Should the HOA take resonsibility for a sellers disclosure regarding common property?

I have a question similar to another recent topic, Subject: Ethical dilemma.
My question is
Should a condominium HOA take responsibility for providing the seller's disclosure for the portions of the property that the HOA is responsible for maintaining? In my case it is even more tricky in that the board removes most of the detail from the attic and crawlspace inspection and does not reveal what has been done about problems previously reported. They also warn homeowners not to go into the attic or crawlspaces without board permission. They haven't mentioned the roof yet but I suppose they would add that to the forbidden list too if I asked. So they are doing their best to keep homeowners ignorant of whatever problems should be disclosed. How can you blame a homeowner for not disclosing what he can't find out?

Eric

The problem with Melissa at times is she or he fails to fully read the question. In your case, you were asking the association's responsibility to the seller. As the seller is the member of the association and is fully entitled to the documentation of the association, the association will need to follow state statues in compiling with the seller in providing full disclosure about the complex, defects, litigation, delinquencies and so on.

Eric,

I believe that the seller is responsible for answering only those questions for which he has knowledge. Therefore, he has no duty to provide an answer about the structural condition of the property if he does not know it. Unless the law requires a disclosure from the association I do not think they are obligated to respond even though they may or may not have knowledge.

My own experience has been that lenders will want to see a recent termite inspection report before they will lend. That means that someone has to get into the attics and crawl spaces. If the association is uncooperative with the inspection the deal will likely not go through. FHA is even more of a stickler and they will send their own inspector to assess the property before underwriting a loan. No access to some areas may be enough to scuttle the loan.

During the sales process, many would-be buyers will employ a home inspector (on the buyer's dime). The inspector will typically ask for access to the attic, roof, and crawl space. A wise buyer would walk away from the deal if his inspector is denied access by the association.

This brings up the question of what is wrong with the current owners? They are allowing the board to deliberately keep them in the dark about the condition of what may be the largest investment they will ever make. If the board is concealing the condition of the property from the owners, what else is the board hiding?

True. An audit, a financial review and a compilation are indeed different services provided by CPA's.

Typically, a financial review is all that is needed in most associations. Having just finished our second financial review, I can assure you that the CPA does look at the assessment ledgers, deposits, expense receipts, checks issued, bank statements, reserves and financial statements the Association publishes.

What they do not do is contact vendors to verify that the work the expense was for was actually completed.

Audits, mainly due to government regulations, now cost several thousand dollars to have performed. Financial reviews are much less expensive (we had three years of records reviewed for $1600).

Here is more info on audits and financial reviews from a previous thread:
Subject: Financial Audits, Reviews or Compilation Which do you use?

I am talking about meetings that would be open but are not being announced. The board has a creative interpretation of our outdated bylaws to justify having secret meetings by e-mail and telephone. They say they can have an e-mail "electronic vote" in two circumstances, where the issue is minor or important. (That pretty much covers all issues.) To the board, emergency meetings are synonymous with secret meetings, no notice to the homeowners, no opportunity to attend. I already know that this behavior is legally wrong so I'm not asking for advice on this new can of worms I opened while answering a question.

I didn't put monthly financial reports on my list because I have been able to get those although I have had to request them each month and nothing was posted to the management company website for a full year until I started up again asking for the financials. That tells me probably nobody else is scrutinizing the financial reports. The numbers tell a much worse situation than the rosey self-complimenting words coming from board publications.

The areas of the unit the OP is referring to is common area, which is owned and maintained by the association (owner), therefore the owner must disclose any defects they are aware of.

Eric,

I don't see the conflict.

The condo act requires all meetings to be open to the membership.
The Corporate law allows for actions without meetings.

VA laws have similar language to what you and I cited. Basically, the action without meeting should be used sparingly and not to circumvent open meetings. For VA, any action without meeting requires written unanimous consent of all directors. Some examples for when we have used action without meetings include: authorize funds to remove storm damaged trees, authorize signing contract (after the board had discussed the contract in an open meeting and simply needed a price finalized).

I think the citation you included is key to the issue. There is also a key word within the issue:


Since the word "may" is used, that indicates that a final decision has not been determined by the courts or legislature. As I, and many other posters on here have posted before, e-mail should be minimal between board members for this very reason.

Eric,

As I said, your Board may have the legal right to utilize action without meetings. I also agree that, from your postings, your Board is abusing this right and very well may be utilizing this option as a method to circumvent the open meeting laws. The problem is, that unless the Board is replaced, it will likely take legal action to determine if you and I are correct that the Board is abusing this authority or if they are simply pushing the line.

Basically, in order to comply with any open meeting law, the rule of thumb is:

if the issue can wait until the next scheduled meeting it should wait. If it can't wait, then either a special meeting of the Board or an action without meeting could be utilized.