What is it with these people who have nothing better to do than screw with their neighbor?
Don’t know why she didn’t respond to the alleged notices. I do believe that condo associations are an act of the devil, contrived by people who have never held any power whatsoever, who then abuse the trust afforded them.
Brush width check:
All of them? :dubious:
Hmmm…I live in a co-op, a sort of condo for apartment houses very common in NY, and just got my maintenance (the building fee, based on the number of shares you own) and the notice of the annual meeting. This was done in a very high-tech and sophisticated big-city way–Pat the super goes around and shoves them under everybody’s door.
Now, since they misinformed me about the Bloomberg $400 property tax refund last year (they never told us younger folks that it was tied into the STAR program, something only old people usually use) I am not saying they don’t make mistakes. But not only have they never, even during a particularly corrupt Board time in the 80s, sold anybody’s property, they would never fail to deliver not one but several notices like this. In fact, the building has its own lawyer and manager on call at all times, and they would personally contact anybody in a bind like this. If it even got to that point–usually you’d start off with a polite but puzzled Board member coming around and knocking on your door, asking if you got the assessment notice and why you hadn’t gotten around to paying it.
How big are these home associations? Are we talking thousands of scattered houses or what? How the hell did this fall thru the cracks? And, while tenants lie all the time and there’s all sorts of drama in our building–one nasty old guy we’ve been trying to evict for nearly three years–I can’t believe that the court’s hands are tied in this either. Weird.
The owner was renovating and not living on the property yet. Apparently, they didn’t have up to date contact info for the owner. Though they probably should have done more or waited longer, eventually they would have to sell the property. I’m assuming that the proceeds of the sale (minus the condo’s fees) would be held in some sort of trust for the defaulted owner. Anybody know?
I don’t understand how an association can sell something they don’t fully own. What kind of fucked up contracts are involved here?
It’s part of the condo law that you agree to when you buy a condo. It makes sense that they would have to do this from the condo’s perspective. If people were allowed to disappear for long periods of time without paying their fees, the condo association wouldn’t be able to pay the communal bills and it could not continue to function. Either all the other owners would have to start paying more to cover the delinquent fees, or they get the money by selling the property. Easy choice, when all the people on the condo board are the ones who would have to start paying more. They are also the ones who would have to explain to all the other owners why they have to now pay more.
This wasn’t actually a Condo issue, but an HOA issue. That’s even loosier and goosier than a condo association. It’s really a neighborhood association that you are required to join when you purchase/build the home, and all subsequent purchasers are required to join.
On the plus side, they help prevent the horrible hillbilly neighbors that my parents have who hang dead deer outside the kitchen window, leave broken rowboats lying in their lawn and have trailers, woodpiles, etc strewn about their property, making the whole area look like crap. On the minus side, you have to pay dues, and you need their permission to do lots of things on your own lawn, like putting up a shed.
I was going to slam the owner for being absent, but it seems mighty fishy that a note was put on the door 7 months after the foreclosure sale. It takes 7 months to take possession of a house you bought? All the while she was paying a contractor to work on the house, and her 6 month window to buy it back for $420 was ticking away…
When you are indebted to a creditor and refuse to pay, the creditor may initiate collection attempts and go after your other assets. All buyers agree to this when they purchase units under the umbrella of a condo or h.o. association.
Mortgage companies have a security interest in seeing that the building and common elements are properly maintained, and the Association is the entity charged by all owners with protecting that interest.
Our bylaws require us to notify the mortgage company of any delinquencies as well as the owner. Delinquent owners are identified at the quarterly meetings and subsequently in the minutes that get mailed out to all owners. [Rhetorical Question]Did this woman never attend the meetings or read the minutes?[/RT] I feel like we must be missing some details here - she’s shelling out thousands for remodeling yet can’t afford to pay a few hundred in maintenance fees?
When I saw this thread I thought the OP was one of the owners in my building. He and his wife are gainfully employed, drive expensive SUV’s and have been delinquent for the past 6 or 8 months. We only hear from them when they have a complaint, and all letters and e-mails regarding the delinquency have gone unanswered. I need to pay bills to keep the Association solvent, what does the OP suggest I do?
I’m not the OP but I’ll tell you what my condo association would do: revoke privileges. Those SUVs get parked on building property, yes? Place a note on the windshild, informing them that this will not be permitted to park on the property until they pay up. If they ignore the note, remove the trucks from the property. Having to park on the street should get their attention but if they still don’t pay up, keep revoking privileges until they do.
