DietDrThunder
Platinum Member
- Apr 6, 2001
- 2,262
- 326
- 126
I agree that having to live in a neighborhood with an HOA sucks. A lot of this suckiness can alleviated if you are willing to spend just one evening a month attending HOA board meetings and voicing your opinions. We have around 500 homes in our HOA, and besides the annual meeting, there are at most 8 homeowners in attendance not including the board.
I got involved because I didn't like the way the HOA was being run, and the neighborhood was starting to look bad as the result. I got myself elected onto the HOA board of directors 6 months ago and I've been busting heads from the beginning.
One other new member joined the HOA board at the same time. We forced a vote of no confidence of the HOA President. Even though the vote didn't pass, he resigned from the board and another new member was elected.
I forced firing of several contractors for doing poor work or ripping off the HOA. The list includes the landscaping company, the pool maintenance company, the pool monitoring company, the porter service, and finally the HOA management company for gross mismanagement. They've all been replaced with the new HOA management company starting August 1st. I didn't do it alone, but if I didn't press the replacement of vendors, the HOA board in its complacency would have continued with the same poor service. All of these new vendors are now on 1 year non-automatic renewal contracts.
In addition, I got the approval and had installed high speed internet for the pool cabana area. This also allowed me to set up two networks. One network I connected the security cameras to for off-site storage of security footage. The other is a guest network for use by homeowners at the pool.
The HOA was also paying $280 a month for keycard access for the pool area, which they had been paying on for 7 years. I got it approved and I installed a new keycard system with all new equipment which can be accessed over the web, for a total of $1,857. The system will pay for itself in 7 months.
The HOA was paying $75 a month to have a phone at the pool cabana for emergency calls. Bundled in the high speed internet which we are paying $60 plus tax a month is a phone line for emergency use. So for less than the cost of the phone, we now have phone and internet.
Overall the new vendors have been doing a great job, and looking at the budget numbers, these changes will have saved the HOA homeowners over $11,000 the first year. This savings has had an additional benefit of keeping the HOA board from raising the dues again (they've raised the dues by 10% 4 years in a row).
After the new HOA management company is in place, us 3 new members of the HOA board have decided to work on putting term limits on the board itself. The former President had been sitting on the board for 10 years, and had been President for the last 6. I don't know exactly how this will work, but something along the lines of 2 consecutive 2 year terms followed by a minimum of 2 years off the HOA board before you can run again, with a maximum of 10 years on the HOA board. But we'll see what we come up with.
We are also working on increasing the size of the HOA board from 5 members to 7. There are too few people making big decisions with just 3 board members needed to be present to have a quorum for the monthly meetings, which then makes it where only 2 votes are needed for an item to pass.
Yeah, HOA's suck. I hate them. The city mandates that every new neighborhood being developed have an HOA. When I retire and move onto several acres, I will ensure that I don't live in an HOA. But for now it is necessary for me to live where I am and not have more than an hour commute.
So I guess my point is, if you live in an HOA, get involved. You don't have to be on the HOA board to make a difference, but just showing up and voicing your opinions will make a difference.
I got involved because I didn't like the way the HOA was being run, and the neighborhood was starting to look bad as the result. I got myself elected onto the HOA board of directors 6 months ago and I've been busting heads from the beginning.
One other new member joined the HOA board at the same time. We forced a vote of no confidence of the HOA President. Even though the vote didn't pass, he resigned from the board and another new member was elected.
I forced firing of several contractors for doing poor work or ripping off the HOA. The list includes the landscaping company, the pool maintenance company, the pool monitoring company, the porter service, and finally the HOA management company for gross mismanagement. They've all been replaced with the new HOA management company starting August 1st. I didn't do it alone, but if I didn't press the replacement of vendors, the HOA board in its complacency would have continued with the same poor service. All of these new vendors are now on 1 year non-automatic renewal contracts.
In addition, I got the approval and had installed high speed internet for the pool cabana area. This also allowed me to set up two networks. One network I connected the security cameras to for off-site storage of security footage. The other is a guest network for use by homeowners at the pool.
The HOA was also paying $280 a month for keycard access for the pool area, which they had been paying on for 7 years. I got it approved and I installed a new keycard system with all new equipment which can be accessed over the web, for a total of $1,857. The system will pay for itself in 7 months.
The HOA was paying $75 a month to have a phone at the pool cabana for emergency calls. Bundled in the high speed internet which we are paying $60 plus tax a month is a phone line for emergency use. So for less than the cost of the phone, we now have phone and internet.
Overall the new vendors have been doing a great job, and looking at the budget numbers, these changes will have saved the HOA homeowners over $11,000 the first year. This savings has had an additional benefit of keeping the HOA board from raising the dues again (they've raised the dues by 10% 4 years in a row).
After the new HOA management company is in place, us 3 new members of the HOA board have decided to work on putting term limits on the board itself. The former President had been sitting on the board for 10 years, and had been President for the last 6. I don't know exactly how this will work, but something along the lines of 2 consecutive 2 year terms followed by a minimum of 2 years off the HOA board before you can run again, with a maximum of 10 years on the HOA board. But we'll see what we come up with.
We are also working on increasing the size of the HOA board from 5 members to 7. There are too few people making big decisions with just 3 board members needed to be present to have a quorum for the monthly meetings, which then makes it where only 2 votes are needed for an item to pass.
Yeah, HOA's suck. I hate them. The city mandates that every new neighborhood being developed have an HOA. When I retire and move onto several acres, I will ensure that I don't live in an HOA. But for now it is necessary for me to live where I am and not have more than an hour commute.
So I guess my point is, if you live in an HOA, get involved. You don't have to be on the HOA board to make a difference, but just showing up and voicing your opinions will make a difference.
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