MattO (California)
Posts: 1
Posts: 1
Posted:
Hi there I have just been named the new president of my condo associations HOA. I want to know what are my abilities to set new rules to protect the HOA and the residents from the costs of having to hire a lawyer to communicate with an owner who is not a resident and threatens to sue the HOA at the drop of a hat. And how do I go about limiting a non resident owners rights if possible and setting rules to deal with threats from people who own property in this building but do not live here in the future.
It is a building built in 1964 with 35 units. Five of the units are rented out by their owners and for the most part the rest of the units are lived in by their owners and there are a few units that have non resident owners with family members living in their property.
Previously there was a law suit brought against the HOA and the previous board by one of the owners who does not reside in the building. Long Story short: This owner along with his sister inherited their parents place. They have let their cousin live in the unit with his wife. Apparently this owner did a remodel of his unit and installed a washer dryer against the rules and had vent put in during the instillation. These vents allowed water into the building damaging his property and one of his neighbors.
Sounds pretty cut and dry that this was a result of his actions and should be his fault. Normally yes but it turns out this owner is a lawyer and sued the HOA saying the leak was caused by holes in the roof, not his instillation of the washer dryer. Due to the possibility of losing big in a court case the previous HOA was settled and this guy makes off with 20k in damages. It defies logic almost.
So now the HOA has lost a lot of money in legal fees and costs dealing with this. The case has been settled and the previous board has resigned and a new board is in it's place. The previous board hired a manager to handle our collections and payments along with the other financial duties. Since the managerial parts of the HOA have been contracted out the new board is now responsible for the community responsibilities and not management.
The owner who sued seems to only communicate through his lawyer, who is his friend and working for free, and seeks to intimidate with the threats of lawsuits. This forces the HOA to have a lawyer respond to him. As you can imagine this could get very costly. As time goes on this building will find itself with more non resident owners and their renters or tenants. If all of them acted like this then it would quickly bankrupt the HOA in legal fees just to send communications that normal people just get told freely. This building has a lot of older tenants and their children may inherit their units in time. If they choose to live here then great. But if they don't then that owner should have limits placed on them to prevent their actions from having possible financial effects on the community that they are not apart of.
I want to know if I can put limits on the rights of an owner who does not reside in the building. What I would like to do is put a rule in place that if a owner requires the HOA to hire a lawyer to communicate with them that they be forced to pay for that lawyers service. This way a person who does not live here can not deplete the HOA's reserve accounts and force the rest of the community to be assessed to pay for these services.
Basically make it so that there is no incentive for any person act in this manor when all they need to do is communicate with free non costly and disruptive means. This HOA should deal with normal stuff like tree trimming and pool maintenance not have to hire lawyers because some owner who does not even live in this building but likes to use the legal system as a stick to beat people with because he can.
Sorry for a long post but I wanted to give you a picture what I am dealing with and get any advice on protecting the community.
It is a building built in 1964 with 35 units. Five of the units are rented out by their owners and for the most part the rest of the units are lived in by their owners and there are a few units that have non resident owners with family members living in their property.
Previously there was a law suit brought against the HOA and the previous board by one of the owners who does not reside in the building. Long Story short: This owner along with his sister inherited their parents place. They have let their cousin live in the unit with his wife. Apparently this owner did a remodel of his unit and installed a washer dryer against the rules and had vent put in during the instillation. These vents allowed water into the building damaging his property and one of his neighbors.
Sounds pretty cut and dry that this was a result of his actions and should be his fault. Normally yes but it turns out this owner is a lawyer and sued the HOA saying the leak was caused by holes in the roof, not his instillation of the washer dryer. Due to the possibility of losing big in a court case the previous HOA was settled and this guy makes off with 20k in damages. It defies logic almost.
So now the HOA has lost a lot of money in legal fees and costs dealing with this. The case has been settled and the previous board has resigned and a new board is in it's place. The previous board hired a manager to handle our collections and payments along with the other financial duties. Since the managerial parts of the HOA have been contracted out the new board is now responsible for the community responsibilities and not management.
The owner who sued seems to only communicate through his lawyer, who is his friend and working for free, and seeks to intimidate with the threats of lawsuits. This forces the HOA to have a lawyer respond to him. As you can imagine this could get very costly. As time goes on this building will find itself with more non resident owners and their renters or tenants. If all of them acted like this then it would quickly bankrupt the HOA in legal fees just to send communications that normal people just get told freely. This building has a lot of older tenants and their children may inherit their units in time. If they choose to live here then great. But if they don't then that owner should have limits placed on them to prevent their actions from having possible financial effects on the community that they are not apart of.
I want to know if I can put limits on the rights of an owner who does not reside in the building. What I would like to do is put a rule in place that if a owner requires the HOA to hire a lawyer to communicate with them that they be forced to pay for that lawyers service. This way a person who does not live here can not deplete the HOA's reserve accounts and force the rest of the community to be assessed to pay for these services.
Basically make it so that there is no incentive for any person act in this manor when all they need to do is communicate with free non costly and disruptive means. This HOA should deal with normal stuff like tree trimming and pool maintenance not have to hire lawyers because some owner who does not even live in this building but likes to use the legal system as a stick to beat people with because he can.
Sorry for a long post but I wanted to give you a picture what I am dealing with and get any advice on protecting the community.