Liability Insurance for our HOA

Currently, our HOA is NOT active. Our development had one set up back in 1999 when the developer began this project, however he abandoned us, and walked away over 10 years ago. We have our covenants filed in the courthouse, and our status with the Colorado Secretary of State is that we're administratively dissolved. I am currently querying the 23 property owners regarding re-activating our association.
Basically, we are in a very rural area, with about 32 single residence properties, of which there are only 5 homes at present. The balance is just vacant lands. We do have 320 acres of community property in the center of a loop drive. Given that we have about 5 miles of gravel roads, which are low speed driving, and the vacant 320 acres of community property, I don't see a huge risk presented here that we need a lot of insurance for.
Do the forum members agree with me? Any ideas on what a policy might cost?

I live in an HOA in Florida and we must have liability as far as I know.

I think your bigger problem is that your HOA is disolved. At this point the home owners can chose not to join the HOA anymore and then they can pretty much do what the want. Now the question is, who is paying for the maintenance necessary on the "common" property. I think in Florida the state would assign something like a trustee and they take over from there, until the HOA is capable incorporating and forming a board again. But I might be wrong.

Cheers
Karl

Sorry, didn't mean to post 3 times, my bad.

I know that the other property owners may not want to join a re-activated HOA. Our covenants say that if 2/3's of the owners want to revamp the HOA, we can. So, at this point, we're just querying the owners to see if there is mutual interest?
There is no maintenance being done on our community property at all. The 5 miles of gravel roads are being graded as best I can by yours truly, out of my own pocket.
The question of insurance was raised by a property owner, so that's why I'm addressing here, for starters.

There are 32 lots here, with a few owners having more than one, so we have 23 owners in all.
The 320 acres of community property is listed in the County records as being owned by the long defunct development corporation. The County officials tell me that the zero taxes being charged on this land, is being compensated for by having each lot owner assessed for it. The roads aren't deeded to anyone, but are on a plat map of our development. At present, we're just in the process of querying the owners to see if they want an association, and an owner brought up the question on the cost of insurance.
As for the developer fears you mention, I am concerned. He had the covenants wrote to favor his interests, and was sly about retaining controls until he sells off all the lots, which he retained one... Currently though, he's walked away from us 10 years ago. I mailed him a certified letter, and after two delivery attempts it was returned. So, either he was gone, or refused it.

Dave,

To answer your initial question on liability insurance. If there is no Active Association and an accident happens on that road and it's determined that there is partial responsibility due to improper maintenance, then each property owner can be sued for contributory negligence.

Just because the Corporation known as your HOA is administratively dissolved doesn't mean that someone can't revive it or create a new Association. The requirement to be a member of the Association would be based on your deed restrictions and nothing else. I would strongly suggest that your group of owners get together, talk to an attorney and petition the court for control of the Association. Otherwise, it's possible whoever buys the undeveloped lots will revive the Association and none of you will have any say or control because they will have the majority vote.

Tim

The best way of determining who owns the roads is to view the plat. In our development the road easements lie on either side of the property lines and corner markers tend to be on one side of the road or the other. In some places, there was an existing county road that formed the property lines. For those lots, the plat shows a property line down the center of the road. Since it would not be advisable to set a marker in the road, the surveyors set the kind of markers you described next to the road. The plat shows the exact distance from the roadside marker to the actual corner of the property.

It is also possible that the road lies between the property lines. This would raise the question as to who owns the road. If your county records are not viewable online you will need to go to the recorder's office and start looking at maps and deeds.

Check your state laws. In Arizona, for example, members of an association cannot be held liable for its debts.

Insurance policies are a double-edged sword. They protect the policy holder from liability but draw hungry lawyers looking for the big score.

that may be true, but if someone gets hurt on HOA land does Arizona state law prohibit them from suing homeowners (stakeholders) for damages? Hungry lawyers love multi party lawsuits, greater chance at a big score