Lawn weeds vs management company

Started by LanceG1 • 14 replies • 366 views

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LanceG1 (Georgia)
Posts: 97

Posted:

I'm on the board on an HOA in GA. We have covenants stating that homeowners need to maintain their yard and keep their lawn seeded and watered. It says nothing about weeds. The board has taken the position that if the lawns are green and mowed that is sufficient and we don't require weed treatment.

While we have the ability to adopt stricter ACC standards for this, we have deliberately chosen not to because that is not what the majority of the neighborhood wants. To get more consistency we tried having our management company do drive throughs (for an extra fee). We didn't give them any guidelines and they ended up applying the typical nick picky arbitrary guidelines that make people hate HOA's. The standards applied went way beyond our CCR's and the management co ended up citing over 50% of the community including current and past board members. Among other things they also never gave the board a chance to review them ahead of time. Incidentally, our CCR's specify a procedure that requires board review for these.

So, the board went back to the management company and said that we wanted to:
1. Have a more relaxed standard than they were applying (which is still in compliance with the CCR's)
2. Review the violation notices before they are sent out.
3. Include photos of the violation.

The management company replied back to us, the board, and said among other things "having weeds in the yard is not and acceptable way to maintain the yard and home." arguing that seeding and watering implies weed control, that us reviewing the notices was not practical and/or would cost more and that taking photos would take a lot more time. Beyond the disconnect, it seems like this is the tail trying to wag the dog since they are a vendor for us.

Has anybody else had to deal with something similar?

JohnT38 (South Carolina)
Posts: 1,631

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By LanceG1 on 04/29/2022 11:51 AM
I'm on the board on an HOA in GA. We have covenants stating that homeowners need to maintain their yard and keep their lawn seeded and watered. It says nothing about weeds. The board has taken the position that if the lawns are green and mowed that is sufficient and we don't require weed treatment.

While we have the ability to adopt stricter ACC standards for this, we have deliberately chosen not to because that is not what the majority of the neighborhood wants. To get more consistency we tried having our management company do drive throughs (for an extra fee). We didn't give them any guidelines and they ended up applying the typical nick picky arbitrary guidelines that make people hate HOA's. The standards applied went way beyond our CCR's and the management co ended up citing over 50% of the community including current and past board members. Among other things they also never gave the board a chance to review them ahead of time. Incidentally, our CCR's specify a procedure that requires board review for these.

So, the board went back to the management company and said that we wanted to:
1. Have a more relaxed standard than they were applying (which is still in compliance with the CCR's)
2. Review the violation notices before they are sent out.
3. Include photos of the violation.

The management company replied back to us, the board, and said among other things "having weeds in the yard is not and acceptable way to maintain the yard and home." arguing that seeding and watering implies weed control, that us reviewing the notices was not practical and/or would cost more and that taking photos would take a lot more time. Beyond the disconnect, it seems like this is the tail trying to wag the dog since they are a vendor for us.

Has anybody else had to deal with something similar?

Remind them that they take their direction from the Board and not the other way around. Tell them exactly what you want and end the discussion.

JohnC46 (South Carolina)
Posts: 14,265

Posted:

Lance

Properly maintaining ones lawn means grass, not weeds.

JohnT38 (South Carolina)
Posts: 1,631

Posted:

Out of curiosity how many weeds must the Weed Police find before issuing a violation? In other words how is this defined? Also, if the Board and the homeowners did not see this as an issue that needed to be addressed doesn't that say something?

SheliaH (Indiana)
Posts: 6,964

Posted:

If you weren't overly concerned about weeds, it was the board's responsibility to make that clear from the start. So why are you mad at THEM for doing what most reasonable people would when it comes to the appearance of a lawn? Most folks recognize that weeds look rather tacky in a lawn, and if you let them stay, they'll crowd out the grass and you may wind up with a lot full of crabgrass and other weeds (even though they're also green).

We can disagree on this, but I find when you have a community full of weeds, passersby start wondering what kind of people live there and they're not inclined to buy a house there. That could ultimately affect property values. Frankly, y'all sound a little lazy to me - It's not about having the lawn look like you see at an expensive good club, but at least it should look like you have more than an acquaintance with weed killer (you can look for something that's safer for the environment)

It's true the property manager works at the board's direction, so if this is what you want, say so - they can refer homeowners throughs the board with questions or concerns. If they're uncomfortable with that, they could decline doing drive-throughs to search for violations and you can figure out another way to get it done. Or you can get another property manager. If this is a company, go to the manager's supervisor to discuss a reassignment.

In the meantime, have fun at your next meeting when a group of angry homeowners complain how tacky the community is starting to look and you say "well, the majority of people don't care about weeds"

The property manager may also think photos are expensive, but tell her or him you'll worry about that. Personally, I like time and dated stamped photos that demonstrate the violation because some people become won't see to it they dont realize what others look at every day.

