| News |
With only a few more months left for
Arizona's 48th legislative session,
homeowners associations are already
preparing for upcoming changes. Two
new laws have so far been approved
that could impact associations.
A disabled Hermitage woman who
claims she was harassed, intimidated
and even threatened by her condo
association for installing
handicapped-accessible windows is
now fighting back in federal court.
Condominium communities are known
for regulating many aspects of
homeowners' lives, but James
Cunningham said he draws the line at
squelching free speech.
In Illinois, condo owners in
disputes with developers, boards and
each other don't have an expedient,
low-cost option for resolution. Is
an ombudsman or other advocacy
program, as several states have
established, the answer?
With more people working at home for
at least part of the week, it's not
surprising that condominium
developers around the country are
beginning to promote live-work units
as part of their mix of offerings.
Building luxury condos on a former
EPA Superfund cleanup site presents
a unique set of challenges for
developers of Biscayne Landing,
which is rising from a former
landfill.
Wind Drift Board President Larry
Rice said that he wishes that his
community had learned earlier about
the simple controls that might have
protected it from losing at least
$200,000 to fraud and theft,
allegedly committed by the owner,
Tim Reedy, of their HOA management
company.
A bill that would have put more
rules on homeowners associations
that govern so many Las Vegas Valley
neighborhoods has now been vetoed by
Governor Jim Gibbons. The veto
follows months of negotiating and
attempts to reach a compromise.
Nearly one-third of residential
property owners in town pay for
trash pickup but don't get the
service. That's because their
properties fall into a category
defined by the board of health as
large condo associations and as such
don't qualify for trash pickup. One
condo owner wants to change that,
and she is likely not alone.
Under normal circumstances, anyone
who built a condo development worth
tens of millions of dollars so close
to the waves to say nothing of the
people who bought the condo units
might be judged mentally unfit to
manage their own affairs. But the
developer and the buyers of Wild
Dunes have an ace in the hole. They
and millions of property owners like
them are covered by National Flood
Insurance.
Today, on Flag Day, Teresa Richard
will fly Old Glory in the front of
her home without fear, following a
long, contentious and ultimately
successful battle with her condo
association.
Eight homeowners whose condominiums
were destroyed by a mudslide two
years ago are about to settle their
lawsuit against the city of Carlsbad
and be reimbursed for their losses,
a lawyer for some of the owners
said.
Schools and public buildings have
installed them. The city now employs
them to solve drainage problems.
Developers feature them in new
construction, to much media hoopla.
A major university in Kalamazoo has
built them. Even a condominium
association in Pentwater has one.
A St. Louis group pushing for
condominium developers to retrofit
projects that do not comply with the
Fair Housing Act are back in town.
The complaint, brought by
Vespa-Papaleo as well as Heller, is
just the latest in a growing number
of housing discrimination cases
brought by people with disabilities,
said Lee Moore, a spokesman for the
civil rights division.
Residents of a Lauderhill condo
complex are concerned they may be
out on the street in the next two
weeks if mandated repairs are not
complete on time by their management
company.
Linda A. Ballew spent four nights in
the Harris County Jail for ignoring
court orders related to a
long-running dispute about her
overgrown lawn before she finally
agreed to cut the grass Tuesday.
The treasurer of the Eagle Lake
Manor Community Association is
charged forging checks against the
association’s accounts to pay
personal bills.
Michael and Donna Alexander bought
their south side condo in The
Timbers development for its natural
tranquility. The condo is perched
above Lick Creek, but now, their
home is suddenly in a precarious
position.
Three of the men accused of bilking
$1.4 million from Hallandale Beach
condominium owners paid a building
employee $86,000 to keep quiet about
the fraud, according to police.
Home-based businesses in Lansdowne
will have 13 months in which to come
into compliance with the homeowners
association covenants or face
closure, according to the three
elected board members who met in a
work session last week.
The notice came from the Arroyo
Ridge Homeowners Association, which
told Denise she could have the
banner as long as it's posted
properly on a flag pole. But Denise
doesn't want to spend 200 dollars on
something she'll only use two weeks
a year. At least one neighbor says
she shouldn't have to.
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2007 Advertising Policies and Rate Sheet
Word Doc
PDF |
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Articles
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What Every Association Needs
to Know About Port Liberte: Appellate Division
Affirms the Right of Associations to Bring
Consumer Fraud Claims
 In
a case of first impression, the New Jersey
Appellate Division has determined that a
condominium association has standing to sustain
claims for both fraud and consumer fraud against
third-party contractors and manufacturers even
though the fraudulent misrepresentations and
omissions by these third-parties were made to
the developer and occurred prior to the creation
and construction of the association. J.
