Maybe knock on the fucking door?

Knew I hated this town and neighborhood associations.
never would have thought...

I would wind up in jail.

We don't even have Zoning, Inspections, or Building Permits where we choose to live.
If someone doesn't like what color we paint our front door, thats their problem.

If we build something and it falls down,
thats our problem.

Condo-minimums?
Why?

But this woman isn't senile or disabled. She appears to be in full command of her faculties and is a businesswoman. She signed a legal agreement tp pay HOA charges and reneged. She is under a contractual obligation to pay. Her excuses don't hold up legally. That's the law and ignorance of this won't release her from it's consequences. Too bad, but she knew she must pay and tried to get away with it. How would you feel if she owed you?

are you OK?
you must have hit your head AWFULLY hard!

Yanking away a senior woman's home over $288 is beyond the pale...

You might do well to learn some compassion in this life...

am a senior woman with ss check of less than $1000 a month. This woman's plight is very familiar where I live in my condo. Some people try to get away with not paying for services done for all of us and then cry poor me or I'm old, etc, while they can pay the hoa if they want to. The rest of us then have to take up the slack for the deadbeats. Just because a person is 70 plus, doesn't mean they are truly needy or have dementia. This person is an international business woman, able to travel extensively. She signed a contract to pay and suffered the consequences we all know when we buy a home. If she was truly needy, I would of course, be on her side. But I've seen this all before.

HOA is a bunch of garbage no matter what, and that is one hard case to make.
I have less sympathy for anyone living in Lexington that I do for people moving into the sort of scum that form and enforce HOA's.
lowest of the low. no redeeming social value. Have I made myself clear?

That's in the territory of taking out a lien on the property or suing her in small claims court, not selling the unit out from under her. Some HOAs are just awful.

So you think her home would value at $5760 or a little more? Try .5% which would be $57,600 x .005 or even .1% which would be $288,000 x .001. It all depends on the neighborhood and it's way out of line.

Just for the picture...

That's 1 - 1/1000th to 5 - 1/1000ths of it's value.

I originally was going to write less than 1% but I've been on DU long enough to know that someone, somewhere would chime in and talk about how cheap housing was where they live and I must be from some elitist area.

that she refused to make good.

Our condo association has two liens out currently on chronic deadbeats. It will take a year or more to foreclose upon their condo units, by law.

This woman is neither poor, disabled, nor mentally incompetent. She's a cheat. She pushed the system too far, and miscalulated.

Fuck "the system," and those that use it to STEAL from their fellow citizens.

Fuck "the system."

Taking someone's *house* over a lousy $288 payment in arrears is theft.
I wonder how many of the HOA cheerleaders would take the HOA's position if it were their own parent(s) who were losing their home over such a trivial matter?

And it finally caught up with her.

...proportional justice you don't understand?

The fucking system is rigged and taking someone's home over a piddling $288 debt is proof of it.

Heartless, greedy people suck.

Just like everyone else.

Instead, like a typical 1%er, she decided that the bills to maintain her community were someone else's problem. Bills and notices an warnings and court summonses and even signs are all for the little people, not someone like her who pays cash for her hundred-grand home.

YES they should have foreclosed on her. I reserve my sympathy for the poor who are struggling and trying their best to do everything right. Self-entitled globe trotting jerks get no sympathy from me.

I'm really glad that I knew enough to avoid HOAs.

C'mon. There was an obvious lack communication there.

The woman thought HOA membership was voluntary, not mandatory.

The HOA should have made sure there was personal, face-to-face contact with the homeowner before doing such an unfeeling, drastic action.

The HOA was not going out of business over $288.

But don't sell her house. That is not a reasonable render for $288.

You can't just garnish income. She would have had to sign an agreement that allowed that as the mechanism for enforcement.

Instead, she signed an agreement that allowed foreclosure as the mechanism for enforcement. And that happened. After a very lengthy process that involved lots and lots of notification she ignored and did not ask about.

Garnishment up to a certain percentage until debt is paid or an order to your financial institution to freeze and pull money from checking or savings to pay the debt. Happens all of the time and would have accomplished the same thing without kicking her out of her home after it was sold below it's actual value.

