Your Home Owner’s Association has sent you a letter (just pretend you have an HOA for the sake of the question), your HOA payment that was due on May 1, 2009 was never documented as being received. The letter threatens a fine if you don’t pony up the payment ASAP. You know you paid it, and even have a cleared check to prove it. Here’s the thing, your HOA president is not returning your phone calls, and the HOA treasurer is very defensive when you call, and states that “I don’t know what was in the letter, my husband sent them out.” You have a handful of neighbors who also received the letter, and paid the fee well over a year ago.
What steps will you take to prove that you paid the fee, if any at all?
Become aggressive and litigious.
Hire a high profile lawyer.
Demand to see the HOA president in person but do not talk to him unless your lawyer is present
Review all the by-laws.
Be difficult and demanding.
Get all the documents from the bank in writing, certified and notarized as well as cell phone records.
Review the letter.
Look for any veiled threats against you, your family or your pets.
And since there are others involved, threaten a class action suit.
HOA’s are bullies. If you right, be firm and aggressive.
When we lived in another state we had problems with the HOA.
A sewer line from the common area backed up, overflowed into our condo.
We called a emergency plumbing company to fix the problem. They unplugged it.
The deal was: The HOA refused to pay the plumber because it was not THEIR plumber.
It wasn’t their problem. Right!
the flood happen 6 more times. It ruined our hardwood floors. It happen once while we were on vacation. We were trying to sell the property. They were billing us every time the plumber came. They said they were going to put a lien on our property.
Finally we asked our Real Estate agent what we should do? He said two magic words.
“HEALTH DEPARTMENT”.
The next day there was 8 people, a payloader, a jackhammer, HOA officers, shovels,Town officials all working to solve “OUR” problem. They had to use a jackhammer in two other condos to dig up the line. not ours.
Now it was their problem.
ironically, The condos that had to be jackhammered were HOA officers.
Karma….Justice.
It only cost our insurance company $8,000+.
We send a Xmas card to our real estate agent every year. We write only 2 words and they are not “Merry Christmas”. It’s HEALTH DEPARTMENT. He knows that to us those two words he said gave us “Merry Christmas” since he intervened.
.-= Jon´s last blog ..Truth embellishment tips for senior citizens =-.
HOA’s are power hungry bullies. If you have documentation don’t be intimidated. If they threaten you and you are paid up, tell them to “go for it.”
Try to resolve it but don’t back down, remember you will still have to deal with them again at some other time so I don’t agree with sunny on this one because in 99% cases it is not worth using a lawyer. small claims court is another matter.
I agree with sunny, to document all dealing with them.
Use email when possible. it is good documentation, record your conversations with them. Tell them it is for ” quality control and training purposes”. better yet, let them leave a voice mail. Then record it. you may need it for small claims court. Save all correspondence with them.
solve it….don’t escalate it.
.-= Jon´s last blog ..Truth embellishment tips for senior citizens =-.
I spente a year transcribing minutes for an HOA and came away with the idea that I would never live anyplace where I had to cow-tow to an HOA.
Sunny and Jon have both given good advice.
.-= Bev´s last blog ..Little Deaths =-.
I’d send a certified letter to his house with a copy of the cleared check. Then once he’s accepted the letter, if he’s still giving me grief, I call a lawyer to threaten him.
.-= Jennifer´s last blog ..Its come to this =-.
I’m with Jennifer. I would do the exact same thing.
.-= Everybody’s Beautiful´s last blog ..The World Looks Beautiful Through My Eyes =-.
I like that. That is documentation with intimidation. A taste of his own medicine.
.-= Jon´s last blog ..Truth embellishment tips for senior citizens =-.