Post #335165 by tin_omen on Thu, Sep 27, 2007 12:04 PM

Oooh! A HOA-bashing thread!

I had a similar issue with my old condo HOA some years ago. But in this case they decided to brow-beat me over an electric_element grill on my concrete slab porch (ground floor unit), that I hadn't even USED. They cited the relevant local ordinance banning "flame" near any, "wooden-sheathed multi-unit residence". Clearly they had no idea it was an electric grill, and just decided to be a pain in the a$$.

Beauty of the Internet: Our city had their entire ordinance base online and searchable. So I dug up the full text of the relevant ordinance. It was written to target "open flame". YEA!

But it also cited that electrical grills had to be hard-wired, and not plug-in. BOO!

So, yea, my electric grill was illegal. And the common-area outlet on the porch wasn't subject to my "hard-wiring" a grill up. At least if I didn't want another pissing contest with the board.:D

But the upside was that I got some decent mileage out of documenting and passing on the "open flame" portion of the ordinance (and pointing out that my "electric" clearly possessed no flame), while forgetting to mention the hard-wired part, when responding to the on-site manager. :^D

She was apologetic, that they certainly looked to be in the wrong. So I was magnanimous and "decided" to put the grill away, just to keep the peace.:^P

I lived there for 10 years. That is, until I finally found and married my sugar-mama wahine, who owned her own house! We finally sold off both the old home and condo last year and bought a new BETTER home. With a big-ole backyard just perfect for partying. And WITHOUT a HOA.

-- did I mention she likes to MOW, and SHOVEL SNOW! --
Damn I'm one lucky...

Whew was I glad to have unloaded that turkey of a condo, before the real estate market tanked much further than it had.

Probably the most gauling thing about the whole HOA process, was that at the time, I worked for a management firm that ran commercial and residential properties, and the condo HOA had less respect for the OWNERS, than our management company routinely did for our rental tenants! If you had a good tenant, you sure as heck didn't go out of your way to tick him off! You worked to keep em!

The board knew that we, as condo-owners, had little recourse. The common thread I found, on the legal front, is that the courts believe that because "we" elect the board, we therefore give tacit approval to all of their actions. If we didn't, we'd simply "elect" a different board.

Yea, try that in the real world.

[ Edited by: tin_omen 2007-09-27 12:08 ]