For example, if you sign up for a credit card or other loan, the documents will include wage garnishment as an enforcement mechanism.

But let's say you refuse to pay your plumber. He can't garnish your income. What he can do is place a lien on the property.

Took the matter to court and part of her money in account was frozen and sent to HOA. I've also had coworkers in HR who have handled wage garnishments for HOA debts. Looks like you are wrong.

The ones I'm familiar with don't allow garnishment.

Ordinary people cannot be expected to honor silly contracts.

horse trainer she wouldn't need a strong command of the English language to work. I agree it's a legal obligation and the HOA needs the money to survive, but I think in 6 years the management company could have sent someone by the house. Most HOAs pay property management companies for oversight and they routinely inspect the neighborhoods. Let someone put something jacked up in their front yard and see if they don't get a visit from the property manager. Not only do they have tremendous negative press for the foreclosure, it doesn't help the comps in the neighborhood. I wonder who purchased her home at auction. They would stand to make a fortune if the foreclosure holds up in court.

"How would you feel if she owed you?"

Generous. Magnanimous. Good-will. Let her off the hook as I've let others off the same hook.

However, I do realize there are "sorry folks" indeed who feel that $400 is more than enough to rationalize the devils on our shoulders, the greed in our hearts, and the meanness in our spirits...

She didn't pay. They sent a ton of notices. They taped a sign to her front door. While the article doesn't discuss a personal visit by the HOA, there would have been plenty of other people showing up at the property during the foreclosure process.

So what, specifically, should have been done? Just let her slide?

And when she just "didn't understand" that property taxes weren't optional? Cut the school budget in order to not be too mean to her?

Its quick and the plaintiff will get court costs if they win. Seems much simpler than foreclosing a house.

I have no idea what the rules are in the relevant jurisdiction, but in many places only humans can go to small claims court. Companies, HOAs and other "non-people" can't.

Going to a 'regular' court makes it take about the same effort as a foreclosure, but the foreclosure is a little easier since it's the remedy she agreed to when she bought the house.

. . . in post after post? Do you not understand that you are coming off as an unfeeling rule stickler.

Someone in that HOA should have made sure a face-to-face conversation or phone call with the homeowner occurred to make sure there was a clear understanding that membership in the HOA was mandatory and not voluntary.

And if for some reason that could not happen then there are other legal remedies short of selling her house.

Common sense and compassion were lacking in that HOA board who voted to do such an outrageous thing.

I wouldn't want that on my conscience.

There's always a way instead of exercising the power trip that many HOA board members seem to get off on.

That's far more reasonable than all the other ways they tried to contact her.

Maybe they could have armed this guard, and you could get a double-outrage if she got shot! You'd really show just how much better you are by railing against that!

"Somehow get her to pay" is not a solution. "There had to be another way" is a lovely thought, but there's tons of people in this thread spouting off ideas that are illegal or ignore that the homeowner refused to respond to attempts to contact her.

In addition, you're not talking about something happening with no warning. To foreclose, they literally had to put a sign on her door saying "We're about to foreclose on you. Call us." Why is it up to the HOA to force her to call them? And how, exactly, do you propose the HOA do that? Break into her house and shove a phone into her hand?

The others on this thread are trying to be charitable. The two points of view will never see eye to eye.

Again, what specifically should the HOA have done to get her to pay?

I said you sounded heartless and seem over eager to take someone's property over a small bill. Maybe she has dementia. Maybe senior services needed to be called in to assist her. But like the greedy HOA all you are willing to look at is $$$$. That is heartless.

which means a lawyer, legal fees, etc.

I am Treasurer for my condo association. We are putting a lien on one co-owner who hasn't paid on time since she moved in, whose last personal check had insufficient funds, who tried to negotiate payments over FIVE YEARS to pay for an entire year's condo fees she owes, and who is "saving that money for her son's bar mitzvah."


The fact that we are rebuilding our private roads at an anticipated cost of $2.5M doesn't seem to matter to this person, who is well aware that she has a legal obligation to pay. And every time we have to use the lawyer, she gets to pay for that, too.

