Covenant Enforcement

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As I was perusing HOA headlines, I noticed an editorial written by the Desert Sun Editorial Board entitled Thumbs Down: Homeowners associations should allow solar panels on condominiums. The editorial slapped the Palm Valley Homeowners Association for not permitting a couple to install solar panels on the roof of their condominium. The roof is a common element and the Association is concerned about damage. While the couple has said they would accept full legal responsibility for damage, the Association doesn’t seem inclined to budge on the issue.

On July 28th, I blogged on a Breckenridge condominium association that had installed a solar thermal supplemental hot water system on the rooftop of the condo building. What is important here is the association installed the system on the roof it is responsible for maintaining. In the Desert Sun story, the homeowners are requesting to install panels on a roof which the association is responsible for maintaining, repairing and replacing. Continue Reading Installation of Solar Panels by Homeowners on Roofs of Condominiums

For anyone who has gone through the process of searching for a new home, you have probably experienced the exhilaration of finally finding the perfect home! If your perfect home is located in a homeowners’ association (“HOA”), do your homework, ask some important questions and be honest with yourself before signing on the dotted line. Here are some suggestions: Continue Reading Before Buying In An HOA: Educate Yourself and Ask Questions

From time to time, homeowners’ associations (“HOAs”) are faced with the problem of addressing a resident who hoards. The Mayo Clinic defines hoarding as: 

“. . . the excessive collection of items, along with the inability to discard them. Hoarding often creates such cramped living conditions that homes may be filled to capacity, with only narrow pathways winding through stacks of clutter. Some people also collect animals, keeping dozens or hundreds of pets often in unsanitary conditions.

 

Hoarding, also called compulsive hoarding and compulsive hoarding syndrome, may be a symptom of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). But many people who hoard don’t have other OCD-related symptoms.

 

People who hoard often don’t see it as a problem, making treatment challenging. But intensive treatment can help people who hoard understand their compulsions and live safer, more enjoyable lives.”Continue Reading Woman with Thousands of Rats Highlights Problems Associated with Hoarding

Yesterday, Molly Foley-Healy wrote about community association rules and evaluating whether your association’s rules and restrictions fit your community. Making your rules and regulations fit your community is only one step in the process of reviewing and revising board-adopted rules and regulations. What if your rules are illegal?

One condominium association in Canada was recently ordered to pay a former owner $10,000 for prohibiting the owner’s young daughter from swimming in the association’s pool. The association’s rules prohibited any child under the age of 2 from using the pool. Even though the rule at issue may have fit the community, which apparently consists of many owners or residents over the age of 65, the rule violated the Canadian fair housing laws because it discriminated based on familial status. Similar fair housing laws apply to Colorado community associations.Continue Reading Ruling Out Diapers Could Really Stink for Your Association

If you follow news stories on homeowners’ associations (“HOAs”), you may have seen coverage on the uproar created by the Sutton Lakes Homeowners Association in Jacksonville, Florida that has asked a resident to remove a sign that simply says Jesus. Evidently, the governing documents of the HOA only permit “For Sale” and “For Rent” signs in the community.

While Colorado law prohibits HOAs from banning the display of political signs, other types of signs can be prohibited through use restrictions found in a declaration of covenants, conditions and restrictions or through rules and regulations. The question is not whether an association has the authority to restrict signage; the question is whether these types of restrictions make sense for your community.Continue Reading Use Restrictions and Rules Should Fit the Community

A Florida homeowners association recently decided to waive $20,000 in fines accumulated by a homeowner who abandoned her property to her lender.  It appears that owner Linda Conti overestimated her ability to purchase the home, and planned to turn the property over to the bank with a deed in lieu of foreclosure.  She moved out before the bank took title, and as a result the property’s front lamp was left unlit for over a year.  This violated the association’s covenants, and the association levied a $50.00 fine every day, resulting in $20,000 in fines and several thousand dollars in attorneys’ fees.

 Continue Reading Dim-Witted HOA Finally Sees the Light

I don’t watch NASCAR, in spite of my vaguely southern roots.  I prefer sports with more action and bloodshed – like homeowners association meetings.  Todd Bodine is a NASCAR driver, an HOA member, and apparently a fan of tiki huts and pool houses.  Bodine constructed a tiki hut and pool house on his property, and after four years of dispute and litigation, the North Carolina Supreme Court sided with his Association.  The Association claimed the hut and house were not approved, and had to be removed.

Continue Reading Even NASCAR Drivers Don’t Get to Cut Corners for HOA Approval

While owners of individual houses and townhomes in homeowners associations may install solar panels on their rooftops (subject to prior association approval), roofs of condominiums are a different story.

 

We often receive questions from condominium associations regarding owners’ rights to install solar panels on the roofs of the condominium buildings. Condominium roofs are common elements and, as such, individual owners do not have the right to place solar panels on them. Solar gardens offer condominium owners an option for receiving many of the same benefits of solar panels otherwise reserved for single family homeowners and townhome owners.

Continue Reading What are Solar Gardens and What Can They Do for Me?

WBTV News in Charlotte, North Carolina reported yesterday on an ugly dispute in a homeowners’ association (“HOA”) over removing a pot-bellied pig from the community. The feud escalated to a point where the owner of the pig posted an entry on her Facebook page with a picture of her pig and “an image of a gun with a backward facing barrel with words “Made especially for HOA Board Members,” according to a report last week from deputies.” Continue Reading Do Your Governing Documents Address Pot-Bellied Pigs?

Summertime and the living is easy . . . unless you are a community association manager or board member in a homeowners’ association (“HOA”) dealing with violations of covenants, rules and regulations or architectural guidelines. It can be extremely frustrating to receive constant complaints on alleged violations, to send out letters to owners informing them of a violation and requesting their compliance – only to be repeatedly ignored. Sometimes the only option left is to “motivate” these individuals to come into compliance by the imposition of a fine. But before a fine is imposed, make sure that your HOA is compliant with Colorado law. 

The Colorado Common Interest Ownership Act (“CCIOA”), at C.R.S. 38-33.3-209.5(2), addresses the parameters that HOAs must comply with prior to imposing a fine. Here’s what you need to know:Continue Reading Before Imposing Fines – Make Sure Your Ducks Are in a Row