Category Archives: privacy

Equal Voting Rights? You’re Kidding, Of Course!

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guest blog by Deborah Goonan

What would you say if I told you that your neighbor voted for the Mayor of your city seven times in the last election? And what if you learned in the news that the owner of the apartment high rise downtown got 240 votes at the polls? What if your neighbor, going through hard times and behind on his property taxes, was turned away at the polls and denied his right to vote? Suppose there was a controversial referendum on the ballot, and lots of wealthy property owners got to cast one vote for each property they owned?

Chances are you would be indignant, as you should be.

But this is exactly the process used to elect your HOA Board of Directors  – that is, when there actually is an election – and how changes are made to your HOA CC&Rs (Covenants, Conditions & Restrictions), all those rules you must follow, or else.

Although your HOA may seem like local government, with the power to enforce penalties for various violations large and small, the fact is that your HOA is a legal corporation and not officially a government.

Therefore, the corporate voting model is used. Each property owned represents one share of the HOA, and gives the right to one vote. Unless, of course, you happen to be the Developer, in which case you have weighted votes – anywhere from three to nine votes per lot owned – during the time of construction and sale of homes. (Not that it matters for elections, because during Developer control, the Board is appointed, not elected. But it still matters for amendments to the CC&Rs.)

It doesn’t matter how many people live in your house, you still get only one vote, as long as you’re the owner. If you’re a tenant, you probably don’t get to vote at all, unless the HOA allows the owner to allocate his or her vote to a tenant.

What about that real estate investor, a friend of the Board President who just purchased 40 homes or condos in your HOA? She gets 40 votes, one for each property. It doesn’t matter that she doesn’t actually live in the community, that she’s an absentee landlord who doesn’t even manage her properties or monitor her tenants (other than to collect rent). She still gets 40 votes to your measly one vote.

As for your next-door neighbor who’s behind on her assessments due to unforeseen medical bills, and the neighbor down the street who hasn’t paid a fine for that stubborn brown spot in his lawn: their votes are not counted! Never mind that the poll tax was declared unconstitutional in 1964, with the ratification of the 24th amendment, because corporations do not necessarily have to guarantee shareholders Constitutional protections.

How might this lopsided allocation of voting rights affect your next Board election? Now imagine what will happen when the Board wants to relax rental restrictions. Who has more votes in your HOA – the full-time owner-residents or the bulk buying landlord-investors?

Contrast this to the more democratic process in conventional American communities, where each citizen who is registered to vote gets but ONE vote, regardless of income level, tax delinquency status, or number of properties owned.

The corporate allocation of voting rights practically guarantees inequity in HOAs.

Welcome to the neighborhood.

CAI To Wage Battle In Massachusetts

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Expect a ton of money to be poured into the pockets of Massachusetts legislators over the next week. What’s up? The State Senate has agreed to a ‘common sense’ bill to order condo associations to pay the legal costs of homeowners who have to sue to get financial records.

A homeowner has an absolute right to see the association’s financial documents, budgets and insurance policies. It’s basic common sense, especially for homeowners who are trying to sell their homes and move out. Mortgage companies require it. The current law mandates that those records be made available. But there’s no penalty for corporate deviants who decide they’re above such puerile requirements.

The current problem is that the bill is stalled. If the Massachusetts House doesn’t get off its collective rear end, or if a lobbyist in a legislative hallway waves a few thousand bucks around, this bill may fail due to official disinterest.

(link to Boston Globe story on condo law)

 

 

Wow! Good Numbers!

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It’s so fitting to be able to write this after two incredibly strong guest blogs by George Staropoli and Deborah Goonan. But sometime over the past 48 hours we passed another readership milestone. In the 12 month running average we have now surpassed 400,000 readers and more than 3.2 million pages of material read.

I haven’t tallied up all the readers since this website began, but I know by now it’s well over a million. So, together we really are reaching people.

Certainly, ongoing problems in the economy are bringing out the mean side in many HOAs and this obviously is causing homeowners to search the web to see if they’re all alone in their personal struggles. It’s also a strange weekend to have CAI come out with more blatantly fake polling data claiming that people in Homeowners Associations are happy with their HOAs. Both George and Deborah have written papers that prove what a sham these CAI polls are. But CAI has billions of dollars to pour into the halls of the nation’s legislatures. We’re just the people.

Yes, we’re just the people.

We’ll win.

 

Not Just HOAs! ALL Of You!