And next time,don't leave it to the property manager to guess at what you want regarding CCR violation investigations. Most will look at the documents and enforce the CCRs as written - you want to deviate from that, put together a memo or something to that effect and hand it to them. That's how you expect home inspections to be done until you say otherwise.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it. Marcus Aurelius

JohnT38 (South Carolina)
Posts: 1,631

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By SheliaH on 04/29/2022 2:07 PM
If you weren't overly concerned about weeds, it was the board's responsibility to make that clear from the start. So why are you mad at THEM for doing what most reasonable people would when it comes to the appearance of a lawn? Most folks recognize that weeds look rather tacky in a lawn, and if you let them stay, they'll crowd out the grass and you may wind up with a lot full of crabgrass and other weeds (even though they're also green).

We can disagree on this, but I find when you have a community full of weeds, passersby start wondering what kind of people live there and they're not inclined to buy a house there. That could ultimately affect property values. Frankly, y'all sound a little lazy to me - It's not about having the lawn look like you see at an expensive good club, but at least it should look like you have more than an acquaintance with weed killer (you can look for something that's safer for the environment)

It's true the property manager works at the board's direction, so if this is what you want, say so - they can refer homeowners throughs the board with questions or concerns. If they're uncomfortable with that, they could decline doing drive-throughs to search for violations and you can figure out another way to get it done. Or you can get another property manager. If this is a company, go to the manager's supervisor to discuss a reassignment.

In the meantime, have fun at your next meeting when a group of angry homeowners complain how tacky the community is starting to look and you say "well, the majority of people don't care about weeds"

The property manager may also think photos are expensive, but tell her or him you'll worry about that. Personally, I like time and dated stamped photos that demonstrate the violation because some people become won't see to it they dont realize what others look at every day.

And next time,don't leave it to the property manager to guess at what you want regarding CCR violation investigations. Most will look at the documents and enforce the CCRs as written - you want to deviate from that, put together a memo or something to that effect and hand it to them. That's how you expect home inspections to be done until you say otherwise.

If 50% of the community got cited for a violation that was never enforced then it's time to pause and come up with a new rule and communicate it before it is enforced. This type of B.S is what gives HOA's a bad name. I'm not against some type of weed policy but it needs to be clearly defined and communicated before you ambush 50% or your community.

JohnT38 (South Carolina)
Posts: 1,631

Posted:

I accidently added my response to the end of the previous post and it wasn't clear that I was the one that wrote it. For the sake of clarity this was the portion that I wrote:

If 50% of the community got cited for a violation that was never enforced then it's time to pause and come up with a new rule and communicate it before it is enforced. This type of B.S is what gives HOA's a bad name. I'm not against some type of weed policy but it needs to be clearly defined and communicated before you ambush 50% or your community.

LanceG1 (Georgia)
Posts: 97

Posted:

Responding to multiple posters comments:

1. Should the HOA police weeds in the lawn if the covenants don't require it in our neighborhood? Personally I'm against it. Why?
a. There are houses close to our neighborhood, outside of the HOA with weeds that have higher comps. So the home values thing doesn't have any data to support it.
b. Likewise I have been in neighborhoods with multi-million dollar homes (our home values are not even close to that) with lawns that were mowed weeds. Once again, didn't affect the value of those homes.
c. Most of the population of the country (outside of the yard fanatic types) do not consider a weed free lawn to be a requirement to have a maintained home and yard, that includes over 50% of the people living in our community.
d. Even our lawyer said that maintaining a weed free yard is not a requirement to be in compliance with our CCR's unless the board chooses adopt a stricter standard through the ACC standards.
e. Let's say that somebody wanted to sue the HOA for not adopting a weed free lawn standard. It has a very low chance at being successful. The city, county, schools, and most of the surrounding neighborhoods have adopted the same standard of mowed and green.
f. Given that a house is most people's largest asset, people are going to maintain them, the fact that the majority owners are not opting for weed free would indicate that they do not see that as part of necessary maintenance.
g. We don't have an army of people beating down the doors telling us that they want us to start enforcing weed control. In fact I can't remember an instance of someone making that kind of request to the board.
h. Since 2009, when the developer still controlled the HOA, maintaining a weed free yard was not a requirement to be in compliance.
2. I agree that it should have been communicated better before starting, but when we clarified what we wanted the standard to be with the management company and they came back with verbiage stating that our standards are not acceptable, my personal read is that the tail was wagging the dog here. My natural inclination is to recommend we dis-continue their drive through service.
3. Another thing to note. Our common areas consist of mowed weeds, with no plans to change that, and are not kept up to the standard that the management company was trying to apply to homeowners.

Our biggest issue was to deal with things such as people not mowing their lawn (letting the grass get over a foot tall), keeping the flower beds looking reasonable etc.. IE: go after the egregious issues and avoid the nit-picking that causes drama.

MelissaP1 (Alabama)
Posts: 13,836

Posted:

My new HOA is going through a similar issue. People are getting notifications about weeds. We are a newly built neighborhood just maybe 2 years old. The Sod they laid all got infected last year with Army worm. Plus they overwatered the grass. It is Bermuda grass. Many people's yards are in terrible shape including my own.

