Tag Archives: HOA

Dream Home Gone Bad | The Ultimate HOA Nightmare

      No Comments on Dream Home Gone Bad | The Ultimate HOA Nightmare

Sometimes people get to own their dream home, complete with fine furnishings, a swimming pool, and a well-guarded community, where they believe they will live forever.  Unfortunately, neighborhood squabbles can make those dreams vanish. All too often, that moment of horror is delivered on a silver platter by a homeowners association.

Technically, a homeowners association is an organization of homeowners that looks out for the common good of all neighbors. But sometimes, the interpretation of “common good” turns into a nightmare. And a new resident finds the community is not so neighborly after all.

A.J. Vizzi bought his “dream home” in the Eagles Homeowners Asso0ciation near Odessa, Florida. Vizzi owned a brand new Ford F-350 pickup truck. But The Eagles deed-restrictions don’t allow pickup trucks of any kind. Had Vizzi purchased a Cadillac Escalade or a Hummer it would have been allowed. But his F-350 had to stay out of sight, inside his garage.  The truck, Vizzi said, was too large for the garage. Beginning in 2001, the HOA began ticketing Vizzi, saying his truck was in violation and had to go.  The tickets kept coming, the fines kept growing.

Finally, The Eagles filed a lawsuit against Vizzi. He stood his ground. The case wound its way through the lower courts and then the Court of Appeals.

In March of 2010, nine years after the fight began, the court not only ruled that the F-150 was legal in the community, but Vizzi’s neighbors now have to pick up the tab for all court costs. It awarded more than $187,000 in legal bills to Vizzi. Presumably, the Eagles also has to pay its own legal bills. So a mindless fight over a pristine, new pickup truck kept the protagonists awake for nine long years, and cost the HOA nearly a half million dollars. The attorneys all got paid, of course, but the neighborhood lost a half million.

The case should give pause to any prospective homeowner looking for a dream home. The Eagles looks like an unhappy place to start chasing that dream.

Vizzi and his family decided to move away from the petty viciousness of The Eagles. They now live on acreage away from the nightmare of Homeowners Associations.

Ward Lucas
Author of
Neighbors At War: The Creepy Case Against Your Homeowners Association

FBI INVESTIGATES BEATING OF SUSPECT IN HOA FRAUD CASE

      No Comments on FBI INVESTIGATES BEATING OF SUSPECT IN HOA FRAUD CASE

Leave it to the Las Vegas crowd to figure out a way to intimidate a police informant!

David Amesbury, a lawyer, is one of ten suspects who’ve pleaded guilty in the Las Vegas HOA corruption case. His guilty plea means he’s going to be a star witness against a massive scheme to rig elections in Las Vegas Homeowners Associations, and steer hundreds of millions of dollars in construction defect litigation to certain attornies and building contractors.

But this week, Amesbury was found severly beaten and bleeding on a street in Henderson, Nevada. The FBI denies Amesbury was beaten because of the federal investigation. Still, they’re taking a close look at it. If there’s a connection, the feds say they’ll take it very seriously.

With one to two dozen more suspects slated to fork over guilty pleas in exchange for their testimony against the real criminal bigwigs, one has to wonder if a message is being sent “Las Vegas style.”

The FBI is aggressively investigating cops, lawyers, judges, businessmen and other unnamed officials in its massive Homeowners Association corruption investigation.

Ward Lucas
Author of
Neighbors At War: The Creepy Case Against Your Homeowners Association

Tenth Las Vegas HOA Crook Takes Guilty Plea

      No Comments on Tenth Las Vegas HOA Crook Takes Guilty Plea

The FBI’s HOA investigation continues to fall into place with a tenth guilty plea. Denise Keser is the first suspect to publicly implicate two well-known targets of the federal investigation, attorney Nancy Quon and businessman Leon Benzer who runs a popular nightclub and several construction companies.

Keser pleaded guilty to one county of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud. She admitted in federal court that she took part in s scheme to illegally gain control of HOA boards by rigging elections. The phony Homeowners Association boards would then steer construction defect litigation to attorney Quon, who would in turn steer construction work to Benzer’s construction companies.

