Owners of townhomes in Plattsmouth were shocked to learn that for about the last five years, they've been paying to mow lots belonging to the developer.
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I dislike HOAs as much as the next person, but where in the constitution does the federal government get jurisdiction over these cretins? This is a state issue.
HOA's are a private agreement between homeowners. You're basically saying the government should have the authority to prevent people from entering into contracts with each other. That's like saying lets ban auctions, or private sales outside of stores. You don't HAVE to buy in an HOA. Plus, many of these HOA's exist because they all own assets jointly. Can imagine if you all owned a pool and every time you cleaned it you had to go knocking on each neighbor's house saying "that will be $5 please or we can't clean the pool"? And most of these problems pop up because the homeowner's themselves delegate (or should I say RELEGATE) power to a management company whose incentives are the squeeze the most that they can out of the homeowners. If they ran it themselves, with their own rights in mind, that wouldn't happen.
Not exactly. Federal law will just make thing worse. But HOAs should be required by STATE law to give full and complete financial report to all the home owners twice a year. It's too easy for this (and embezzlement) to occur.
@@dennisd9554 -- As I mentioned earlier, the authority to regulate an HOA does not rest with the feds, but the state does have jurisdiction, just as the state can regulate any other type of business. In my opinion, HOAs take on a quasi-governmental role. As such, they should be required to obey and respect the constitution. In many cases, btw, a developer buys up empty land. At some point during the process, they create the HOA, and they legally bind the properties to it. They appoint the "board" (their own employees or agents, of course), and only then do they start selling the lots. As the majority property owner, they continue to control the whole thing. Until the developer is out of the picture, the individual residents don't have enough power to change the setup.
It's OK until the tall grass becomes home to various unwanted critters, like spiders and snakes. If I lived there, I would ask for criminal fraud charges.
@@spqdallas -- I've lived in such places. The snakes where I live tell you they are there, and they are infrequent, and spiders are everywhere anyway, and they eat mosquitoes, so they don't really bother me.
Also the fire risk. Don’t get me wrong. I think a grassy field is way better than another home, but if I’m paying $125 every single month plus I’m getting fine if my grass isn’t cut the standard then I’d be pissed for sure.
It’s not the builders fault. He said he had no knowledge of anyone mowing his lots. The HOA was mowing his property without his knowledge or permission and using the residents money to pay it. It’s the HOA and only the HOA who are at fault here.
@@sitcheyr9352doubtful most developers are willing to take all from anyone ! Business owners/ developers tend to be greedy and corrupt, when the people have to reach out to public news stations
@@sitcheyr9352They need to look closer at who's been mowing it and do they have any other ties with the builder. Dig deeper and then if nothing is there it's on the HOA or management company. There's the possibility that someone in the HOA is friends or even family that is getting paid. If that's the case they're the one that they need to be approaching. Not the builder and certainly not the company that provides the service. If proven and no authorization from the builder to perform the service, to me that's short of embezzlement funneling monies to them that hasn't been approved.
@akbychoice pretty sure that is actually legal. If you knowingly let someone do work on your property, then they can charge you for the service. But if you tell them you don't want the work done or call the police, they're out of luck.
One time a field grew across from my house and the mice moved out of my basement into the field. Seems like they like their natural habitat better than someone's house.
@@JaelinBezel No, the one guy stated, how would you like that across from you. They want it mowed, just not with their money. Let it grow back natural.
If I was a resident I would start checking my mortgage agreement. If they haven't turned over the homeowner association to the homeowners I'm wondering if the homeowners are even homeowners?.
Depends on where you live. While most people in my city get "city water" which is managed by a large water company, I live in a neighborhood with its own well, and that services about 30 homes. Our rates are cheaper than normal city water folk. By state law, the water is tested regularly by an independent lab, and it always passes. (Most recent test sample was taken at my house, so I know the sampling is legit -- I watched him do it.) Anyway, I haven't checked "their accounts" but that wouldn't matter to me. The rate is correct, so I don't care if they buy too many office supplies or pay for something they aren't obligated to pay for. Oh, and I don't live in an HOA. Wouldn't want to.
