Assessment Increases

Paul posted the following in another thread, and it sounds like a timely item:


First off, two communities can appear identical from the outside but have very different assessments. Factors that affect assessments include:

* Age and condition of the community (how well have things been maintained)
* Self-managed or do you employ a community manager
* Streets (are they public or private)
* Utilities (included or not, which ones, what are the local utility rates and have they changed recently)
* Amenities (what kinds, what condition are they in)
* Insurance (have your rates gone up dramatically for some reason)
* Reserves (are your reserves adequate, are they being neglected, are you playing catch up for past underfunding or paying off a loan)
* Legal expenses (has the association been involved in legal actions)
* Delinquencies (how many owners are behind in their assessments, how successful have the collection efforts been)
* Location of the community and unusual environmental conditions (can include things like being in a flood or wildfire area plus the general cost of living for your part of the country)

In addition, townhome communities can either be HOAs or condos. If condos, the association will be responsible for a greater share of the maintenance of the buildings, so assessments will be higher. I suspect you're in condos since owners in HOAs generally pay for their own utilities such as water and sewer - at least that's the case in my area.

Finally, inflation has been running around 8% last time I looked, supply chains have been wonky (and are about to get wonkier since China has taken the brakes off the covid pandemic), and community associations have been competing with the building industry for workers and raw materials. All of this has been driving up costs dramatically,

An assessment of $345 per month doesn't seem out of line to me, especially when considering the factors above. I'm in a condo community, no amenities whatsoever, and I pay around $250 per month. Pools are expensive to maintain and expensive to operate (water, regular testing, cleaning, security, insurance, etc.). If we had a pool, I'd expect my assessment to go over $300.

If they are condos, then the association is very likely responsible for all of these things. if HOAs, then the parking lot for sure but maybe not the other two items.

Townhome communities can really fool people - that's why I'd said that people who try to compare similar-appearing communities can really mislead themselves. Another area of confusion is the real estate websites that only have room to list one assessment. The problem is that in larger HOAs that have both single family and attached homes, the attached homes will probably have two assessments: the annual one paid by everyone in the community plus a monthly one that covers things like lawn care and snow removal in their section. People look at the listings for the attached homes, see that low monthly assessment, and they think it's a real bargain or that communities that are charging in the $200s and $300s each month are cheating owners. Neither of these is correct.

First, Condos or stacked units, as well as townhomes, can be called HOAs or Condos. Condos can be single-family detached homes. I have seen all kinds.

The most important piece of the equation in regard to price is HOW MANY UNITS?

We're in Texas. We have 84 townhomes. It just went up in 2023 to $350. We have two pools and the HOA is responsible for everything on the outside, roof, painting the buildings, fences, landscaping. We have two site men that make minor repairs and will help neighbors when needed.

To maintain a pool the cost would be about $500.00 per month. For an HOA or Condo of 50 units, the cost per unit would be $10.00 per month, whereas the cost per unit of a complex of 500 units, the monthly cost would be $1.00 per month. And so forth done the list of all the items Cathy itemized.

The number is just an example of cleaning a pool on a monthly basis. The more units you have to spread the expense, the lower the assessments.

The price was only arbitrary, the point was the number of units you can spread the pain over.

Or he has a life and doesn't live for this forum.
There are many who don't check the forum daily.

These discussions are read by many more people than the original poster. It's one reason the regulars often provide additional context and side discussions may may appear irrelevant to the original question.

People are free to ignore whatever doesn't interest them.

Good for Cathy & JohnT. We never know who might be just "stopping by" and sees something that helps them.

Monthly