What is the Purpose of an HOA?

To me, the purposes of an Association is to (in order):

1) Maintain common property and/or common amenities
2) Provide services specified in the governing documents (trash/recycling services, etc.)
3) Pay common expenses, if any (street lights, water, etc.)
4) Obtain and keep adequate liability insurance and other required insurance
5) Pay applicable taxes and fees to ensure ability to continue providing 1-4 above.
6) If authorized, enforce the covenants and restrictions of the CC&Rs.
7) As authorized by the governing documents, set and collect assessments to perform all of the above.

If an Association is able to do all of the above items it may help in making the properties appear to be a place one would like to live in. This may or may not influence potential buyers so homes that are for sale sell quickly. Will that maintain property values? Maybe.

Property values are based on so many other things that are out of control of the Association that it's really impossible for the Association to actually protect property values. Is there a lot of crime in the area? Do the surrounding neighborhoods look like a war zone? Are the schools performing? What commerce is in the area? Are their employment opportunities nearby? Is the new Highway or commuter rail going right by the property? What are the city/county taxes like? etc. etc. etc.


Kathy, how do you believe your Association protects (or can protect) your property value?


Would you elaborate on what you mean?

Is it that their is no consequences or that the Association fails to enforce?
Sometimes the Association fails to enforce because of the individuals who are serving don't want to enforce OR because they simply don't have the time required to enforce (as volunteers they can only dedicate x amount of time and that may not be enough time to do everything).


An Association must do what is legal.
Sometimes (perhaps often) what is legal is not always what is fair.

The governing documents should specify what elements of the community the Association is to maintain. If you don't agree with what the documents specify, then there is a way for those documents to be amended.


You cannot control how the meeting is ran unless you are in charge of the meeting.
You cannot control what decisions are made unless you are part of the decision process.

My suggestion, gather support and solicit proxies (if allowed) so you control the votes to get yourself and other like minded neighbors elected to the Board. Once on the Board you can make the decisions that are needed.

If not elected, perhaps you can still volunteer to serve on the architectural committee or compliance committee and help turn things around.

Hope this helps,

Tim

The first thing you need to do, Kathy, as Tim points out is to get yourself and others--who feel your HOA needs to better enforce the rules-- elected to the Board.

It sounds like you & others also need to have a solid understanding of your HOA's budget--you may have more expenses than you think. It's possible that a couple of little parties a year are the least of what should concern you. What %, for example, of your annual budget do those parties cost your HOA?

How many on your board-3? How many seats up for election? You are under homeowner, vs. developer, control, right?

Re: HOA's purpose. You can search high & low and will not find in your governing docs that the purpose of your HOA is to protect your property values.

But you will find the your Association's responsibilities & duties. The first is to PROTECT your Association, which, drawing from Tim's list, requires insurance, payment of taxes, payment of your common area expenses, e.g., water, etc, and providing the services specified in your CC&Rs, e.g., trash.

Next the Board's duty is to MAINTAIN the common areas, Tim's #1. I'd add making sure there's adequate funds in your reserves account to repair/replace common area items that will wear out, e.g., your entry sign, fences.

Here we also might include enforcing the rules in your governing documents concerning architectural approvals, enforcing other rules regarding parking and private yard maintenance. As Tim suggests, these aesthetic matters can be done by the Board or by some sort of Rules or Compliance Committee that the bird appoints.

Third, I think, is to ENHANCE your common areas, e.g., upgrading fencing, signage, entrance plantings.

But, Kathy, I respectfully suggest that complaining to this forum isn't going to improve your HOA--only the action of you & your neighbors banding together will.

actually:

to maintain the FEDERALLY MANDATED and COMMONLY OWNED

storm water retention / sediment control / filtration (of run-off) systems

which are MANDATED by the Clean Water Act of 1972 and its 1985 ammendments

the 'premium' lakefront lot(s) actually abut an engineered storm water retention pond which WILL require dredging with HEAVY equipment every 15-20 years

CAVEAT EMPTOR

Mel said:

A HOA is only funded by it's members for it's members. A HOA can create or resolve the rules it wants to live under/by. A HOA is both a quasi government/corporation of which each owner is a stock holder or member of. The power to make change is in your own hands when you move into a HOA. You can be apathetic or in charge. The choice is yours if you get involved and educate yourself.

