Special Meeting- Impact Fee

If your documents say a special meeting must specify what will be discussed, it's perfectly fine to call it a special meeting to discuss the pros and cons of impact fees for rental property or something similar. That's an example of what a special meeting is - something to address an extraordinary tooic, which could range from voting on a special assessment to meeting candidates for the upcoming board election.

Usually HOAs ( the responsible ones anyway) have meetings where people can get information, ask questions, brainstorm ideas, etc, before having another to cast a vote. So calm down and go to the meeting and perhaps learn something. Or not - that's your choice too.

The OP didn't ask about this, but the association should first investigate the legality of charging a special fee to landlords simply because they are landlords. We've had similar discussions in my community about assessing pet owners a fee, and our attorney said "nope, discriminatory". This could vary by state, but I'm not so sure...

The real solution to keeping the number of rentals down is a properly worded and enforced rental restriction. The problem is that you have to enact this while the numbers are still low, otherwise you won't have the necessary votes to amend the governing docs.

Terri

Easy enough. The subject of the Special Meeting is Rental Impact Fees. I think the meeting was misnamed. It could have been called Informational Meeting to discuss Rental Impact Fees versus a Special Meeting.

The questions will be, does it require owners approving and what % of owners? If you set fees will you have push back (possibly legal) from those that rent their units. To nip this in the bud, have an attorney advise how to do so.

I think your HOA board may be treading into discrimination territory by claiming that occupied homes generate more trash and burden on the overall community. If those same rentals were owner-occupied, how would the owners create less community impact than if it's a tenant?

I understand the opposition to having an abundance of rentals in a neighborhood but blaming tenants seems to be a stretch.

It is a special members meeting. The members do want to discuss possible options on how to handle the rental situation at our HOA. Hopefully a lot of ideas and brainstorming will take place.

Rental restrictions- amending the bylaws might be our best bet (as one on this thread said- before there are more rentals).

Unfortunately rules are not enforced. The board president has sole discretion on who gets warnings and fines when violations are reported. Hopefully that can be ironed out soon.

I believe in the last 6 months, our complex has had to go to twice a week trash pick up, rather than once a week.
All units are small and can only have 2 - 4 guests. Unfortunately some owners rent to people that have 6-8 guests.
More trash and more water. Numerous times, especially this summer, security/property management has been called to our property due to rental/guest issues. Loud partying, fighting, and fireworks on the docks to name a few.

Personally, I think if rules were enforced and some owners were fined, then they might do a better job of screening their renters. Rule enforcement is a bit of a problem.
Nearly all the rentals are short-term, 2-5 days. About 30% of our units are rented out this way.

The whole impact fee was brought up by our property management company, (after owners complained about the unruly guest, not following rules, etc). So what I think started out as a concern about renters behavior- turned in to a way to charge the owners that rent- when the PM suggested an Impact Fee. The issue for owners did not start out as a way to get more money from Owners that rent. It was more about how to get owners to follow the rules. It turned into an impact fee discussion after the owner of our PM company suggested it.

I think our meeting will have good positive discussion.

Me too. I don't get how more rentals translate into extra trash, water and security" costs. Maybe the issue is short term rentals where rowdy transients throw loud parties for their friends and guests and they generate a large amount of waste and trash way above normal, and use copious amounts of water on top of it all.

If enough people want this then I suggest you move on it ASAP. If you wait too long then owners whose primary goal with their units/homes is to generate income will have the upper hand. They'll never vote for more rental restrictions and then you're stuck.

Also, I would consider amending the CC&Rs with any new or changed rental restrictions. I don't think the rights of owners should be restricted in the Bylaws.

Were the next sentences coming out of the mouth of the property manager, "But I pulled 'impact fee' out of my arse. To assess rental units differently than non-rental units, an amendment to the Bylaws or Declaration would be necessary. Even then such an amendment might not pass muster with a court,"? If not, then your property manager is clueless.

By having restrictions on rentals, you are only making it more difficult to sell your property in the future. Not wise, because less people interested means less demand and lower property values. A lot of people buy a dwelling specifically to rent it. Why deter them as buyers?

