As our HOA is voluntary, we had even stopped paying our dues for the past few years because we didn't feel that the HOA provided any valuable service to the community and we just didn't see much reason to support the organization. Last spring we met our HOA president as we were doing a clean-up project on our vacant lots. He seemed like a nice guy and we decided to pay our dues last year and get involved in some volunteer work for the community.
In June, the HOA sponsors a spring-clean-up event, bringing in several dumpsters to the grade school parking lot. HOA members are allowed to bring tree trimmings, dead shrubbery, old lumber and other things that may be cluttering the outside of their homes and dump this stuff for free (after they've brought their dues current.) Meri and I volunteered to help out at that event last year and we spent a whole day assisting neighbors with unloading trailers, pick-ups and trunks full of debris.
Last September the community was shocked to receive documents in the mail from a law firm that had been retained by our HOA, unbeknownst to the membership, to rewrite our covenants. The goal was to make our HOA mandatory, requiring all homeowners to join and pay dues. The packet that we received from the attorneys contained proposed amendments to our covenants that would allow the HOA to place fines, liens and ultimately foreclose on properties that did not obey the covenants.
We, as most of our neighbors, were shocked by this proposal and we started looking into this. The more I studied HOAs around the country the more I found an insidious trend to empower HOAs with punitive tools designed to keep homeowners "in line." I read of many, many cases, even right here in our area, where HOAs had used their powers to either scare their members into submission or force them out of their homes.
The law firm hired by our HOA is the biggest firm in Colorado handling legal matters for HOAs here. They've lobbied for strict laws that favor the HOAs over the rights of homeowners and they make the bulk of their money from collecting on fines, liens and selling liens to investors who then foreclose on properties. It's an area of law that seems to be unchecked and only adds to the mounting problems in a housing industry where bank foreclosures are tearing people’s lives apart. Add to that an HOA that is reaching into your pocket and you have a recipe for disaster.
Our annual HOA meeting in October drew a packed house of over 300 people (the usual attendance is 30) and there was a loud and unanimous outcry to drop this proposal and fire the law firm. As we left that meeting we felt sure that the Board of Directors had got the message and things would go back to normal. Come to find out, the Board had no intention of dropping this and they continued to work with the attorneys to try to get these amendments passed.
I had put my name on a list to volunteer to serve the HOA and one day in late October I received a call from the HOA president inviting me to serve on the Board of Directors, filling a vacant seat. I gladly accepted the appointment, thinking that I would have an opportunity to give voice to a large segment of our community that opposed these changes. As the weeks went by, the Board somehow saw fit to appoint several other new Board members, most of whom were of a like mind, opposing the covenant amendments. I’m not sure what the Board was thinking, but this group of new blood became a coalition with the goal of making positive changes in our HOA.
I went to my first Board meeting in December. There was much discussion about the uproar in the community over the hiring of this law firm and the proposed changes. The president, who has served for 4 years, said that he'd had enough and was tendering his resignation as president (although he remains on the Board.) As no one else came forth to take the office from him, Meri nominated me for the job. We thought that we would then be able to exert more control over the Board and get things back on track. The Board voted unanimously that night to elect me as president. My political career was in motion.
My election was subsequently challenged on a bogus technicality by a Board member who was absent at that meeting and we had to do it all over again for his benefit. Same results - waste of time. So now I'm president of our HOA and with the help of some very intelligent new Board members, we have managed to get the attorneys fired (to the great delight of most of our neighbors) and squelch, for the moment at least, any attempts to amend our covenants.
I came to the job with the best intentions of reuniting a community that has been torn apart in the past few months by the reaction of angry homeowners to the secret and unbridled efforts of a Board of Directors seeking to accomplish something that few homeowners in our community want. A great distrust of the HOA has grown among our neighbors and my goal now is to calm the waters and restore order. I seem to have the support of the community and have made proposals (all of which have passed at Board meetings) that reflect the will of the homeowners.