A condominium is a business, not a charity.

Since it's impossible for the HOA to represent itself in court, it can not go to small claims court.

And she ignored all the other legal notices. Why would she pay attention to a notice from a small claims court when she ignored all the ones from "big-boy" court?

Being a business is not the same as being a corporation.

The key element is no one in small claims court can have an attorney representing them. A corporation can not walk into the courtroom, so it has to be represented by an attorney.

On some furriner that might have died, or othewise incommunacado. The nice horse lady needs to sue the daylights outa somebody, starting with every name her wolverine of a lawyer can find associated with the seizure.

Thank you.

Most states require some sort of owner's signature or proof of legal condition/notification of the owner or estate if a private company is going to seize a property asset.
There are lots of small business owners who aren't very well versed in legal issues and contracts. Heck, a lot of them barely graduated high school, and others rely more on verbal and handshake agreements in their dealings than written contracts.
When I owned my house, it was the last at the end of a common driveway for which we had a "HOA", where every year we paid a portion of the insurance for that alley. We would have a big "After Thanksgiving/insurance payment" party so everyone would remember they had to chip in for it.

As for what she owed - small claims court at the most. There is no reason why they should be able to sieze and sell physical property she owned seperate from a "maintenance contract" with them. $48 a year? That's gardner money, or at most, insurance on common property, not an escrow account.
Would it be the same if they siezed her car and sold it instead of her home, since she owned both outright, and both were on the common property?

She should sue for any amounts collected in the sale above what she owed to the HOA, at the very least.

Haele

Edited because I assumed with such low HOA fees - even for a retirement "village" in the SE, it was a trailer park.

AFAIK, every state requires something similar to sticking a neon sign on the front door with "FORECLOSURE" on it in giant letters. There also would have been a court summons, which most states require to be delivered in person - some allow registered mail.

(In addition to all the other letters, notices, registered mail)

Or for a retirement community. Like her, I would probably have expected something that low to go to pool care, and figured they either had an opt-in or opt-out for it.

I suspect that at 70 years old, even if she were fairly astute in her business, if someone told her, "...and the residents are required to pay $48 a year to pay for areas like the pool " while they were showing her where to sign to move into our house, she probably assumed that if she told them she wasn't going to use the pool, she wouldn't have to pay that money.

Not saying that's right, just commenting that lots of people think that way when faced with finish-up paperwork.

If it was not made crystal clear to this woman that paying the annual HOA fee was a requirement for her to purchase the house - that it was just like a property tax, (which she was apparently current on, so there didn't seem to be any confusion there) then, depending on the state laws, she could have a case against them.

But again, if I were in the HOA, I would have taken her to small claims court for that amount, could have recovered off a lien on her income tax, if nothing else. Too risky otherwise, especially if she was still a businesswoman.

Haele

Anyone who believes otherwise is deep in sociopathic territory.

She should have burnt the house down on the way out

for $288.

$288 is no reason to sell someone's house out from under them.

I've been on an HOA board chairman and can tell you that there should have been direct outreach to this homeowner to find out what was the problem.

And by direct outreach, I mean a face-to-face conversation. That would have found out that the owner thought membership was voluntary and not mandatory.

A little common sense and human empathy was in order — $288 dollars and someone loses their house?
I repeat, get real!

I'd hate to have that on my conscience as an HOA board member who voted to do such an unfeeling thing.

she should LOSE HER HOUSE???
Man, some heart you got.

The HOA here does nothing except send out a $400 a year bill for nothing. There is no pool, they do not maintain the lawns, they do not even maintain the old wooden fence around the perimeter of the subdivision. The good thing is they have stopped even sending out the annual bills. I think the HOA dried up and went away. We're keeping an eye on them to make sure that they don't do the same to us for not paying this year.

HOA's are a joke.

I imagine may people predicate their sympathies on zip codes rather than on the people themselves-- regardless of how they may try to rationalize it otherwise.

