HOA required to provide snowplowing

Started by SherryG1 • 4 replies • 1646 views

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SherryG1 (Montana)
Posts: 7

Posted:

This is a small RV/mobile home park located in Montana where some winters do get lots of snow. We spent over $1500 this past winter to provide this service. Normally it runs 800 to 1200. Originally, this park was setup as permanent residents for the mobile homes (currently only about 7 of 15 mobile homes have residents)and seasonal for the RV/park model lots. Over the past few years 2 of the RV lots have residents during the winter months.

My question is whether the HOA is required to provide this service? There has been heated discussions at every budget year meeting over this subject. I hear statements such as:
1. Required because of our Insurance.
2. Required because emergency vehicles must be able to reach the lots.
3. I'm a member of a HOA in town and they don't provide snowplowing.

Thanks for your feedback.

TimB4 (Tennessee)
Posts: 21,059

Posted:

Sherry,

What is required would be within your governing documents.

If the Association owns and maintains the roads, then I would be of the opinion that snow plowing would be part of maintaining the road.

If the Association owns and maintains the roads and they do not plow the roads, then there is the possibility of liability if someone was injured or emergency response vehicles were detained. This liability would be determined by a judge.

If the Association owns and maintains the roads, the Insurance may or may not require that it be plowed in order to have the coverage. You will need to check with the insurance company.

If the roads are owned by the city/County, then the responsibility for plowing and maintaining the roads would be theirs and the Association could be in trouble if they do plow and the plow damages something.

Tim

SteveM9 (Massachusetts)
Posts: 3,699

Posted:

Was it setup as seasonal or full time residents? If seasonal, you could just close in the winter.

BruceF1 (Connecticut)
Posts: 2,535

Posted:

For what it's worth, our roads are private (common elements). The documents state the association is responsible for maintaining common elements and limited common elements, which include driveways. The association takes care of snow removal from the roads AND the driveways. Homeowners are prohibited from applying sealers to driveways since they are maintained by the HOA. Our roads cannot be accepted by the town because they are too narrow for public roadways.

That's one of the big gripes of the homeowners. We are an adult community so we don't have children in the school system. Our taxes are the same as those of everyone else in the community (town), yet we don't receive the same services (no children in school and no roadway maintenance). There was a bill before the state legislature a couple of years ago that would have provided a property tax exemption to homeowners whose roads were privately maintainted, but it died in committee.

The upside to having roads that are privately maintained is that when it comes to snow removal our contractor is ready to move before the first snowflake falls. If we were plowed by the town, our roads would be a lower priority than the main roads which have to be cleared first.

Yes, for us liability for not having the roads cleared is an issue.

But, you need to check your documents

EW4 (West Virginia)
Posts: 95

Posted:

Our HOA has private roads. We take care of the snow removal via a private contractor. Budget about $5k/ year and usually come in at less. That is $43/ househould. The exception is 2 years ago doing the blizzards in the East when we hit 16K. Our libility are the roads.

Driveways are taken care of by homeowners as they own them.

Bid the work out now and get quotes from several contractors, get references and ensure the contractor carries all of the necessary insurance. In our last bid we found a outstanding contractor who was 15% cheaper, does not charge a seperate trip charge.

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