There is a rumor out there that buying a condo or a home in an HOA not only protects but also enhances property values. I still haven’t figured just out how that supposedly works. But proponents of the regime insist it is so. For the sake of argument I’ll leave that alone for the time being. But how on earth do they explain the fact that homeowners are responsible for the actions or inactions of the people either elected or hired and paid good money to “protect and enhance” your property?
Jan Bergemann joins us On The Commons. Jan is a long time advocate and legislative activist for protecting the rights of home and condo owners in Florida. Jan is the founder and President of the Florida based Cyber Citizens for Justice . He keeps a close watch on all the news related to housing, rentals, litigation involving homeowners and pending legislation that would affect the owners. Many, if not all, of the stories end up on his web site. One recent story involves a $7.5 Million award to a condo owner who seriously hurt himself when he fell into a hot tub that had been partially emptied, ill lit and left unprotected while the necessary repairs were being done. We talk about the case and wonder just how much it will cost the owners in the condominium to cover any shortfall in the event that the insurance isn’t adequate to cover the entire $7.5 Million? How does the assertion that a condo protects and enhances property values work in a situation like this?
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I was hoping to get some help on how Florida passed into law HOAs being regulated . In Colorado its a different story-we are trying to get help on how to do this we are meeting with a house representative this Thursday to discuss our horror story but would like to give your information. Our 360 unit building in Denver Co has an HOA president that once was a ex-judge that was voted off the bench and not retained due to “lack of courtesy and compassion and having communication problems” It seems she still wants that control like the HOA meetings are a court room. She curses and screams at owners in the meetings-its horrible. Its crazy how anyone can be voted in-no background check or anything-managing millions of dollars. She has been on the board for 8 years as president and now our reserves have dwindled away to almost nothing. A special assessment is now in progress due to old pipes-they want to repipe every building for 30 million. However they just had a lobby renovation for $450,000 meanwhile knowing this has been coming. Just learned they discontinued our accounting company and are using an independent contractor that left that company for medical reasons-now works out of her basement-she is not a CPA-but our kicked off the bench HOA president makes all the rules nothing is regulated she has unbridled power. We need help-finally have a meeting with a house rep in Colorado on Thursday any help would be greatly appreciated.