Category Archives: racketeering

HOA Murderer Commits Suicide

It won’t satisfy the families of the victims, but it’s just another chapter in the world of ‘HOA Amerika’. The killer of two HOA board members has committed suicide.

Dr. Mahmoud Hindi was a doctor and a homeowner in the Spring Creek Homeowners Association in Louisville, Kentucky. (Most news reporters are ‘goosey’ about using the HOA’s name.) The neighborhood is quite a high-end development, but Hindi’s next door neighbors were officers on the HOA board. And Hindi felt they were perpetually tormenting him over minor code violations. So he walked into a 2012 board meeting in a local church and gunned the two men down.

Hindi wasn’t shy about telling police exactly what he had done and his murder trial was set to begin next year. But a couple days ago, Hindi committed suicide by hanging himself in his jail cell.

There’s nothing that can excuse first degree murder. But the case does provide more insight into how constant torment by neighbors can drive a homeowners over the brink. It’s not the first time a homeowner has fired a gun and taken lives during an HOA board meeting. Sadly, it probably won’t be the last.

(click here for story on Hindi)

 

Elder Abuse– Dr. Gary Solomon

Nevada psychologist and Homeowners Rights advocate Dr. Gary Solomon has an incredible way with words; cogent, insightful, powerful. His paper on ‘HOA Syndrome’ made headlines. His paper on elder abuse in Homeowners Associations is absolutely worth printing out, and possibly mailing out to some of your HOA neighbors.

Dr. Solomon believes that elderly homeowners are intentionally farmed by HOA management companies because they have trouble fighting back, and this 50 billion dollar a year lawsuit machine creates unbelievable financial and medical distress for hundreds of thousands, possibly even millions of elderly homeowners across the country.

Do yourself a favor and read his elder abuse paper linked below. If HOA abuse of elderly homeowners is ever stemmed, Dr. Solomon will have been one of the three or four national leaders who made it happen.

http://www.texashoareform.org/Documents/HOA-Elder-Abuse.pdf

 

Ugliness Over Wittenberg Decision

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)

 

 

Will That Be Cash, Check, or Foreclosure?

guest blog by Nila Ridings
 
$70,000 to $90,000 per condo owner is what’s needed to repair major structural problems since the reserve account is bone dry.
 
Victor Salcana and his wife saved to purchase in Colina Condominium Complex in South San Francisco. She’s joined the board hoping to become a miracle worker and keep all 144 unit owners from having to write these checks…or go into foreclosure, if they don’t.
 
Richard Munson, President of the California Association of Homeowners Associations says, “Mismanagement of HOAs is widespread.”  And since boards are generally lay people and property managers aren’t required to be licensed it’s the blind leading the blind.  Who couldn’t have guessed that?  
 
Once again, listen to the adage…the best day in an HOA is the day you move out!
 

“He fought for the flag and we’ll die for the flag!” ~Louise Helton

guest blog by Nila Ridings
 
This story has reduced me to tears!
 
I hold a special place in my heart for aviators, veterans, and the American flag.
 
In the course of his 92 years, Mr. Helton of McDonough, Georgia has VOLUNTEERED to fight in 3 wars for the United States of America.  He fought for my freedom and yours. He fought for these ungrateful, insensitive, and brain-dead board members, too!  Today, He sits in his chair with his aviator’s shirt on. He is devastated. And he can’t hold back the tears.
 
Why?  
 
Because four board members from the Village At Spring Creek HOA marched themselves to his front door and ordered him to take the America flag off his house or they will fine him $25 per day.  And one of them said, “If you don’t take it down, I’ll take it down!”
 
If you’ve read this far please think about what I am about to say.  Do we really and truly want the last years, months, days, or hours of life on this earth for those who have sacrificed so much for each of us to be spent in the greatest battle of their lives to be with their Homeowners Association?  The Helton’s have lived in this HOA hellhole less than one year. President George W. Bush signed into law the RIGHT to fly the American flag in 2005 so any of us who wish to fly it could freely do so.
 
This story makes me feel more and more like our enemies are not on foreign soil. They are right here living next door and down the street.  Every single story I read about HOAs cements that belief for me. 
 
Please join me in our efforts to stop this insanity by flying your American flag today.  
 
United we can and will make a difference!