They are non-resident owners. Their unit is rented to tenants.
That makes a difference. I’m not sure what our association would do in the case of non-residents.
Small claims court?
Where’s vix1? Maybe she’ll do a vanity search and come in to tell some stories about her battles with her condo board. I am resolved never to live anywhere with a condo board or HOA.
As the OP, I assure you that I live in no such location, and would live in a cardboard box before choosing one. Every experience I’ve had with condo or homeowner associations has reinforced my belief as expressed in the OP. Petty people with too much time on their hands, who spend that time snooping on neighbors, as opposed to really having a life and doing something productive with it-that’s the folks I’ve had the unfortunate experience of dealing with.
A car on blocks, a door hanging by one hinge-those are issues which demand attention. When people whine about the wrong shade of paint on shutters, and that the cable TV line isn’t tucked behind a cornerboard, I long for a jar of chloroform and a rag.
I have to agree. I currently live in a condo, and some of the things that I see them getting upset about are just odd. For example, they are currently in the process of suing one of the homeowners because he has a white front door. The thing is, while it is true that this is in violation of their uniformity code, there is no such attention to any screen door. The result is that there is no appearance of uniformity anyway.
There is a special circle in hell for the Home Owners Associations in Houston, Texas.
You guys haven’t even touched the tip of the iceberg. As has been mentioned, in some (most) neighborhoods in Harris County you must join a HOA upon buying a new home. Yes, they keep the riff raff to a minimum and all of that. They take it to an extreme in Houston, AFAIC.
You cannot repaint your house - even the color that it is already - without applying first. You may not change your garage doors, may not have your car parked for more than a day in your driveway without moving it, may not cut down a tree in your yard without applying first. You are allowed to plant small flowers outside your home, but if you get into any serious landscaping, you’d have to apply. The fence around your backyard was a required feature and had to be maintained regularly but - you guessed it- you would have to apply for permission to fix your fence if it had a broken board or something. Grass too long? (and I’m talking about an inch or so - not several inches to a foot tall or anything) $50 fine. Change something without permission? Fine and possibly, you’d have to pay to put it back the way it was. (i.e. you decide your house was born to be light green but the board liked it better brown? You must repaint it brown and pay a fine as well as the cost of repainting, natch.)
There are, IMO, ridiculous rules involved in those HOAs. We are not talking about condos, we are talking about regular houses. The HOA we belonged to in Houston had control over maybe 300 houses. (at least in our neighborhood - I think they managed several neighborhoods on the west side of town)
There were even incidents of neighbors sneaking into other neighbors’ back yards to look in their houses to see if they were making any changes that weren’t already approved!
The condo I live in is pretty reasonable, even though it is in a formerly “55 and older” community. I get along well with the building president and I haven’t had a single problem in the four years I’ve lived here. If someone gave me a problem or there wa s a rule that I didn’t like, I would work to get the rule changed or have the problem taken care of. It’s just like any kind of government or politics, bitching about it won’t really help, you have to work (and vote) to change the things you don’t like.
Before moving into a condo, when they “interview” you, you should also be “interviewing” them. There are good condos and there are bad condos. If you move into a good condo, you won’t have to worry about dealing with and overturning all the stupid rules. If you move into a bad condo, you fucked up and you’re going to regret it. You shouldn’t have moved into a place with stupid rules in the first place.
Speaking of stupid rules, I am now going to counter all the good things I just said about my condo. There was a new rule posted recently stating that it is now against the rules to leave your front door open unless you have a closed screen door. I totally don’t get it. Luckily, I don’t care because I don’t have or want a screen door, I never leave my front door open, and I’ve never even noticed anyone else leaving their door open. The fact that it’s a stupid rule bothers me, but since it doesn’t affect me in the slightest, I don’t care to oppose it. I’ve got to remember to ask about it though, I’m really curious as to the reasoning behind it. There’s got to be a good story there somewhere.
Interesting. I wonder if it has anything to do with Houston’s famous lack of zoning has anything to do with it.
It’s friday night, and I’ve been into the Fat Tire.
“I wonder if it has anything to do with Houston’s famous lack of zoning?”
There, that’s better.
They ship Fat Tire to Texas? That’s just not right. They should keep it here and send y’all Coors.