Homeowner Association Blocks Guests When Fees Go Unpaid 54
The Stoneybrook West homeowners association in Orlando, Florida is serious about collecting its fees. So serious in fact that the association will not let anyone coming to see Melissa Solis in the gated community. Solis has fallen behind on her association fees and now guards at the gated entrance to her neighborhood prevent her friends, family, babysitter and even the pizza man from going in to see her. Even Melissa's mother-in-law was banned from coming inside when she came for a family birthday party. Association lawyer Jim Gustino says, "We have to bring whatever lawful pressure that we have to bear on these folks. No one feels good about it, but it does result in collecting money. Many folks will, by some miracle, come up with the money they couldn't come up with before, because they don't want their family members to be denied entry."
Re:HOAs may be evil, but she agreed to it (Score:4, Informative)
The route from the community entrance to the driveway is presumably the HOA's property (as a "common area"). Permitting access to this property is a service which the HOA is within its rights to withhold. The means by which you and your guests approach your property is one of the things you have to think about before making a purchase. It's also something most people recklessly take for granted. If you don't have a clear property right (e.g. easement) in the ground you must cover to access your property, you'd best remain on good terms with those who do.
If you want to talk about the issues with HOAs, let's start with the way the terms supposedly attach to the property rather than the owner; i.e. the way that you—as the sole owner of the house and the land on which it's built—aren't permitted to sell your own property to anyone who doesn't also contract with the HOA. Of course, the new owner might end up needing a helicopter to get to their new home, but limited access shouldn't prevent you from selling it to them.
Re:HOAs may be evil, but she agreed to it (Score:2, Informative)
Dunno what planet you are from, but here on Earth in a place called the U.S.A. when we buy a house it involves an agreement with more pages that Stephen Kings " The Stand" with print so small, ants can't read it and details that make Microsoft EULAs look fair and friendly. Nobody reads these, crap, it takes an hour and a half just to sign the damn thing,just flippin through the pages. HOAs can appear just about anywhere, even in my neighborhood. It's just as bad as the way we let politicians take away our rights with legislation and start an income tax over the last century. Just like boiling a frog, turn up the temp slooowly, froggy won't even notice till his eyes explode. Best advice, infiltrate and subvert an HOA from within and eventually dispose of it. It's an unamerican institution as the modern Democratic party, hellbent on ressurecting the old USSR business model (anyone notice that failed a while back?) Failing infiltration, open tactical warfare and thermonuclear intervention may be required to rid your neighborhood of these cockroaches.