Unauthorized improvements

I'm a homeowner and I need your professional advice on what I should do.
We bought a house couple months ago and until yesterday I received a letter from my HOA's lawyer to give me a final notice of violating Deed Restrictions on "Unapproved Improvements" terms. However we haven't done any improvement since we moved into the house. I guess the previous owners might do some improvement on the house but I am not sure what it is. The letter stated that this is final warning (this is first warning for me!) lawsuit may be filed.
What should I do? Should I contact to the lawyer? or should I reach out to my HOA? Please give me an advice what I should do. I attached the lawyer's letter below.

Thank you very much.

I'd check the purchase documents that you and the seller signed, in case the seller represented to you that all HOA rules had been followed. You may have a claim against the seller. I'd definitely let the HOA know that you didn't make any improvements.

I don't know if this common in TX, but in Florida the closing agent typically requests the HOA to supply the assessment status and if there any outstanding violations (known here as an estoppel letter or certificate). The closing agent is often a title insurance company, did you purchase an owner's title insurance policy? If the association certified that there were no outstanding violations, then they would probably not be able to enforce against anything that existed when you bought. In addition to requesting a hearing, I would suggest contacting the closing agent to see what they requested and received from the association. If you bought title insurance, they might even provide a lawyer to represent you.

If you contact the HOA's law firm, then the law firm can respond directly to you, even if you had a lawyer involved. So I would contact the board and others, but not the law firm.

Camy

DouglasK and ND both described processes which take place in their states, in Texas there is a similar process involving a document known as the Resale Certificate.

You would have been given one sometime after the purchase to contract was signed and well before the closing of the sale. Most likely you were not given a paper copy, it would have been on a CD or thumb drive, along with financial information about the association, the governing documents, and other documents like rules and regulations.

If there was an outstanding violation on the property at the time the Resale Certificate was produced, it is unlikely your agent, the title company, or your lender would have allowed the sale to close until the issue was addressed. If the Association did not note the violation on the Resale Agreement, they will have a very difficult time holding you responsible.

If I were you I would:

1. Find the Resale Certificate and look at item I in which the association should have described any violations taking place on the property. If a violation is noted and it was not resolved, shame on your agent, the title company, and your lender. If there is no violation noted, take no immediate action.
2. Contact your agent and inform him/her of what is going on.
3. Contact the person at the title company who managed the closing of the sale and inform him/her as well.
4. File to appear at the hearing. At the hearing, present the Board with the Resale Certificate and, if appropriate inform them they should have resolved the issue with the seller. Take your next steps based on their response.
5. If this is not resolved by those listed above, I would seek out an attorney who specializes in HOA law. You do not want a general real estate attorney, nor do you want to use a friend or relative who happens to be an attorney and whose area of specialization is family law.

ND offered sound advice about writing letters and keeping copies. You should keep at hand what he wrote.

Hi Camy

Here's a link to a standardized resale certificate from Texas.

https://www.trec.texas.gov/sites/default/files/pdf-forms/37-5.pdf

Section "I" is where the HOA should have described any physical deficiencies.

If the things the HOA is complaining about now aren't listed on the resale certificate, they cannot add requirements now. If it was listed, you are obligated to comply.

If the Seller never gave you a resale certificate, the Seller is probably liable for failing to disclose - But that depends on your state's law on whether the resale certificate is mandatory or optional. In my state, it's mandatory.

Collect whatever docs you can. Speak with a lawyer.

My rationale for calling the P was to simply ask about the situation ... I’ve been P several times over many years and always welcomed calls where I could get a heads up on something having gone wrong ... in this case, I would says thanks for the call and I’ll look into it, then task the MC to let me know wha is going on ... then nip in bud if a mistake, or prepare for the resolution meeting, if appropriate.

Solve as the lowest level, as quickly as possible - another job of the P, IMO, is to welcome new neighbors and help them with issues - this is certainly an issue.

Now, there could be things we don’t know about ... there sometimes are.

The OP has not replied, hopefully they are reading this thread as it contains a lot of great info from a variety of posters, including those in TX who are familiar with the laws and how things are typically done in that state. CamyT, if you are still following this can you report back what you find out?

Thank you! I took your advice and contact title company to obtain the Disclosure and Resale Certificate. We will see if there is any unresolved violation.

I combined your advice with others who live in TX. I agree I'm asking title company to check and email us the CD to check if there is any unresolved violation. Thank you for advice. I will update with group later.

Well in the letter the attorney encourages calling into their office. Furthermore it's likely the attorney is unaware of the particulars of the circumstances i.e. violation notices were sent to previous homeowners not you. It wouldn't surprise me at all if someone in the HOA completely dropped the ball on that very important piece of information.