That is the de-facto standard in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis-St. Paul and burbs) for "newer" developments. That was for developments with townhouses starting in the low 100s and homes in the low 200s and up. In the Twin Cities, those price points won't work for "snoots" - they would consider that slumming.

Builders put HOAs in place before they begin the development for the simple reason that they can impose rules to keep the neighborhoods to *their* standards while they continue to build and sell. At some point, typically when the development hits 70 or 80% buildout, the builders lose their seats on the board (until that point, from my experience and reading, the builders hold a majority of the board seats and therefore control the association).

That is just a reality of the times if you want to move into a newer development in many parts of the country.

it's a shame that people buying think that it's a necessary evil. Buyers have to let builders know they won't buy if there is an HOA - although there will always be those who want HOAs because they live in holy fear of someone painting their door pink and affecting their property values by $10. Anyway.

The brand new duplex I bought did NOT have any HOA, BUT, it is in what the town has designated as an 'architecturally controlled' area. Basically, for 6 years after the house is built, I cannot change the outside of the house or the basics of the front yard landscaping (ie, I can add flowers, I cannot cut down the fruit tree). After that, I'm free to do what ever I want. Owning the land my house sits on, and having that control and lack of an HOA was a HUGE selling feature and was the main reason I bought my place (that and I got a great deal and it's a high efficiency building). I don't know why buyers put up with an HOA. I think I'd go insane. I've had friends and family that have owned condos and have had huge issues with the busy bodies on the HOA. My brother, who was a young guy who bought a condo in a building where there were mostly older people found they were always going around raising money for ridiculous improvements not really needed, like new tulip bulbs for the flower beds and so on. He was there for 3 years and in that time the monthly fee went up $100. My parents currently deal with an HOA for their lake lot and they were having huge problems with constant raises because of money mismanagement until they urged their accountant friend to run to take over the finances. When he did, suddenly there was all kinds of money. Turns out the previous people in charge were hiring their friends for all kinds of bogus 'maintenance' jobs and telling the tenants that these jobs were necessary. When the accountant went over it he found there were all kinds of duplications. The previous HOA president sold his lot pretty fast once he got voted out. But really, who wants to deal with that shit? Not me. I'll take the risk of my property values tanking over dealing with control freaks who are looking to enrich themselves and friends.

You can't buy a newer house without one nowadays.

The trick is to find one with an HOA you can live with. Ours isn't all that great, but the neighboring subdivision's is worse.

And after it's built out, HOA is turned over to homeowners but they are usually idiots and the actual administration of HOA functions is outsourced to professional management companies. I personally think HOA's are a horrible legal creation just to make sure someone get fined if their satellite dish was installed without prior approval or they leave their trash can at the end of the driveway while out of town.

But here in my area, one of the poorest in the country, it's the rich and snobby part of town full of doctors, lawyers and kids of money that won the genetic lottery.

In other parts of town, people live in subsidized housing and modest homes.

Perhaps my statement made an unfair generalization.

That means that they deserve to lose their homes and have bad shit happen to them?

While my kneejerk reaction is that this lady was wronged, I admit she may have just been hard-headed stupid too... If it turns out she was warned and warned and warned but refused to pay what she agreed, it sucks, but sadly it's her own fault. However, if the HOA didn't even let her know what was going on, then I'm not going to pretend like she deserves it just because she lives in a "nice" part of town.

Except even they have gotten out of control.

I'm sorry but she does have some fault here. When she bought the house someone must have explained what HOA fees are.

and yet we're supposed to believe she just didn't understand? And didn't bother asking anyone? Or mention it to anyone?

Foreclosure does not just "poof" into being. There's lots and lots and lots and lots of warnings, notices, letters, warnings posted on your front door, and so on. It is not possible to just "miss" that something is happening.

For $288.00?

Don't want to risk losing your house over $288? Don't sign something agreeing to lose your house over $288. Don't understand what you're signing? Then why the fuck are you signing it? Ask what the hell it is.

Don't understand what all these notices and court summons are, including the one taped to your front door with FORECLOSURE written on it in giant letters? Ask what the hell is going on.

Do you think a city is entitled to a home if the owner doesn't pay their property taxes?