At the annual meeting in October, the Board denied our right to an election of Board of Directors as required by our Bylaws. At the demand of the membership, we have now taken steps to conduct a special election to rectify that omission. All current Board members will have to run in this election to be legitimized, and we'll be up against anyone else from the community who chooses to run for office. I have a sense that I'll be officially elected through this process and I can only hope that the election will result in a Board of Directors that I can work with to the betterment of our community.
This whole adventure has been very educational for me. For one thing, I've learned a lot about politics. Not only have I had to learn how to strategize and maneuver to accomplish my goals within our HOA (dealing with some very different points of view held by the long-standing Board members) but I've also now reached out to our state government and become involved in law making. After many meetings and phone calls with some of our state legislators, I've managed to get one of our representatives to introduce legislation that would ban HOAs from foreclosing on properties during these tough economic times. If that passes I feel that my little foray into politics was worth the headache and the hours involved.
As in most aspects of my life, this whole experience has resulted in a song-writing effort to tell a story of HOA abuse. I enjoy the vehicle of parody and one day the similarity between "HOA" and "MTA" struck me and my creative juices started flowing. I came up with the following lyrics:
CHARLIE AND THE HOA
Parody by Bob Haworth © 2008 Three Cats Music, BMI
THESE ARE THE TIMES THAT TRY MENS’ SOULS…
IN THE COURSE OF OUR NATION’S HISTORY THE PEOPLE OF GOLDEN HAVE RALLIED BRAVELY WHENEVER THE RIGHTS OF MEN HAVE BEEN THREATENED. TODAY A NEW CRISIS HAS ARISEN. THE 6TH AVENUE WEST HOME OWNERS ASSOCIATION, BETTER KNOWN AS THE HOA, IS ATTEMPTING TO FORCE A BURDENSOME SITUATION ON THE POPULATION IN THE FORM OF RESTRICTIVE AND PUNITIVE AMENDMENTS TO THE COVENANTS. CITIZENS HEAR ME OUT – THIS COULD HAPPEN TO YOU!
NOW LET ME TELL YOU A STORY OF A MAN NAMED CHARLIE
AND HIS BATTLE WITH THE HOA
HE GOT BEHIND IN HIS DUES ASSESSMENTS
NOW THEY’VE TAKEN HIS HOME AWAY
CHORUS:
DID HE REALLY GET BURNED?
YEAH, HE REALLY GOT BURNED!
NOW HE’S OUT ON THE STREET TODAY
ONCE HE LIVED IN COMFORT IN HIS HOME IN GOLDEN
‘TIL HE LOST IT TO THE HOA
CHARLIE WORKED FOR YEARS AT A LOCAL BUSINESS
THEN HE GOT LAYED OFF ONE DAY
HE STRUGGLED HARD TO MAKE HIS MORTGAGE PAYMENT
BUT HE COULDN’T PAY THE HOA
NOW THE FINES AND INTEREST ON HIS DUES ASSESSMENTS
WERE GROWING DAY BY DAY
THEN ONE MORNING HE RECEIVED A NOTICE
FROM THE LAWYER FOR THE HOA
THEY HAD PUT A LIEN ON HIS HOUSE IN GOLDEN
AND TO MAKE THE MATTER WORSE
THERE WAS NOW A BILL FROM THAT DAMNED ATTORNEY
CHARLIE THREW UP HIS HANDS AND CURSED
AS THE WEEKS WENT BY CHARLIE’S DEBT GREW LARGER
AND HE KNEW HE COULD NEVER PAY
HE FINALLY LOST HIS HOME
THROUGH JUDICIAL FORECLOSURE
NOW IT’S OWNED BY THE HOA
CHORUS
NOW THE MORAL OF THIS STORY FOR ALL HOMEOWNERS
YOU BETTER LISTEN TO WHAT I SAY
THAT HAND IN YOUR POCKET
TRYIN’ TO GRAB YOUR WALLET
IT BELONGS TO THE HOA
CHORUS
Responses