Monthly Archives: July 2017

Law Suits, Litigation

John Cowherd

We’ve all heard the ridiculous explanations about the horror and abuses of HOAs.  “It’s ALL your fault, condo and homeowners, because you agreed”.  And that begs the question of why any sane and rational person who fully understands all the ramifications of association living would ever agree to the lopsided powers against them?  Do housing consumers really understand that the notion of an HOA contract is as fake as they come?  In a contract both parties are pretty much on an equal footing.  They agree, in the case of an HOA, to pay a certain sum of money on a monthly/quarterly or annual basis in return for certain services and benefits.  So far sounds OK, right?  But in the event of a breach in the contract the HOA has seemingly limitless powers to enforce their perception of the breach of the fake contract while the owner is left with nothing more than the right to hire an attorney and go to court.  The association? Well, they can fine you and take your house away without ever going to court.  Seems fair, right?  No, I didn’t think so either.  What happens when you exercise your 1st Amendment Right to Free Speech and decide to tell your story?  Does that offer you any leverage?  Can you prevent someone else from getting caught in the same house of horrors?  Well, that’s where more and more homeowners these days are running into something called a gag order.  You can’t talk about what you have endured and how the courts sided against you even further tipping the scales of justice in favor of the association. 

John Cowherd join us On The Commons this week.  John is an attorney in Northern Virginia who represents homeowners caught in the web of HOA horrors.  Surprise, surprise, he knows the laws pertaining to condos and HOAs in Virginia.  Something not many attorneys understand.  John is a blogger where he writes about all things related to real estate, including HOAs.  His blog is called Words of Conveyance.  We talk to John about his recent blog titled Are Legal Remedies of Owners and HOAs Equitable? We talk about the associations right to fine, why they like that power and what an owner can do to protect him or herself.  We also talk about court imposed gag orders to prevent any information about the cases from ever seeing the light of day.  Perhaps we ought to remind them of the Louis Brandeis quote: “Sunlight is the best disinfectant”

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Condominium

Jan Bergemann

In the civilized world a crime is a crime is a crime and will be treated as a crime.  Tax payers believe that their tax dollars protect them from ALL crimes and criminals.  Call the police, file a report and leave it in their capable hands.  In general that is true.  But when enormous sums of money are embezzled from condo coffers, why then does it become a “civil matter” and up to the condo owners to hire attorneys and investigate the theft?  Why aren’t all crimes treated equally?  And why do we need laws making the theft of hundreds of thousands of dollars a crime?  These thefts could lead to the loss of people’s homes and their largest assets but they are swept under the rug.  The criminals get away with it and the victims are left helplessly to try to pick up the pieces of their lives.

Jan Bergemann joins us On The Commons.  Jan is a homeowner, an owner advocate and the founder and president of the Florida based Cyber Citizens for Justice.  As an advocate who has seen the abuses and the horrors that occur routinely in residential associations he has an intimate understanding of how and why such hideously outrageous abuses occur.  We’ll talk to Jan about a new law that just took affect in Florida – HB 1237 – dubbed, of all things, “the Condo Crime bill”.  The bill has many moving parts and addresses a number of insane situations that are so commonplace in condos and homeowner associations but would raise more than eyebrows in a civilized, sane society.   We go through some of the parts to understand why it was necessary to include them.  Some don’t require much imagination like attorneys may not represent BOTH the HOA and its management company.  Picture that one in a court of law – arguing both sides of the case!   Any cartoonists want to tackle that one?

Representing both sides – a client on the right and one on the left, which one will generate more money in the future?  Morality and the truth is always sacrificed.  

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Abuse, Fighting Back

Jonathan Friedrich

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First you scare them, then you promise to protect them and then you own them.  Once that is accomplished, perpetrating the biggest consumer scam is a piece of cake.  Buying a few state legislators’ assistance, creating a very lucrative stream of “free” income for the municipalities, paving the way for developers to increase their profit margins exponentially seals the deal.  And that is how simple it has been to force housing consumers into HOAs where they can be robbed of their homes, their wealth and health and their peace of mind.  The lies that have been repeated over the decades to scare prospective homeowners appear to have become universally accepted truths.  After all, if you keep hearing the same thing over and over again, if must be true, right?  However, the one thing that is true is that non HOA controlled housing is almost nonexistent in most of the country.  So being told that the house you are buying is in a mandatory membership homeowner association is no surprise. 

Jonathan Friedrich joins us On The Commons.  When he retired, Jonathan left New York in search of lower property taxes and moved to Las Vegas, Nevada where he bought a house that needed a lot of work.  He rolled up his sleeves and got to work.  When he bought the house he was given an HOA disclosure package which contained a Declaration of Covenants, Conditions & Restrictions commonly known as CC&Rs.  Jonathan’s concern was getting away from crippling property taxes and not so much HOAs.  His focus was fixing the house he had just bought and making it habitable. He also became involved in his new community.  And that’s when the imperfections of his association and association living in general started rising to the top.  He dealt with all the usual insanity that seems to go along with HOAs which not so surprisingly led to the court house.  After 5 long years in court, Jonathan won his case.  But as the saying goes, the devil is in the details and to truly appreciate the win one has to hear the details of his story, in his own words.  The twists, the turns, the lies, the misrepresentations made along the way should alert consumers of what to look for and where to look when buying a house.  There may be more to come as Jonathan is not finished cleaning up the mess. Stay tuned.    

Jonathan also has a web page HOA Corruption – Check it out.

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Gates provide security.
No, they don’t!
One of the many LIES designed to scare and protect you

 

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Condominium, Construction Defects

Tyler Berding

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They don’t build things like they used to.  The Pyramids of Egypt have been around since approximately 2700 BC, that’s almost 5000 years.  I wonder how much maintenance has been done on them over the centuries?  Our cardboard and scotch tape buildings fail after a few years and will probably not be a source of amazement in a century.  In fact, at this rate, most of them will not be still standing and that’s with maintenance.  How times they are a changing!

Tyler Berding joins us On The Commons this week.  Tyler is a founding partner of Berding and Weil, a law firm in California specializing in construction defect litigation and condominiums.  He has long warned us of the perils we are facing by not being adequately funded for multi unit housing.  Tyler also maintains a blog called, not surprisingly,  Condo Issues.  Tyler talks about a couple of recent tragic building failures in California that claimed the lives of several people.  He explains why he believes these buildings are failing and what can be done about it.  He also tells us about one bill he wrote that he thinks might help in the future.  But at no time does he promise us that we will be building and living in anything that is remotely as well built as the Pyramids built by the ancient Egyptians.  Take another listen.

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