updating documents

I was just reading about updating documents. Our condo association began in 1981. WIthin the past two years we have changed managers and the Master Deed is written as though the old manager is still the manager. This was actually changed with just a majority vote at our annual meeting last year. And this was actually an amendemt to the Master Deed that actually requred a highte percentage of votes to pass. It passed by just 2 votes.
Do you think we should spend money to update our documents. Some people including our President want to return to the old manager which was a church organization. Thanks for your thoughts on this subject. Oh our owners have been told we have saved money by separating from this church organization when it has actually cost us more. We did not use to have to pay for copies and we had a $2,000 lawyer bill last year.

Bonnie - confirm your terms. You use the words "under" and then 'management company" and then "church" to describe who is running your organization.

Did your organization break away and establish its own HOA corporation, with your own bylaws, board, rules, etc.? This would account for the lawyer's fee.

It' s unusual for the Master Deed to be changed simply because the board decided to change management companies.

we are trying to change the Master Deed simply because the Board decided to change management companies. Updating our Master Deed and bylaws was talked about long before we hired our current management company. Prior to hiring our current PM we were self managed from March 2010 to October 2013. That was not any fun.

Actually it wasn't a management company per say that was written into our Master Deed. The Master Deed states that the church organization will manage the condominium and 100% vote is needed to relieve the church organization of its management duties. Shortly after I moved in there was some major problems with our financial report. Some of our owners accused the Care Center (owned by the church organization) of theft. Remember I wasn't on the Board at that time so I don't know the whole story.

Long story short at the annual meeting a vote was taken (I was not on the Board at the time) and the vote was 16 to 14 to relieve the church organization of management duties. I don't want to go into detail about what happened after that vote was taken February 2010 to October 2013 when our current PM was hired. I will just say we had problems up the yehu.

The church organization was our declarant. The church organization is repeatedly referred to as the declarant in our Master Deed. I have studied NE law and to me it seems we don't have a declarant. (Our lawyer is checking on this for us). But when I mentioned at a Board meeting that the church organization may not be our declarant a Board member go upset. So I just said something to the affect that our lawyer will check and this and dropped the subject.

BonnieG1, When our management company takes over management for an HOA one responsibility is to review and become familiar with all of the controlling documents. Often we find these to be out of date and lacking in important items. We recommend to the Board important amendments which we feel are needed and the reasons why. Thus, I think it common for other management companies to do likewise.

The "Declarant" is the entity filing the original Declaration of CC&Rs (Master Deed), commonly the Developer. When amending old CC&Rs we often recommend "Amending and Restating" the entire document, including eliminating all references to Declarant and updating as necessary.

You are wise, Bonnie to have an attorney interpret your documents for you. No point in speculating.

True this was an old post, but the OP, Bonnie, reactivated it herself. I'm with you though Tim. I think new threads are the best way to go. I'll do that within the next day or two mainly because I don't know how to find my old spots.--well, I've never actually trie.

Actually, I didn't realize I resurrection one of my old threads. I do agree that new threads are the way to go.

Bonnie is a legit member of her HOA board and has posted here many times, JohnB! I do think we could offer her better advice if she'd stick to each current topic instead of revisiting the past president, etc.

Bonnie
Is the issue still live or did your HOA get past it?

The issue is still alive. I hope to have a member vote at our annual meeting to place ourselves under the authority of the condominium laws for the condominiums established after January 1, 1984. Our lawyer is reviewing this and will give us the pros and cons.

I have also studied the newer condominium laws and have my own idea of the pros and cons.

If we do place ourselves under the newer laws, then IMO it will be easier to update our documents.

If we don't place ourselves under the newer laws, updating documents will require much more work as individual items may need to be voted on as amendments to the documents.