Because if there are no rental restrictions, then you'll lose the buyers who don't want the disadvantages of living in a rental community along with the disadvantages of home ownership. (I'm one of them. If I'm going to live around transients, then I want the benefits of being one myself.) And you'll lose FHA eligibility. And lenders won't want to lend to buyers if there are too many rentals, further limiting your buyer pool to those who can afford to pay cash. And you'll have the fun of dealing with the airbnb's, and don't get me started on that.

Cathy's Rant du Jour: I have a real problem with investors who basically ruin condo communities. One of the reason that these properties are attractive to buyers *and* tenants is that nearly every home is owner occupied. By buying "investment property" they're basically destroying the main reason it's desirable. People who want to own rental property can buy up houses or apartment buildings - or if they don't have enough money to do so, they can buy shares of REITs (real estate investment trusts) which trade on the stock market like any other shares. It's not like their only option is renting out a condo. Finally, it's basically dishonest since the association (ie, the neighbors) are going to be picking up at least some of the slack for maintaining the property - if you own free standing property or shares of REITs, the entire cost of maintaining and managing falls on you the investor, which is exactly where it belongs. The neighbors didn't buy condos in order to help you make money. /end-rant

The big problem is that condo communities can be targeted by investors - which happened during The Great Recession.

Investors start to buy up units in a community, and when they have enough to control the association, they convert the community to rental only.

The remaining owners (ie, those who hadn't seen the writing on the wall and bailed earlier) are given the option of either renting their homes or selling at a low price. The offering price continues to fall until the owners are forced to decide one way or the other.

And yes, this is perfectly legal.

There are good reasons for condo owners to be wary of landlords. It's not just that we're unreasonably bigoted against tenants, although I'm sure that some are. Condo communities work best when all owners are pulling together for the good of all. Owner-occupants' and landlords' interests differ in important ways.

Rentals are not bad for neighborhoods. Sounds a like a lot of people here want to discriminate against landlords.

... and of course, as long as an investor is complying with the covenants, especially those regarding renting, the investor has the right to buy up units/homes. It is what it is.

An acquaintance of mine once complained that I was being classist when I complained about a high proportion of renters in my then condo community. I told him he should take his kvetching to housing lenders, since said lenders often and pursuant to the law, use the proportion of renters to limit or sometimes, prohibit home loans to borrowers.

Amen! This is pretty much what happened in my community. Since I stepped down from my board in 2014, I don't know what the owner-occupant percentage is these days, but the community does seem quieter. Maybe because the rowdy owner-landlords left (or lost the house in foreclosure) or they've improved their tenant selection. Now if only we could stop all the mattresses, sofas and what not landing in the dumpster near our clubhouse!

As you can see Terri, the preceding discussion is what you'd likely hear if there was a special meeting to discuss the pros and cons of impact fees. This is why it's silly to quibble over what type of special meeting it is - you already know or should know, a specific topic will be discussed and the notice should state if there will be a homeowner vote or not. You already know this is supposed to be an information meeting - if you want to go, fine. If not, stay home.

If your real issue is that this may go through and you'd have to pay the fee because you want to rent out your home, you need to be honest about the situation, go to the meeting and say so (maybe people will agree with you.), so I really don't understand why you wondered if this was allowed by your Bylaws or not. Sometimes, people need to stop and use common sense once in a while - wouldn't you prefer the community to have a discussion about impact fees and then vote on whether to amend the CCRs to allow them? This is what informed voting is all about.

Whatever you decide, I believe rule enforcement regarding trash, noise and all that is critical. When you drive through a community, you shouldn't be able to tell if a tenant or owner occupant lives in a house or condo because EVERYONE's complying with the rules. I'm not a fan of investor owners primarily because they seem to prefer communities with weak boards that don't enforce the rules that will cost the owners money. Since they don't live there, they usually don't give a damn if the place is inhabited by people who'll treat it like the frat house in Animal House or something from the Amityville Horror.

The key is consistency - make sure all owners understand they're responsible for the behavior of the people in their household or their tenants. If they don't want to be hauled before the board every month for a rules violation and have to deal with fines, lawsuits and all that stuff, maybe they'll pay close attention to what type of people they allow to live there and think about more than the check clearing.

What you describe here is different that what, I bet, many of us were envisioning. As a vacation rental, you may have options. First, there's the bona fide nuisance (which is abated by calling the police). Also, there are limits on the number of people who can safely and legally occupy a dwelling.

Good luck.

I haven't read this whole thread, but SheilaH is correct. What's the concern here?