I agree. Educate yourself and get involved. You have the power, now learn how to use it.

Thank you for your comments.
I was on the Board and served as "member at large". I worked hard to improve the neighborhood and its' appearance, and I kept homeowners more informed, which was severely lacking in the past.
I was up against apathetic homeowners and apathetic Board members. Out of 4 total Board members, two were incapable of comprehending basic logic, reason and procedure regarding our governing documents. The other Board member was sane and supported me privately, but would not speak up enough at meetings. I was on my own. I finally quit early to save my sanity.

The ongoing problem is, we do not have a management company that takes care of violations, Board members are supposed to be doing this, but no one wants to be the bad guy, so violations persist, and homeowners know there are no consequences, so violations would persist anyway. It was suggested at last years annual meeting to add some kind of consequences for repeated violations, homeowners shot this down.

In my opinion, it would be a waste of money to hire a management company to handle violations if no amendment is created to add consequences. It's a catch 22 situation.

To follow up on my original question...
Although it isn't stated verbatim that the purpose of the HOA is to protect property values, if the rules already in place were actually enforced (and complied with), our neighborhood would be more attractive to potential buyers and properties would be better maintained so as to keep property values up. So, is it not presumed that the end result and purpose of having an Association is to maintain a certain quality standard for the neighborhood that is in place to keep property values up?

Carol, I apologize if I sounded like I was complaining, but my original comment was on topic and appropriate for this forum. I see people complaining about various things all the time here. I was just looking for some fresh, positive input on a very dysfunctional HOA.
Thank you again for all your responses.

So, Kathy, are you saying that your HOA doesn't list penalties--a schedule of fines-- in its governing documents?

But even if in place, it wouldn't seem to do any good, if your Board won't do its job. And I imagine it wold be difficult in a community of your size.

You say you left the Board due to lack of support from Owners, but it sounds like quite a few are unhappy now that your board isn't doing its job. What would happen if all who are concerned went to the next meeting and spoke up about your dissatisfaction? Sometimes group pressure, politely applied can really be effective.

You say that homeowners "shot" down" an attempt to add consequences. How? Was there a ballot item? Or was this just a straw vote? Or?

I'm puzzled about why you have a board of four? Is that in your bylaws? Most are odd numbers to try to avoid tie votes.

Typically an HOA is created to make more money for a developer. Let's say your city requires 200ft of road frontage per lot. You only have 200 ft of frontage from the city owned road, but you have 100 acres, so according to this, you can only have one lot.

Now....... lets say you create your own road and break up that 100 acres into 100 lots, 1 acre each, each with 200ft of road frontage on your new private road. Now your making money. It would be too expensive to make a road that would conform with city standards, so you make your own cheap road and an association to own and maintain the road.

Just one example.

My Association has similar language.

Per your bolding, the Association, or any owner, has the right (authority) to enforce. That paragraph specifies no requirement. In fact, that paragraph acknowledges that there is no requirement to enforce by specifying that failure to enforce now does not nay-gate the option to enforce later.


No. I interpret that section to specify what the assessments are to be used for. It doesn't require that assessments be spent, it just says that if assessments are to be spent, they shall only be spent on one of the following a,b,c.

As an example, lets say that your parties are to promote recreational use of the properties. Since recreation is one of the things the CC&Rs say assessments can be spent on, the Association is free to chose to use the funds for parties or not. However, there is no requirement that the Association sponsor parties.


I suppose that an argument could be made for that. Of course, since members have this same right/authority to enforcement, if a member chose not to spend their money on enforcement, would they be negligent? Regardless of who may be negligent, the answer would have to come from the courts.