Randy Sawyer, Esquire, a shareholder in Stark &
Stark’s Construction Litigation Group,
successfully argued this matter as amicus
curiae on behalf of the Community
Associations Institute along with counsel for
the homeowners’ association. You can read
Randy’s detailed discussion of the Port
Liberte decision
here.
Read More
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Condominium Association Politics:
The Seesaw Effect
There are several “hot potato” political
situations in Condo Associations throughout the
City. I want to focus on two that really serve
to demonstrate a condominium political condition
I like to call the Seesaw Effect:
Read More
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 Details May Be “Devilish” but They’re Also Essential in
Association Contracts and RFPs
We are often warned that “the devil is in the
details”—an admonition to read carefully and
understand fully the terms of any agreement
before signing it. That is good advice, to be
sure. But community associations are as likely
to be harmed by their failure to include
essential details in the contracts they
negotiate as by their failure to heed the
details proposed by others
Read More
Follow-up "Contractor
Checklist" (PDF)
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After the Recall - Turning
Things Around
Occasionally, after all the efforts to
convince some board members (even if they are a
minority) to communicate well and be reasonable
with the members of their community, there will
be those whose actions prompt the members to
attempt a full recall of the board. If the
recall is successful, it can create a very tense
situation within which it will be difficult, but
not impossible, to operate.
Read More
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| HOA Course Changing
 Boards
of homeowner associations are often challenged
to change the status quo for the better. A
common scenario includes a newly elected board
that promises to start enforcing rules or
architectural policies. The problem is that
there are HOA members that like it just fine the
way it is and they loudly resist the board's
proposed changes. If certain board members are
single-minded about forcing change, the
resulting brouhaha will take center stage, the
goals being moved to the peanut gallery and
little being accomplished other than ruffling
feathers. Flexibility is the key to success.
Read More
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Why Basements
Leak Water?
Basements that leak water in through the joint
where the floor and wall meet after a rain or
snow melt are considered to be, the most common
wet basements. More than 90% of the wet
basements leak water from the walls and the
joint where the floor and wall meet. Most
basements rarely leak water up through the
floor. Surface water collects and builds up in a
pocket around the foundation causing hydrostatic
pressure. Water then is forced through the joint
where the floor and wall meet.
Read More
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| Nine Steps to
Having Your Association Painted
STEP ONE: Decide Upon the Scope of Work. The
first step is determining exactly what needs to
be painted in your association. This important
decision is generally made by the board of
directors with the input of a reliable painting
contractor. Generally, stucco surfaces should be
painted every eight years, wood surfaces every
four years and wrought iron fencing every two
years. The best value is to have everything
painted at once. Why? Because in order to paint
just the trim, for example, a painter has to
spend additional labor hours protecting all the
surfaces not to be painted that are adjacent to
the trim. This results in greater costs.
Read More
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| Don't Get Hung Up on Restrictions,
Know Before You Buy
Living in a planned community with a
Homeowner's Association can be a blessing or a
lesson in frustration depending on which side of
the clothesline you hang.
"It's a huge problem. There are 300,000
community associations around the country and I
would say that a large majority of them ban or
restrict the clothesline," says Alexander Lee,
Founder and Executive Director of the nonprofit,
Project Laundry List, which he started 11 years
ago when he was in college.
Read More
Common Area Upgrades That
Don't Break the Budget
You know that you need to
upgrade your apartment so that the building can
both maintain its value and avoid costly repairs
and maintenance down the road. But have you
considered the common areas in the building as
something that can affect your co-op or condo's
property value? For owners, common areas might
not seem like a huge priority when it comes to
making upgrades, but many experts beg to differ.
Read More
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HOATalk.com
Meet with thousands of HOA
leaders online. HOA news & information too. Free!
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Editor's Notes |
This issue
marks a couple of firsts - one good, one not so good.
The good one has to do with the move our our news feeds
to our own server, and the expansion of the number of
news feeds available. We now have 19 separate news
feeds covering the US, International, Legal and
Legislative and the Community Association Industry.
You can pick them up as an RSS feed to your computer, or
as a Javascript feed that you can host on your web site.
Both are updated automatically when new items are
posted. Let the news come to you.
Check out the feeds.
The second item has to do with a new policy of our
outbound mail server, RoadRunner. They've
arbitrarily imposed a limit on the number of outbound
e-mails daily. As a result, we're going to have to
spread the mailing of this newsletter over 2 days, so
some of you will receive it on Tuesday, some Wednesday.
Sorry for the inconvenience.
Joe
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