This one happened right under my nose here in the Denver area. The Denver vicinity, as some of you know, is home to one of the biggest HOA embezzling cases in the country. A management company stole homeowners blind in a largely minority community. But these homeowners were smart enough to catch this jerk. The bitterness, though, never really goes away.
Now there’s another incident, this one in the same part of town. David W. Martin, PMG Enterprises Inc., has had to surrender his state license to manage Homeowners Associations. He may be the first to do so under Colorado’s new licensing law. The law isn’t perfect. It has very few teeth and some appointed state officials who are really out of their league.
For the record, here’s a link to the story in the Denver Business Journal.
The daughter of a Nashville family nearly died after accidentally getting a window blind cord wrapped around her neck. But their HOA won’t let them put up safer blinds.
This one is personal to me because a close friend had this happen to his child. His son was playing in the basement standing on a chair pretending the window blind cord was a lasso. My friend heard things suddenly go quiet and went downstairs to check. His son was hanging by the neck, the cord wrapped around his throat. He saved his son and the paramedics took the child to the hospital. He lived. But many others across the country have died.
How does an HOA board have the gall to forbid the use of safer blinds?
Christmas. What a wonderful holiday. I love it as much as I love Hanukkah and the Seder and all the other religious holidays. In fact, I love any religious person’s special days. It’s just what we do in America.
But why, oh why, are Homeowners Associations coming down so hard on holiday lights? I get it that some light displays are over the top. I get it that gorgeous light displays bring more traffic into a neighborhood. But the greater spirit I see during the holidays satisfies an inner part of my soul. Homeowners Associations, as far as I know, are the only entity in America where expressing your religious beliefs is verboten.
The Illinois Supreme Court has handed down some pretty goofy decisions on behalf of Homeowners Associations. I loved the one last year, the ruling that gave untrained, private HOA security guards police powers, the ability to pull over motorists and hand out tickets.
This latest one is a humdinger. It makes any new buyer of a condo responsible for all unpaid assessments, fines and legal costs run up by the previous owner IF it fails to pay the first monthly assessment on time. Once again, ask yourself what financial organization in its right corporate mind would invest in an HOA? And if you can’t find lenders, what does that do to property values?
I blogged about the Cobblestone Community Homeowners Association a few days ago, but the update linked below is worth reading. While I can refute this reporter’s claim that “Most homeowners’ associations work and work well….” Hmmm, this leads me to believe this reporter is a novice. In truth, every Homeowners Association is one vote away from disaster. They don’t protect property values, they don’t ensure personal security, they don’t protect you from embezzlers on the board or in the management company.
The lawyer quoted in the story says he’s frustrated. Of course he is. He knows how dangerous HOAs can be!