I agree it is frustrating when we get those letters in the mail about the weeds. All we have to do is show we are treating the problem. Many have little signs with whomever they hired for weed control. They just take a picture and send it into the MC.

Do not let me get started on the neighbor who planted non-Bermuda grass next door... Do you count that as a "weed" as it's not Bermuda grass...

Former HOA President

DeanJ
Posts: 1,786

Posted:

The Board’s responsibility is to interpret the regulations. There should be no violation notice sent for any violation until the Board has found there is a violation and approved the violation notice.

With that said, don’t lower your community standards because clawing them back is very difficult.

JohnC46 (South Carolina)
Posts: 14,265

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By DeanJ on 05/14/2022 11:20 PM
The Board’s responsibility is to interpret the regulations. There should be no violation notice sent for any violation until the Board has found there is a violation and approved the violation notice.

With that said, don’t lower your community standards because clawing them back is very difficult.

Good advice.

SteveH35 (Washington)
Posts: 339

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By JohnC46 on 05/15/2022 9:08 AM

Good advice.

Dean and John, this is *NOT* good advice. Generally, enforcing a well-written set of governing documents should not require Board intervention unless:

> a violation hearing is requested
> the circumstances of the violation and the rule and/or restriction are ambiguous to the point where the enforcing party (usually a management company or community manager) requires direction

A Board of Directors has the ultimate authority to decide when to enforce the governing documents, but cannot do so in an arbitrary or capricious manner. Courts have deemed such decision-making unreasonable and therefore illegal. Many CICs have a LOT to learn about enforcement. There's an entire Enforcement page dedicated to this: https://www.(LINK-NOT-ALLOWED-PER-POSTING-RULES)/governance/enforcement

Regards,
Steve

JustinT5 (Alabama)
Posts: 50

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By LanceG1 on 04/29/2022 3:36 PM
Responding to multiple posters comments:

1. Should the HOA police weeds in the lawn if the covenants don't require it in our neighborhood? Personally I'm against it. Why?
a. There are houses close to our neighborhood, outside of the HOA with weeds that have higher comps. So the home values thing doesn't have any data to support it.
b. Likewise I have been in neighborhoods with multi-million dollar homes (our home values are not even close to that) with lawns that were mowed weeds. Once again, didn't affect the value of those homes.
c. Most of the population of the country (outside of the yard fanatic types) do not consider a weed free lawn to be a requirement to have a maintained home and yard, that includes over 50% of the people living in our community.
d. Even our lawyer said that maintaining a weed free yard is not a requirement to be in compliance with our CCR's unless the board chooses adopt a stricter standard through the ACC standards.
e. Let's say that somebody wanted to sue the HOA for not adopting a weed free lawn standard. It has a very low chance at being successful. The city, county, schools, and most of the surrounding neighborhoods have adopted the same standard of mowed and green.
f. Given that a house is most people's largest asset, people are going to maintain them, the fact that the majority owners are not opting for weed free would indicate that they do not see that as part of necessary maintenance.
g. We don't have an army of people beating down the doors telling us that they want us to start enforcing weed control. In fact I can't remember an instance of someone making that kind of request to the board.
h. Since 2009, when the developer still controlled the HOA, maintaining a weed free yard was not a requirement to be in compliance.
2. I agree that it should have been communicated better before starting, but when we clarified what we wanted the standard to be with the management company and they came back with verbiage stating that our standards are not acceptable, my personal read is that the tail was wagging the dog here. My natural inclination is to recommend we dis-continue their drive through service.
3. Another thing to note. Our common areas consist of mowed weeds, with no plans to change that, and are not kept up to the standard that the management company was trying to apply to homeowners.

Our biggest issue was to deal with things such as people not mowing their lawn (letting the grass get over a foot tall), keeping the flower beds looking reasonable etc.. IE: go after the egregious issues and avoid the nit-picking that causes drama.

remind the management company that they work for you and if they can't do it yourway, you will look for a new company. We use CEDAR and they do what you want. Depending on the manager, they might be hawkish or more lienient. just reviewed last months notices and told them not to cite white clover as a weed since its' all over almost everyone's lawn. good luck.

LanceG1 (Georgia)
Posts: 97

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By SteveH35 on 05/15/2022 9:26 AM

Posted By JohnC46 on 05/15/2022 9:08 AM

Good advice.

Steve,

In the case of our covenants, they very clearly state that violations are to be recommended by the ACC to the board. Then the board is to review them and if they agree send out a notice. Of course our management company is trying to argue that we don't need to follow the procedure stated in our documents which seems really dicey at best. Also in our case, the management company literally was making things up. IE: stating that seeded and watered means no weeds, which it doesn't.

SteveH35 (Washington)
Posts: 339

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By LanceG1 on 05/15/2022 7:07 PM

Lance, fair enough. I think all our volunteer directors would pull our hair out if we had to review every violation. Thumbs up for simply doing what's in writing. Debating what's in writing (and a lot of people do) is generally a waste of time, unless what's in writing is vague or ambiguous.

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