Just like the HOA. Karma.

... if they "didn't understand they had to"? You just let them slide?

They are not. What is the HOA doing for its precious money anyway? They could not be bothered to make a personal visit to the house before they disrupt a person's life. Karma will come back at them.

So you don't believe in honoring contracts. OK. It seems a lot of people don't. I was raised differently. I have no fear of karma.

Any creditor can get a judgment and a lien, and they must have gone through that in order to get a foreclosure. Something should have grabbed her attention that this was something she had to do. Sounds like going into foreclosure was about the only way to get her attention. Likely she can pay up now that she realizes it. It's not worth it to the HOA. OTOH, maybe they are fed up.

Maladies listed in the DSM IV might be closer yet to the mark, but I'll just leave that part unsaid.

You seriously belive this woman should lose her $100,000.00+ house for debt $288? Ever heard of small claims court or preportional punishment? On a liberal forum we can't even agree that stealing a womans house over a $288 debt is wrong!

Do you think a city is entitled to a home if the owner doesn't pay their property taxes?

I have no idea if that's true of this jurisdiction, but it's probably not available to the HOA.

Corporations are able to sue individuals or pursue court action against them. There are other options available to them they just chose the worst option of the bunch.

She lost the house, but got the proceeds of the sale beyond the $288 and the legal fees. She bought it for $93,000 house and she got $88,000. I have no idea if the difference is all fees or if the real estate market in her area is shitty compared to when she bought it.

Of course. The money goes to something you like.

Again, depends on the jurisdiction. It's likely that they're more than $40/year. They will still be a tiny fraction of the value of the house.

Then I have terrible news for you. Cities don't do that. They take the property.

At least, not in the jurisdictions I'm aware of. Most small claims require the person to represent themselves. As a non-person, a corporation can't do that. They inherently have to have a representative because a corporation isn't a person.

the payments, or lack thereof in this case, could accrue penalty and
interests charges.

Slapping fees and interest on an account does not make a check appear.

have imposed these fees.

Yet you entered this discussion claiming foreclosure was the wrong way to get her to pay.

...but I don't think the HOA gets to keep all the money from the sale of the home. They can only keep the $288 and the amount that it cost them to take, and sell, the house. The rest of the money goes back to the former owner.

I just read the whole article. The house sold for $93,500 and the woman received $88,000.

She lost quite a bit though. Doubt this is the end of this. She will probably get it back somehow.

the get to sell her home, receive the $288, and she gets the remainder less legal fees / expenses.

The only thing the HOA got out of this whole mess was $288.

Court summons are hand delivered, and need to be signed.
Official notices are certified mail.
If she wasn't at home, she couldn't have recieved the certified mail, it would have been returned. The stupid thing she did was toss out the HOA notices, but if she assumed she owned her house free and clear and this was like a "normal" city neighborhood where all she had to do was pay taxes and for the services she used, I can see why she thought they were asking for money for a service (the pool) she wasn't using.

In this case, I could see where it would seem like the offers my step-sister in law soliciting the payment of greens fees because the development was built around a nice 18 hole golf course. (She doesn't golf - but they assume her guests might and constantly pester her to think of them...for only an additional $150 a year!)
Now, greens fees would be an addition to her HOA, which is included in an escrow account she had to agree to if she wanted to buy the house, required to pay for her garbage pick-up, fire and ambulance services, taxes, and homeowner's insurance.

The association and the courts apparently didn't even contact her neighbors to see if she was still living there. It appears they assumed that, like most of the elderly people living in that retirement community, she had just died or "moved" (I guess that means "moved into an assisted living facility&quot .

Records hadn't been checked to see if she had been declared dead and the property passed into trust.

This appears that the homeowner's association did not do their own due dilligence before proceeding on the assumption that they were foreclosing on an abandoned property.


Haele

Lets not debate whether this women understood or did not understand the notices. The Association forclosed on her property for one very simple reason: She owned the property free and clear. She had no mortgages and her Real Estate Taxes are current. if she had a mortgage on the property then the HOA would not have forclosed because they would be responsible for the payment of the mortgage as a junior or subordinate lien holder. This was a calculated move by the Association. They now own a property that they can sell for value and do what they want with the proceeds. Although I believe that this is a deplorable act it is a perfectly legal way for the association to recover its monies. HOA boards are run mostly by frustrated power hungry people who like to make other people miserable.