The FBI investigation is targeting lawyers, judges, cops and more than a dozen Homeowners Associations.

Ward Lucas
Author of
Neighbors At War: The Creepy Case Against Your Homeowners Association

Banning the Boy Scouts! (keep the snot-nosed little beggers out of MY HOA neighborhood!)

      No Comments on Banning the Boy Scouts! (keep the snot-nosed little beggers out of MY HOA neighborhood!)
You stupid, stupid board members at the West Melbourn Homeowners Association in Florida. You know what you’ve done. You’ve told 4000 Boy Scouts that they may not collect for food donations at Brevard County Homes. for the less fortunate.
The Boy Scouts have collected these donations for years. Now you’ve apparently decided you’re just too good.  You’re just too special, too high class to have to stoop to help those less fortunate.
Shame on you, West Melbourn Homeownes Association.  It’s not just that you’re refusing help feed those with real needs.  It’s that you’re depriving a group of the most wonderful, gentlemenly, most decent young men in America from trying to do their part.  Organizations like the Boy Scouts represent the few good people this country has left. These are the young men who, years from now, will be your doctors, your lawyers, your advisers, your counselors, your friends! They will be the ones defending your country in the military.
I don’t care if you don’t want to donate. That’s your business and I have no criticism for that. But how dare you say the Boy Scouts may not collect emergency relief rations in your Homeowners Association? Are you really that arrogant that you just can’t allow someone to help other people less fortunate than you?
Frank Brunn, President of Hammock Lakes East and West, aren’t you a little ashamed when you turn out the lights at night? Aren’t you just a little conflicted? In your new position of power, you get to start unilaterally throwing scumbags out of the neighborhood, scumbags who just want to take advantage of the wealthy? But Mr. Brunn, the Boy Scouts?  Were you never a Scout? Were you never taught the Boy Scout Motto and the code of ethics?
Mr. Brunn, you’ve demonstrated to your neighbors that you’re not up to the job of making your neighborhood a better place than it was when you took office. That’s sad. But you can still fulfill your moral responsibility by just stepping aside, resigning, and letting some man or woman with a more compassionate heart teach you what the word ‘neighbor’ really is.  It’s actually not really a word. It’s a concept.  It’s a lifestyle.

Another Vegas Crook Bites the Dust

      No Comments on Another Vegas Crook Bites the Dust

Daniel Solomon pleaded guilty to trying to swindle his neighbors at the Vistana Homeowners Association. He admitted he became a “straw purchaser” in the Vistana HOA so he could direct construction business to his co-consirators. He’s the 9th bad guy to admit to the judge that he’s guilty.

If I were living in an HOA whose value plummeted fifty to sixty to eighty percent because of scandals like this, I’d be mortified. If I knew my condo had ZERO resale value because a bunch of neighbors were skimming property values off the top to slip into their own greedy pockets, I’d be more than furious, I’d take to the streets.

Are you HOA members in Vegas such pastel patsies that you’ll put up with this garbage?  Across the country, the same kinds of scams are happening everywhere. Yet homeowners meekly sit by and whine, “I just don’t really want to get involved.”  Involved?!?!?!?  You’re being cheated. You’re being robbed. You ARE involved!!!  Your retirement savings are being wiped out because some crook down the street wasn’t honest enough to say, “No I don’t want to commit the kind of crime you’re offering me!” You ARE involved.  But where’s your anger?  Where’s your outrage?

My upcoming book, “Neighbors at War: The Creepy Case Against Your Homeowners Association” addresses the Las Vegas Scandal, but it goes after some of the swindles going on in 300,000 other Homeowners Associations across the country. You will not believe the lives this movement has ruined. You won’t believe the families who’ve been broken apart because some HOA Nazi decides to confiscate a home under the most incredibly minor circumstances.  God Bless you if you live in one of the rare HOAs that haven’t had problems.  But don’t be naive.  You have absolutely no Constitutional rights when it comes to defending your beloved home if you live in an HOA.

I’m thinking of called my second book on the subject “Gutless in Las Vegas“.  It wouldn’t be too far off the mark.

Ward Lucas
Author of
Neighbors At War: The Creepy Case Against Your Homeowners Association