Offer to buy HOA land

Started by LoriM15 • 5 replies • 131 views

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LoriM15 (Florida)
Posts: 1,009

Posted:

We got a letter from a land company in Colorado (we're in Florida) offering to buy a piece of vacant property that is part of our HOA. It looks like a scam (the letter includes an offer price and and agreement to sign and send back) and there's no way we would seriously consider it. Even if we did, it would require a membership vote to sell the property.

The piece of property is a preserve area/buffer zone. There's no access to it from the road. This company must have been searching the county property appraiser's site looking for undeveloped parcels and this one slipped through. Somebody obviously didn't notice the association as the owner or didn't look at the plat to see that it's not accessible.

Has anyone else ever been approached like this? I can't figure out the business model of this company for buying pieces of land like this.

ElleN (Idaho)
Posts: 1,334

Posted:

I am shopping for houses (a bit). More and more I see Opendoor and other professional, mass house flippers offering cash to sellers and then selling them. (How quickly we forget 2008?)

I wonder if what your Board received is in this vein.

SheliaH (Indiana)
Posts: 6,964

Posted:

Happened to us several years ago. The land ran along the back of a strip mall - it was supposed to be lots for more lots in the community, but the developer went bankrupt. These folks wanted to build a store on the property and came to a board meeting with a sales agreement AND A CHECK for earnest money!! Obviously they thought we'd chomp at this, and granted, it would have helped our reserves a lot because we were in the midst of dealing with a ton of delinquencies (dome of which were also a product of 2008).

We consulted our attorney and decided to hold a special homeowners meeting on the subject so they could ask questions. The would be buyers also sprang for pizza and pop. There were lots of questions and it became clear no one was excited about this because there were concerns about traffic, a possible uptick in crime, as well as likely static from a single family community that also bordered the property and the strip mall owners.

The neighborhood association would also object (the county often consults neighborhood associations when a developer wants to put something weird in the community that would require a zoning variance.) So we said no thanks and that was that.

Good on you for listening to your Spidey sense on potential fraud (lots of title fraud going on these days) and you're correct in that this would deserve major review by homeowners, your attorney, zoning and who know who else. Legit buyers would take a more transparent approach and understand this isn't like buying a cake at a bakery.

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

TimB4 (Tennessee)
Posts: 21,059

Posted:

I get letters and cold calls (hits voicemail) all the time for property we own.

Could be legit, could be a scam.

I toss the letters and don't answer the calls.

Part of life.

On a side note, I continually receive credit card applications for my old Association.
I've tried and simply can't get off their list.

SheliaH (Indiana)
Posts: 6,964

Posted:

They may have sold or rented the owner list to some sort of data broker, who then sold or rented it to everyone and their mother.

You may need to do this the old fashioned way, starting with tossing it out. The direct mail association still has an opt out list for its members - go to https://www.dmachoice.org/ for more information.

There's also
https://www.optoutprescreen.com/, run by the consumer credit reporting agencies (experience, trans union, eqifax) where you can opt out or into being on the mailing lists of companies sending credit card offers or insurance offers.

Make sure you opt out of being included on the mailing lists of any charity you donate to (you should be able to do this online). Ditto for businesses you deal with regularly.

Since some sort of personal information is already out there,, you won't stop all of it, but may be able to slow it down. Good luck!

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

DeanJ
Posts: 1,786

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By SheliaH on 06/19/2025 11:17 AM
Happened to us several years ago. The land ran along the back of a strip mall - it was supposed to be lots for more lots in the community, but the developer went bankrupt. These folks wanted to build a store on the property and came to a board meeting with a sales agreement AND A CHECK for earnest money!! Obviously they thought we'd chomp at this, and granted, it would have helped our reserves a lot because we were in the midst of dealing with a ton of delinquencies (dome of which were also a product of 2008).

We consulted our attorney and decided to hold a special homeowners meeting on the subject so they could ask questions. The would be buyers also sprang for pizza and pop. There were lots of questions and it became clear no one was excited about this because there were concerns about traffic, a possible uptick in crime, as well as likely static from a single family community that also bordered the property and the strip mall owners.

The neighborhood association would also object (the county often consults neighborhood associations when a developer wants to put something weird in the community that would require a zoning variance.) So we said no thanks and that was that.

Good on you for listening to your Spidey sense on potential fraud (lots of title fraud going on these days) and you're correct in that this would deserve major review by homeowners, your attorney, zoning and who know who else. Legit buyers would take a more transparent approach and understand this isn't like buying a cake at a bakery.

You should have at least had 3 readings so you got more free pizza.

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