Home Owner Associations - the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly!

Anyone looking in to buying a new home should pay careful attention to the home owner associations; if there is one, how much it costs to belong to it, and whether or not you have to belong to it. Most of all, carefully read the rules and restrictions and realize that they can change.

Home owner associations are there for the home owner. They help you with maintenance and landscapingand often organize community events like picnics and block parties. They take care of shared facilities like swimming pools. But the real reason for their existence is to make sure the properties keep up a good appearance and preserve property values.

But in all of this, there’s a price to pay. Aside from the home owner association dues, you often lose much of your freedom as a homeowner. In some (many) cases, homeowner association rules are more intrusive than a landlord would be. They can micro manage everything from colors schemes to the number of pets (or even whether or not you’re allowed to have pets).

Some home owner associations won’t allow children to play in front yards. They often have restrictions concerning the number of cars parked in the driveway or on the street. One woman was penalized just after 9/11 because her flag-pole (proudly displaying her country’s flag) was one foot too high.

The worst thing about such micro-management, is that it often becomes a political gamefull of favors and rewards, grudges and punishments. Anything that offers some kind of power over other people is bound to draw a certain crowd. So the home owner association board members are often not the kind of people you would want making decisions for you.

Complaints about neighbors who may break the rules arise out of personal feuds. If the complainer is ‘in the click’, the board listens. If you’re not ‘in the click’, you could get constant harassment.

Becoming a board member for the home owner association isn’t always easy. You would have to be able to play office politics and know how to flatter. In some home owner associations, the board members can be re-elected over and over again, without limits to the number of terms they serve.

This makes it easy for them to abuse the system. Most of the community members are generally happy with the home owner association board as long as they’re not being bothered. So they have little reason to vote for new members come election time. For some people, these issues are tolerable because the property values are guaranteed. But if you’re the kind of person who would rather have more freedom, you might be better off in a community without a home owner association.

Copyright 2006 YourLenderForLife.com

Keith Gill is a professional Real Estate Investor and Mortgage Loan executive and Consultuant for a major mortgage bank. http://www.bestarizonahomeloans.com

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