If it did go to court, as a layman, I would have to ask why a member of an Association would bother to take their Association to court over non-enforcement when that same individual had the same authority to take their neighbor to court to resolve the violation. This question may limit the members credibility in the case.

Perhaps its a fiduciary decision by the Board. Per your own posting, there is no teeth in the enforcement clause of the documents. I'll interpret that to mean that the Association may not fine and is limited to proceedings at law or in equity. This would mean that your Association could send out notices to ask for compliance but the only way to achieve compliance is to take the violator to court (a proceeding of law/equity) for a court injunction to force compliance.

Lets look at this in reality, are you going to incur the expense of attorney fees and court costs every time someone leaves their trash can out too long? What about if they leave park in the wrong space. The common sense answer is NO.

The costs involved simply doesn't equal the benefits received. Additionally, if the Association did use the courts for all the minor violations, there is the unintended consequences of the development getting a reputation of being "sue happy." This can result in Realtors steering potential buyers away from the development. The courts could see it as a waste of the courts time and when something big happens that needs to be litigated, the Association may not be given the benefit of any doubt in the case.

Hope this helps,

Tim

Kathy

I am not nor do I play a lawyer.

You ask:

If one of the purposes of assessments is enforcement, and the Association has the right to do so, but Declarant (the builder) is out of the picture, do you interpret this as meaning that my Association is "required" to enforce?

If the association has been turned over to the owners then your docs have not been updated to show such. Thus when it comes to the Declarant being mentioned, read through/skip the references as they mean nothing anymore.

Having the right to do something does not mean one must do something.

I interpret this as, if my Association is not enforcing (or at least attempting to enforce) then the Association is not using assessments for one of the three intended purposes and therefore negligent in its' duties.

Novel approach. Bottom line is the same. They have to right to do so but they are not required (must) to do so thus if they are not doing such, they are not negligent. You cannot force them to do what they do not want to do as it does not say they "must" do it.

As I see it you have two choices. You as an individual owner are allowed to sue. Very costly and time consuming and I suggest you do not do so. The most prudent and the most expedient path is to get yourself and like miinded thinkers elected to the BOD and run the place as you see fit, including enforcing whatevers.

Keep in mind if you get control of the BOD then some fellow owners may come on here and say our new BOD is nitpicking us to death. How do we get rid of them? Then we can advise them how to get you off the BOD.......LOL

Hope this helps.

Taking anyone to court is the last thing I would ever want to do.

Just wanted to add, I'm not a lawyer, but doesn't the word "and" mean that assessments are to be used for all a, b and c?
I am beginning to understand that Associations are not "required" to enforce.

Tim, you are correct, according to the "purpose of assessments", parties are an acceptable use of funds.

Brian, you are right too. I've come to the conclusion that HOA's are just builder propaganda to get people to buy their homes and lots.

John, I am just asking for basic standards of maintenance, when your grass (and weeds) gets to knee height, mow it. No auto mechanics business in your driveway. Nothing remotely close to nitpicking. No amenities to speak of here and neighbors do what they want, and paint their houses & landscape without approval anyway.

It comes down to a basic lack of respect from neighbors who, if you say anything, will turn it around like you are the one being disrespectful. That's just the bad side of human nature coming out I guess. No one wants to be told what to do even though they legally agreed to abide by certain rules when they purchased their homes.

Anyway, I see the neighborhood declining, the same homeowners with the same violations. We can only lead by example, but you can't change people who just don't care. I naively thought we had some protection from trash as members of a mandatory Association required to pay mandatory assessments, which if I don't pay, they can take my house.

I would only consider taking someone to court if I had my house up for sale and it wasn't selling for months and months AND I could prove that buyers weren't buying my house for a specific, provable violation stated in my DCCR's.

....to repeat

I think that Tim has a good idea, Kathy. Perhaps there's a dept. in your municipal agency that would enforce really overgrown yards?

I still wonder if your HOA has any sort of written penalty structure--a schedule of fines for various types violations perhaps?