, I was p.o.’d about that and it was one of the reasons I finally dumped the condos when the market improved.
But what if a federal EEOC sexual harassment lawsuit/judgment happened while I was still an owner? I could have been hit with a 10 to 50 thousand dollar special assessment for something I had zero knowledge about. Most Vail condos are owned by average people in Denver who just want to ski a week or two a year and rent them out the rest of the year to make the mortgage payments.
Incredible that completely innocent homeowners or condo owners could be financially ruined by this kind of thing.
(link to legal news on EEOC sexual harassment lawsuit)
http://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/condo-association-sued-for-sexual-70687/
Dear Reader,
You’re supposed to do your due-diligence before buying that first home. Sure, the place looks great. Yes, it’s a sexy North Miami Beach high rise condo.
But, good grief, take a look at what’s happening around you. One family in the building can’t access their six-story balcony because it’s hazardous. Walking onto the balcony could mean sudden death. There are dozens of others inaccessible balconies. The building is full of mold. There are allegations of the embezzlement of more than a million dollars worth of dues paid by homeowners to the management company for parking fees.
Big cracks are appearing in the Jade Winds high rise. The condo association has filed for bankruptcy. It’s not an uncommon phenomenon in North Miami Beach and around the country, for that matter.
This continues to be a national scandal, the biggest one that state and federal legislators are NOT looking at. “Please go away from my office. Please don’t talk about HOAs. It’s too confusing and my mental capacities are not functioning at full speed right now.”
I love the readers of this blog, I just want to protect them from financial disaster.
(link to news on condo catastrophe in North Miami Beach)