Like so many "legal" things...it is not right.

Yep. Describes our HOA president perfectly. He was also president of the PTO for years, until someone pointed out the term limits clause written into the PTO charter. He's now installed himself as the school's Girl Scout liaison, where he's driven off at least two leaders with his demands for leader meetings ("to plan the work the girls need to do this year," never mind the girl-driven nature of the program) and his plans to have the girls do a bunch of landscaping work at the school as a "service project."

I can't stand him. He's a bully, and I can't move away from here fast enough.

the HOA is a business. It doesn't matter if there's a mortgage, a tax lien, whatever.

If fees go unpaid, the property is liened, and then foreclosed if the lien is not satisfied. There are very specific procedures to follow. Contract law is the oldest form of law there is and it is well-understood and constantly used.

"They now own a property that they can sell for value and do what they want with the proceeds." Absolutely untrue! Nor would they have been forced to pay the mortgage. That's what a foreclosure settles. We had a co uple of foreclosures, and it was the Mortgage Company that paid the outstanding condo fees and property taxes and maintenance. The Mortgage Company owns the property until the mortgage is paid off. That's why they say People don't buy houses, Banks do!

If the HOA did NOT follow contract law, the BOARD would be PERSONALLY liable for suits from all the owners who WERE paying their fees.

That's why contracts are important to follow. Don't sign one unless you intend to comply. That's why serving on a board is a responsibility and generally, an unpaid one.

The only contract that's easily broken is the marriage contract, and even then the financial penalties can be very high. It is the chicanery employed by the unfaithful spouse that colors most people's understanding of all law. BUT family law is the messiest, least settled part of it all.

"HOA boards are run mostly by frustrated power hungry people who like to make other people miserable." Only if the people of the HOA are too damn lazy to step up and serve.

I've been serving on the Condo board 11 years, now. We've had our petty tyrants, our totally incompetent, our fuzzy, bleeding hearts and our lazy to the bone members. We've gotten them off the board, and currently have a competent, diligent bunch doing good things and the gratitude we get is only in passing, as a road gets rebuilt, the pool renovated, or some other such thing as we are supposed to do.

We just lost our last incompetent, petty tyrant when the people fought back. Now we have to convince somebody competent to fill the vacancy.

Not everybody can or should serve. I'm protecting my investment in my home. (Frankly, I don't dare quit, at least, not until the roads are completed.)

The woman got the sale proceeds after the $288 was taken out.

of good intentions paving the road to hell.

Why people choose to put up with the mini tyrants is beyond me.

for 300 bucks owed. thats just wrong

HOAs all should be banned.

did any of the HOA morons actually, you know, talk to this woman in person?

I know, how dare they communicate with a "lower life form".

I hate them.

She read courts summons and just ignored them?

This woman's stupidity is just as much to blame as the overreaching HOA.

And, yes, it is stupid to plunk down cash on a property without knowing all of the obligations you'd have in connection with it, including HOA fees.

ESPECIALLY in a foreign country.

If the house wasn't in a very well defined subdivision, one might not realize there were HOA dues associated with it.

Still, it seems that there's something going on. It's really hard to foreclose. Not worth it over $288.

For six years, you repeatedly sent them letters asking them to pay you for services you rendered, and you kept performing the service because it was a bulk contract and the other clients relied on your to keep performing your service despite you not getting paid to do it by some or just this one person.

Lesson, don't throw away your mail, know what you're signing. When it comes to the stupid tyranical BS I've seen from HoA's, I hate them. But when it comes to dues that were fully disclosed when you bought the property, I have zero sympathy.

It would be better just to collect the money owed and be done with it, but unless the HOA was not disclosed to her when she bought the house (it will be on the paperwork; there will at least be a box checked), the HOA is legally within their rights.

mostly lawyers who would probably be the promoters in the end.