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guest blog by Deborah Goonan

There may be a tendency on the Neighbors At War website to concentrate on warning people in Homeowners Associations. But that may be too narrow a scope.

Don’t limit our audience to HOA owners. Include tenants, who make up more than 30% of HOA residents in many communities. Include home and condo buyers, particularly those who are looking for a home and true quality of life.

Savvy real estate investors who really want the HOA model and know how to work the system: We can leave them out of the equation.

But an important audience of people who SHOULD be paying attention to the big picture are the owners of non-HOA properties. You see, all taxpayers are eventually going to foot the bill for the next approaching crisis in housing, as aging, failing HOAs with insufficient funds to maintain the infrastructure turn to traditional government to solve their problems. When HOAs cannot be maintained, blight and crime increase. Property tax bases decrease along with property values.

Evan McKenzie has explained this well in Beyond Privatopia. Local governments will have to pick up at least some responsibility – and cost – of repairing crumbling roads, correcting poor drainage that leads to flooding, increased police protection for crime-infested areas, increased strain on the courts related to crime and HOA-related lawsuits, etc.

I will give you a real life example. My former HOA in Florida had a developer-owned water & sewer utility which was recently sold to the local municipality and County under an inter-local agreement.

According to the pre-purchase County-funded Engineer evaluation, the water/sewer system was in shambles, the sewer system out of compliance with FDEP since 2010, the water system with a history of sporadic water quality violations and boil water advisories. Two out of four wells were unusable, and two wells were barely enough to meet demand. The entire system needs to be rebuilt – potable and sewer treatment system, lift stations, wells, etc. The system lacks redundancy – meaning there is NO back up if a major component fails. So redundancy must be built in to bring the system up to current code. This will cost in excess of $11 million. There are about 1500 homes and a handful of commercial customers (who threaten to connect to a different utility provider). After the purchase last fall, owners received a 47% rate hike. More increases will follow. So far, it has only been HOA owners affected.

But the local news recently reported that the city who purchased the utility is “broke” and they blame the high cost of acquiring the water utility from the HOA! They are reporting there will be tax increases for City residents! So you see, the people in this municipality are going to have to pay for the former HOA developer’s deferred maintenance of a water/sewer system that is not even used by non-HOA residents.

I recently read that Fairfax County VA is seriously considering taking over maintenance of “larger” storm water ponds in HOAs. Why? Because the HOAs cannot afford to maintain them, and downstream flooding is resulting due to lack of maintenance. Who will pay for this? Fairfax County homeowners, even if they do not live in an HOA.

So, should the Neighbors at War message be aimed only at those who own homes in Homeowners Associations? My answer would be “NO!” It’s a problem for all American homeowners. You will eventually be taxed for the misdeeds of the out-of-control Homeowners Association Industry.

Community Associations Institute (The Disinformation Institute)

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guest blog by George Staropoli

Think in terms of the Third Reich and the Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, Josef Goebbels in charge.

CAI is the modern incarnation of the Ministry. If, as has happened, CAI goes unopposed with its ongoing propaganda campaign about the grand and glorious benefits of HOAs without even whispering “constitutional violations” or “de facto private governments” who will believe anything is amiss?

What? Those malcontent, troublesome homeowners who don’t know how to live in a community with rules? That handful of trouble makers? They can’t even write decent legislation! Let the CAI lawyer/lobbyists explain the issues to your legislators so you can make better decisions.

Who would you believe?

Over the years CAI in Arizona has been basically silenced in the public media, because I would confront, challenge, and expose their lunacies and false statements whenever I could.

In the 2000 – 2005 time period the CAI repeatedly slandered homeowner advocates. We often heard statements from legislators like, “You’re just trying to get out of a contract.” “You agreed and you should have read your contract.” “Anyone who didn’t read or understand their CC&Rs and signed anyway was really stupid. I wouldn’t do anything like that.” Or even worse, “If you don’t like your HOA, just move out. That’s all!”

This year the Arizona Legislature approved SB 1482 without any questions being raised in committee. The bill was simply voted on and passed. Why? An almost identical bill was passed last year but failed in the courts. Also last year I repeatedly confronted and exposed CAI simply by quoting erroneous statements their lobbyists had made in public. Many legislators began to realize CAI was feeding them bad information. Of course, the previous law was eventually thrown out by the courts because it was fundamentally illegal.

However, CAI lobbyists still walk the halls of the legislatures whispering in each lawmaker’s ear, spreading the same old disinformation. This will never change unless voters contact their legislators and truly educate them on the issues.