Category Archives: Foreclosures

Nevada Can’t Make HOAs Obey The Law!

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A wild story was broken this morning by the Las Vegas Review-Journal. A member of the Nevada state board which oversees Homeowners Associations says financial conflicts of interest on his own board essentially render it impotent and dysfunctional.

Jonathan Friedrich is one of the most prominent Homeowners Rights advocates in Nevada. Earlier this year he was appointed as one of seven members of the Commission for Common Interest Communities and Condominium Hotels. But Friedrich has been frustrated in his efforts to reign in some of the more outrageous behavior of many Homeowners Associations.

A prominent example is the habit of Homeowners Associations to tack on huge collections fees and legal costs on fines issued to homeowners. A fine of a couple hundred dollars often soars to thousands of dollars, far exceeding what state law allows. But HOAs really don’t bother to follow state statutes. They just want the money. And four of the seven member State Commission in Nevada apparently have no intention of enforcing the law.

HOAs have super-priority liens on all housing meaning they collect their money before the mortgage company gets a chance to collect. And that’s led to a vast number of Nevada houses sitting vacant. No prospective buyer wants to invest in a house which has thousands, sometimes tens of thousands of dollars in liens that have to be paid off. Even the federal government, which owns a large number of foreclosed homes, can’t get rid of its Nevada inventory.

Friedrich says a majority of the members on the state panel have conflicts of interest: They are representatives of the Homeowners Association industry. They personally profit from sheltering HOAs and their illegal fines. And they oppose any move to force HOAs to abide by state limits on how high a homeowner’s fines can go.

Not covered in the Review-Journal article linked below is that one of the commission members who’s thwarting HOA reform has said he’s a founding member of CAI, the powerful money-guzzling Community Associations Institute. And at least two other commission members are CAI members.

Conflicts of interest, illegally excessive fines, flouting of state and federal law: It’s really no surprise in the HOA industry.

(click here for Las Vegas Review-Journal story)

 

Ugliness Over Wittenberg Decision

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The knives are out for homeowners in California after the historic Wittenberg v. Beachwalk court decision. The Court of Appeals ruled that Homeowners Associations MUST PROVIDE equal access to all means of communication if an HOA takes any kind of advocacy position for a board candidate or change in HOA rules. After 24 of California’s top HOA law firms pleaded with the courts, they were set back on their heels. The Court of Appeals essentially told the law firms to ‘get lost.’

But don’t think for a moment these out-of-control boards will take it sitting down. These ruling elite make hundreds of millions of dollars a year in legal fees for fining and suing homeowners over such incredibly petty things as parking a car on the driveway ten minutes after the mandated deadline.

A number of HOA boards and websites are now referring to homeowners as ‘dissidents’! In other words, if you want to run for a board position, or you want to stop your board from making outrageous tyrannical decisions, you’re a dissident. If you remind a board that it’s in violation of the law established by Wittenberg, you’re a dissident. If you just want to be left alone, you’re just a lowly dissident.

Arrogance.

There’s no other word to describe these rogue boards.

Sadly, Wittenberg doesn’t create a precedent for the 49 other states. But it does create a wonderful roadmap.

(click here for Wittenberg decision)

 

 

How Many Conservatives ‘Get It’?

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Historically, many Republicans and indeed many conservative Republicans have strongly supported the idea of Homeowners Associations. They falsely believe that the smaller a governmental entity gets the closer it is to the people. Many conservatives AND liberals have discovered over the past few years this is an empty-headed belief.

An old-time outdoorsman’s axiom is that if three people get into trouble in the wilderness two will always turn against the one. You can’t get any closer to true democracy than three people. And as John Adams and Toqueville warned us eons ago, we all need to beware of the “tyranny of the majority.”

Democracy is an ugly word unless it’s accompanied by guaranteed restraints like a Bill of Rights, due process, and an orderly court system. Always remember that a mob running down the street breaking windows and burning buildings is a true democracy.

If there is no set of checks and balances, it’s basic human instinct to try to dominate all those around you. And right there is the fulcrum around which the national Homeowners Association scandal spins. Without checks and balances there are no human rights. Believe it!

The article linked below is a couple of years old, but it’s fantastic when a columnist for the conservative Townhall.com begins to understand that the Homeowners Association Movement has the potential of being downright dangerous to the finances and freedom of individual homeowners. The real tragedy is that we don’t hear a constant drumbeat from both the Townhall crowd and the ACLU crowd. Anger at this national scandal is not conservative or liberal. Every political faction should be screaming at the outrages going on in every state in the union.

All that being said, the attached column is worth reading again.

(click here for Townhall column)

http://townhall.com/columnists/rachelalexander/2011/06/22/homeowners%E2%80%99_associations_becoming_unavoidable_and_quasi-governmental/page/full

 

 

 

Huge Victory for California Homeowners!

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The California Supreme Court last week upheld a lower court decision which would essentially prevent the CAI (Community Associations Institute) from controlling the outcome of all board elections in Homeowners Associations.

Truly, the CAI has emerged as one of the nation’s most disgustingly evil-minded institutions. CAI claims it represents homeowners, although sometimes it refers to ‘stakeholders’. What CAI really represents is a massive and growing cash diversion from private homeowners to tort lawyers and service providers. When a homeowner gets into a beef with his or her HOA, CAI refers the case to its own secret closet of favored tort lawyers. But the ‘California dance’ by CAI was just beyond belief.

California’s Fourth District Court of Appeals ruled that an HOA which takes a position or becomes an advocate for a certain board candidate or ballot measure must provide “equal access” to opponents. This includes access to any means of publication including HOA websites, bulletin boards, community meeting rooms, newsletters and any other publication routes. CAI lawyers, of course, went ballistic.

Equal access? Who the heck ever heard of such an outrage? Equal protection? That’s for U.S. citizens, certainly not the citizens of HOA Amerika.

Twenty four California law firms filed ‘Friends of the Court’ briefs to the California Supreme Court begging the justices to overturn that stinking ‘equal access’ judgment. Count ’em: Twenty four law firms, each one of them sucking at the teat of the HOA lawsuit machine.

For a very brief background on this lawsuit, the Beachwalk Homeowners Association board figured out a sneaky way to get CAI affiliated members elected to the board. If the CAI-guy didn’t win, they’d just keep holding elections one after the other, advocating all the way until the homeowners got weary and finally gave in to the constant political propaganda and elected the previously chosen CAI-guy. These 24 HOA law firms, by filing such Friends of the Court briefs, demonstrated they were absolutely behind such odoriferous tactics. Remember the old Soviet Union where voters could vote, but there was only one candidate on the ballot? Well, the CAI-guy election tactic was Communism on steroids.

In a strange turn to Constitutional fairness and due process, the California Supreme Court essentially ruled that opponents of in-house candidates or ballot issues actually got to have the freedom to discuss alternative views. Amazing!

Any homeowner who wonders where his or her HOA dues are going, or who wonders why Homeowners Associations have become so despised by individual homeowners, should read the decision in the California case: Wittenberg v Beachwalk Homeowner Association.

Calling all homeowners: You finally won a big one! Congratulations!

(click here for California decision)

http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/G046891.PDF

 

WOW! Breaking Story This Weekend!

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An incredible and controversial story should be breaking in the desert southwest late this weekend. If this happens as scheduled the whole world of HOAs might be a bit rattled. Spread the word and stay tuned!