There is no need to be adversarial yet. I worked with several HOA attorneys from the HOA side of the equation and we expected our legal counsel to advocate in the best interests of the HOA which included talking with affected homeowners and reaching resolutions that cost everyone involved the least amount of resources whether time or money. That said reaching out to the HOA simultaneously would be a smart move too. I'd send emails so that you have a "paper trail". As a practical matter you MUST know what the violation is in order to be able to fix it.

Updated to my situation:
I think I am in bad situation. I contacted to the title company, they still insisted that there were no violation until the date we closed on the house. However, later on, they email to us the HOA Fee Schedule and in there, it stated that the house is on pending deed restriction violation (I attached the letter). So I decided to call to HOA and they said if I bought the house, I also bought the problem. They do not care if we bought the house that comes with problem.

They do not schedule for any hearing. They said I can apply for ACC, but they cannot warranty that problem will be solved.

How could the title company let a huge problem like it passed by? I thought the title company supposes to clear any violation or legal issue before processing the closing.

I do not know what to do. So much headache!
Camy

CamyT, I would write the HOA a letter stating the following:
___________________________________

April 23, 2019

Dear Sharpston Civic Association,

I do not have a description of the violation that Sharpston claims exists for my home at [insert street address]. I honestly have no idea what the violation is. Please provide all documents on file with the HOA pertaining to the violation. I want to resolve this as soon as possible. But I cannot do so until I know exactly what is in violation.

Thank you,

[insert signature and printed out name]
____________________________________________

Send the letter certified mail, return receipt requested. Report back here at hoatalk[dot]com with a description of the violation.

2 big question Camy:

1. Did you or your realtor ever receive a copy of the violation notice at or before the closing?

2. Title companies typically date and time stamp every document received. Can you get a copy of the violation notice with date that title company received it and who they received it from?

1. No my realtor did not receive any copy of the violation notice. Hence we did not receive it neither. I checked the disclosure and the previous owner did not state the violation on it neither.
2. The title emailed us the copy of HOA schedule fee, there is not our signature or stamp on it. The HOA stated that the title company did not pay for the legal fee for the violation neither, they only paid for the owned HOA money.

JaredC
We did review all the documents before signing, including the disclosure. The buyer did not state any violation on the disclosure, and on the CD, title company only paid HOA transfer fee, but they did not pay for violation legal fee, even though HOA already sent that HOA fee schedule to them.

Before embarking on a long, stressful, expensive legal journey, see if you can find out what the issue is. If it can be fixed for a few hundred dollars, it may be worth it to do so and pay the $237.00 outstanding fees.

However, you do have an issue with the title company and, frankly, with the HOA as the Resale Certificate was apparently not correctly filled out.

Consistent with the Resale Certificate NpS linked and what BillH10 posted, Texas Property Code 207.003 (b) (11) requires the HOA to provide to the buyer a resale certificate containing inter alia, "a description of any conditions on the owner's property that the property owners' association board has actual knowledge are in violation of the restrictions applying to the subdivision or the bylaws or rules of the property owners' association;." See https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/PR/htm/PR.207.htm

Section 207.005(c) appears to let the owner's agent and title company off the hook.

What CamyT shared with the hoatalk forum pis no "description of any conditions on the owner's property that... " et cetera.

For now, I would not pay the HOA a cent. If the HOA gets ornery, cite the law above to them and say you are doing the best you can and you hope the HOA is as well.

I'd agree to write directly to the Board IF you don't have a property mgr. In larger HOAs, the PM is the way to begin such a process. If Onwrs could communicate directly with the Board" or the Board president in our complicated high rises, no one would be on the Board.

So, Camy, it depends upon how your HOA is set up. I agree starting at the lowest level and that may be the PM.

Try the phone call or direct contact.... keep it friendly ... note you have no idea what the letter was about and want to move past it.

In case that was the wrong link, try this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_c195&v=pTFkPKileUE

That wouldn't fly in my state.
Buyer is legally exempt from any violation that is not clearly identified in the resale certificate. Period.

Thank you for helpful information! I took your advice. So I reached out to the HOA yesterday, they were not helpful. They just informed briefly that the seller did something with the driveway and conversed the garage. They told me to apply for ACC application with the dimensions and drawings... However I do not know the original dimension or how the house looked like before. Even in the survey, it only has the current setting of the house.
So I emailed to HOA again today to ask them for more details. Hopefully they can provide me all the documents of the violation that they sent to the previous owner or anything can help me with the drawing. We will see. I will update when I have any news from them.
Thanks again

Camy, this is sounding like a lot more than a few hundred dollars if you are talking about unauthorized garage conversions and restoring structures to some prior configuration.

Do wait to see what information you receive, in the meantime I recommend you begin looking for an attorney who specializes in HOA law. I think you are going to need him or her.

I wouldn't send that letter just yet. It looks to me like this is a voluntary membership association. The statute might not be applicable under the circumstances. Better for Camy to continue pursuing copies of all documents relating to the deficiency. Their failure to respond with good information in a timely manner actually works in Camy's favor if things ever get nasty.