I imagine that the management company doesn't have to turn the HOA over to the residents until a certain percentage of the neighborhood is finished. They may be leaving it undeveloped on purpose.
LOL, this is why HOA is a huge mistake, first they want rules where none is needed because "it increases the house price" as if they were planning on selling it or something, then many of them tend to try to get people to join said association either by tricking or harassing (my aunt was almost tricked into it but luckily my cousin saw the papers they had given her to sign) then even if you aren't a member they sent threats if they see something they don't like not to mention their financial management tends to be very shady at times.
When we were looking at homes several years ago, we were shown a lovely place at a good price. However, when we asked about an HOA and found out the area had one, I said "I don't want to buy here."
HOA's and particularly their boards draw narcissists like flies to a garbage pile. They are like a middle school clique where they want to rule everyone else. Never buy in an HOA community. BTW: The land that your house is on is not yours. In these communities each owner owns a non-divisible share of the community. Example: say that there are 100 homes in a community, each home owner owns 1/100th share of the community. It is about like owning shares of stock in a corporation.
I owned a lawn care business for almost 20 years before health issues forced me to retire. One of my customers was a development that had a HOA. All the years I did it,10-12 years, there never seemed to any issues with money being available for common ground maintenance of any source, mulch around the homes or tree work and the such. The same time I retired they went from self governed where you had to live there to be on the board, to management company. I had made several friends over the years living there and I told them then they were going to regret it. Suddenly the same dues that had always been efficient enough to cover the above needs were no longer there. The management company apparently was bleeding them dry and left nothing for expenditures they had always financed. I do know a couple of my friends actually moved and I lost contact with the others. I hope they were able to get away from the situation that they had found themselves in.
Thank God my parents live in an area with an optional association. It's optional and $50 a year. It goes to pay for landscaping and electricity. No one is paid. 30 years ago, the cost went from $25 to $50. In 30 years, only one house was threatened with a lien because it had fallen into disrepair to the tune of $500k.
Where I live, 99% of new houses are in HOA's. And the houses that aren't (both old and the 1% of new homes) are much more expensive as they tend to be on larger lots. My first house was a newer townhouse with an HOA. Never again. As soon as we could afford it, we bought a 50 year old house NOT in an HOA. It was much more expensive and is a lot more upkeep but totally worth it. Will never voluntarily live in an HOA again!
We had a large field behind our home and we were not in an hoa but our homes near that field had an issue with mice spiders small snakes and other insects that were coming from the field until they mowed it down and turned it into a sports field for the YMCA. The whole problem lasted for 5-7 years
Oh no! A sports field is worse than the vacant field. Noise, noise,... and more noise! My formerly peaceful Sunday afternoons -- and my privacy -- would be ruined!
Read your covenants that YOU signed when you bought your property. I’m sure they say something like the developer is the sole HOA authority until X amount of lots are sold. Very common in developments. Know what you buy before you buy it. Own your mistakes.
Check how much is in petty cash. If it’s more than 500.00 then they are stealing your money. You should get an itemized report of where money is going.
The developer would have been the only entity that could have hired the management company. The developer is the board at this point. Not sure how they can claim they aren't responsible. It's not like there are elves hiding in the tall grass that formed an HOA board and hired the management company.
Our HOA was originally run by the neighborhood residents for 10 years until the developer who, right when he started building a new phase in the neighborhood, discovered that the HOA had $100,000 in savings. The developer promptly took over the HOA and the money had to be turned over to the management company he hired. Then the developer started saying that he was going to build a second neighborhood pool. I brought up at the next meeting that he’d better not be planning to use any HOA money to build that pool as it was not an HOA expense but a development expense. Guess what? No second pool. Our HOA was great when it was resident run. But now that it’s run by the developer it’s horrible.
