Maintenance Fees Regardless Of Property Size?

Our Covenants say all costs are equally split.

Is your HOA responsible for maintaining aspects of the individual houses, Fred? Paint the exteriors? Re-roof? Or?

The answer lies in the governing documents. If it says all maintenance fees are split evenly, then they should be split evenly. That would be tied to the deed.

Were there actual lawsuits? or just threats?

The bid should have been shown as a total for all the roofs together.

Either way, if the governing documents do not expressly say the charges can be separated and not an equal amount to all, they did it wrong. When Lot C came complaining saying why does he have to pay the same as Lot D even though Lot D is larger, I would have said "because you own part of Lot D"

Good one, Douglas, when you wrote: "I would have said "because you own part of Lot D."

Both you & I wrote it depends on what's in your governing docs. Not sure why Richard says we're guessing at that. Fred can either tell us what's in his docs or not. Up to him.

It's called experience!!

CCRs can say equal assessments, but change when it covers special assessments. I believe I have reviewed more than most here.

FredW5, I sympathize. In my community, half of the homes were built by the original developer and the other half by a different homebuilder after the original developer bailed out of the project. My HOA is responsible for the maintenance and periodic re-roofing of all 100 homes. We're still 5-7 years away from the next scheduled re-roofing project in accordance with our reserves schedule. Over the last few years about 10 of the original roofs, per year, have required repairs to fix leaks. This year the total cost of these repairs is running about $8,000. Meanwhile, roughly 2 of the newer roofs per year have required repairs.

The roofs on the older homes experience 5 times the number of roof leaks per year. This trend has been steady for the last few years and the owners of the homes built by the 2nd builder are asking the same question as you. Namely, why should they have to share the burden of frequent roof repairs on the original homes, when the newer homes have almost no problems at all? In next year's budget there's a $10,000 line item for roof repairs and if past is prologue then 85% of that will be spent for the benefit of only half of the homeowners, and it appears that this is becoming an annual thing. All owners, however, must contribute their 1/100 share of the maintenance costs of the association as per our governing documents.

The governing documents also say that the 1/100 proportional share for all regular and special assessments may never be altered. A lot of us wish there was something we could do about the situation but it appears we're kind of stuck with it.

(The roofs on the original 50 homes are somewhat more "fancy" than the roofs on the final 50 homes that were built with many more valleys and ridges. The roof designs on the newer homes are much simpler. We've been told that is the reason for the discrepancy in roof repair rates between old and new.)

Please see my last post with Docs. attached. Thanks!

Based on the second document it appears the Board can change the budget and come up with a different method.

What does that have to do with how assessments are divided up?

Simple solution, REMOVE THEM! The plants, that is.

IMO, Fred, you've cited the wrong part of your governing document. Your citation seems to apply only to common area that more than one "development" may use. In those cases the boards seem to be able to decide how much each development should contribute to that common area that's shared by more than one development. Then the lots in each development would be assessed equally for those common areas.

Now, maybe you have only one development and the developer simply put that article in in case he DID develop subsequent developments.

What you need to find is how the lots or units in YOUR development are assessed. What formula, if any, is specified? Surely when someone wants to buy a home in your HOA and asks: "How are dues determined?" Someone can point to an article in your covenants that states that.

BTW, Fred, the doc. article that you cite seems to say that Owners must approve or ratify the budget each year. Has that been happening?

I hope this is on-topic, but after several years in an HOA and two years as a (now former) director, I've found that some people have trouble adjusting to HOA-style communal living and paying for things that may benefit others. We all pay equally here, even though houses and individual plots of land vary in size. People tend to accept that, but you do see some resentment on smaller things.

For, example, the folks who don't use the tennis courts or the pool would be happy to see them ripped out, even though they help keep up property values. We have a current Board that is neglecting much-needed maintenance on the pool and even let it run dry of chlorine last year and afoul of some laws, likely because none of them swim. And I can still remember the time during an historic blizzard last year when I had to explain to two complaining homeowners why their properties were not plowed first, and that we plow certain homes according to need (i.e., doctors, EMTs, frail elderly, etc.) and then do the rest on a random basis that gets the entire property done in the shortest amount of time.

This may be slightly off-topic, but I also find it odd when people want to add tall plantings on common land to increase their privacy and block their view of other homes. If you're looking for that amount of privacy, why move to a community of attached homes?

There's a difference, though, between something people could use but choose not to (like a pool or tennis court), and something they can't, like a driveway or patio for a specific unit. It's a tricky issue and there's often no way around it, but you can't blame people for being a bit resentful.