I'm just guessing that the developer is the HOA. They will turn over the HOA to the homeowners (to the extent that this ever truly happens) after they sell 51% of the lots, with the vacant lots ensuring that they never surpass 49%
"you wouldn't want that across your street", actually I wouldn't mind a field of tall grass. It looked rather nice. These people haven't seen ugly vacant lots full trash and abandoned homeless camp debris.
you keep your HOA and i will think about you every time i am out in my pool or when i go out back and pulla part off that old jeep or when i just dont feel like mowing my yard today, how about when i leave my trash can by the road all week.
In no way was it an accident. It was intentional, they knew exactly who they were paying and where they were getting the money. The developer should be paying dues of $125/month on each of their lots like everyone else. Never live under an HOA.
A lien would be THEFT!! The lot owner never had a contract with the HOA to cut his grass!! In fact, the HOA trespassed on the property to cut the grass.
Services were rendered to the developer. Out of the home owner funds. If you're a developer. You know what is going on. All the home developer has to do is pay back for services rendered. The point the is the home owners are NOT Responsible for mowing another one's property. How are you, so sure, there was not a contract?? Can you prove it?
@@trueamerican2023 .. A contract would have been produced if there were one. "Services rendered" is NOT true if the "services" weren't requested! Hey, when you're on vacation, I'll show up and I'll paint your house... whether you ask for it or not. Then I'll give you a bill for... "Services rendered!!" BTW... Cutting the grass was TRESPASSING!!
HOA devalues your house why would anyone want a mini dicatorship running around putting stupidly high fines over curtains being wrong or grass half an inch to high? It's so stupid to live in an HOA.
What is south of the Metro? Are you in Bangladesh, Philippines, South Pole??? No where do you list where this newscast is located. Please put the city and state for your location in your opening screen, so people from foreign countries and even from the United States will know where you're at.
Pretty sure HOA used to start out as just a bunch of home owners getting together, chipping in a fund and making their neighbourhood better taken care of. Then one day, someone decides that the association has gotten large enough they can make a full time job out of managing it and paying themselves with the fund. Then the developers saw this and decided they want in on the idea, selling new homes already set up in a HOA they created and run by a management company they made so after the home buyers bought their home from the developers they get to continue paying them or their friend's management company. They can set whatever fees and contract the work to more of their friends for special higher than normal rates, give themselves salaries and bonuses and make rules and come up with fines for them, and if you don't pay the fees they can take back your house.
"You wouldn't want a big open field with natural plants infront of your house. You would want more houses that look exactly like yours"- typical suburbanite
A lien would be THEFT!! The lot owner never had a contract with the HOA to cut his grass!! In fact, the HOA trespassed on the property to cut the grass.
let me let you in on a little secret, they ain't gonna put the money back because you are the board.. you would be putting the money back, so it would be a double dip. you would have to hold the board members responsible personally. they are the ones that miss used funds. They're the ones that need to replace the funds not the HOA because that is you.
You’re not owed a dime! That’s exactly what your hoa is supposed to do! Don’t move into a hoa neighborhood they owe you no money and no explanation and you do not deserve any representation of any kind!
They (the developer) probably created the HOA in the first place, and likely aren't paying any dues, or just nominal dues. One of the reasons developers do this is to protect their property values as they finish the development -- they don't want people painting houses pink with blue polk-dots or letting weeds grow where there should be lawns. They really don't care about the undeveloped property as it doesn't bring down property values. Once created, these things can take on a life of their own, with busybodies creating one new rule after another, all in an attempt to "preserve property values" but really just giving them points of control over their neighbors.
My initial take is that the developer IS the HOA, and that these vacant lots prevent them from surpassing the agreed upon percentage of sold properties at which they will transfer control to the honeowners.
The geezers at the HOA prohibited driveway caucus were always complaining about the tall grass. Now they find out they paid for the mowing. I hope these elder Karens and Darens never get reimbursed for the mowing costs. It just grass people!
