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The age old known fact that people abuse power. That's why we need less governing en ies in our life, not more.
SAN ANTONIO – Most suburban San Antonians have to pay hundreds in yearly dues to their homeowners’ association (HOA). This money goes to all sorts of things that are supposed to help beautify and improve the neighborhood, which - in turn - increases property values for the homeowners. So everybody benefits.
Homeowners in the Longs Creek neighborhood contacted the News 4 WOAI Trouble Shooters because they felt the money they paid their HOA was being terribly misspent. Longs Creek is located on the North Side near Madison High School. With over 1,300 homes, it’s one of the biggest associations in town.
Shortly before we aired this story the homeowners delivered a flyer to every neighbor telling them about our investigation and urging them to watch our story on TV or at WOAI.com.
The neighbors wanted everyone to know exactly where their dues were going, so they also presented their findings at a recent HOA meeting that got so out of control some people were threatened with arrests.
"People are outraged," exclaimed Peggy Sue Wilson-Schmueckle. She’s the homeowner leading the fight to rid the association of what she calls gross mismanagement of funds by the board. “Once we uncovered it and did an audit, people were very outraged. They want them [the current board] to resign.”
The information we uncovered explain why the homeowners are so bent out of shape. Records detail board meetings at nice restaurants; meetings that were not open to the public. We also found a do ent showing a $4,200 expense paid to the board president's son-in-law for brush work he did in the neighborhood. Additional records showed the HOA donated thousands of dollars to random charities. The HOA even gave more than $1,300 to a group of HOA lawyers to help them lobby the legislature.
The homeowners paid for all of it.
more...
http://www.woai.com/mostpopular/stor...DcApEP2fg.cspx
The age old known fact that people abuse power. That's why we need less governing en ies in our life, not more.
PTA's work the same way. The kids are out peddling candy and wrapping paper that the officers use to go to some annual meeting in Boston.
I'd be outraged if that was my name.
Is that really an outrageous amount of money? And what if the son-in-law did $4,200 worth of work?
A few years ago, when we were buying a house, my wife convinced me to lean strongly towards looking at houses outside of an HOA. I did so kicking and screaming because I didn't want to live next door to some moron who was too lazy to mow his lawn, or someone (notice I am not saying moron necessarily) who wanted to express their artistic freedom on the outside of their house. I knew that I, at worst, mow my lawn every two weeks and had no desire to paint my house purple with dark red trim so, what me worry? After reading these articles and hearing about the troubles that one of my friends has with the HOA at his townhouse, I am really glad that my wife stood up to me on this. The only "problem house" we have had was one where the "grass" grew over my head, but it was about 15 houses away from me, and as soon as we called the city (didn't think about it until very late), they came out a few weeks later and chopped all of the crap down. For the most part, I am the one who looks like the lazy guy who won't mow the lawn when I get busy and have to go two weeks in between. Most of the people in my neighborhood take personal responsibility for their yards and they are quite nice. They keep their houses up, and none of my fears have really materialized. Not to say that they won't, but considering the alternative . . .
I live in an area "in town" on the north side with big lots and no restrictions. It has it's upside/downside. When I put in my barn/arena I didn't have to fight a HOA. All I had to do was get permits/inspections from the city.
Unfortunately, when a coyote bought the house/lot three doors down and moved a bunch of crap travel trailers into the back for overnight layovers there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. There might be 20-30 of them at a time wandering the neighborhood and going to the bus stop. My house got broken into twice on snatch and grabs. Building and zoning, SAPD, INS...nobody gave a . Fortunately I think he finally got busted "on the road" and got out of the business.
I would have planted an ied in his yard.
j/k
no i'm not
yes i am
my old neighborhood started up a voluntary HOA... no dues required.
The only reason it started up was that the vacant corner lots where our neighborhood meets the main drag - were going to be sold for subsidized housing. Our neighborhood did not want subsidized housing right next door.
It was successful in stopping the welfare housing from coming.
There are no rules or anything that I know of. Some people have 2 months grass growth on their front yards, but that's about it. If you have any complaints, like if someone has old refrigerators in their front yard, or cars on blocks, then I guess you can complain to the HOA.
If you are still in the city limits (at least in San Antonio), grass over 12 inches is considered a code violation. No reason to have a slow moving HOA try to send a letter when the city can do it and enforce it faster.
Just another reason for me to hate on the current state of the HOAs.
Sounds like a lot to me for some brush work, but even so, if it's a justifiable amount, then the mother-in-law should have no problem being honest about it to the home owners and to the trouble shooters.
Declining to comment about it does her no favors.
I can pretty much tell you from my experience that in this situation, the HOA would have gone through all of those city en ies first before trying to figure out whether or not those trailers would be violations of the covenants/deed restrications and what to do about them if they were.
Actually, we need governing en ies make better laws regarding what HOAs can and can't do.
I think girl scouts selling cookies sucks in that same manner, but the difference here is that if you want to buy a home in SA, almost any home built as long as 15 years ago (maybe even longer) now forces you to join the HOA and pay dues as part of the contract.
that's how it should be, in my opinion.
old refrigerators in yard, junked vehicles and overgrown grass are all city code violations and anyone at any given time can complain to the city's code compliance department about them.There are no rules or anything that I know of. Some people have 2 months grass growth on their front yards, but that's about it. If you have any complaints, like if someone has old refrigerators in their front yard, or cars on blocks, then I guess you can complain to the HOA.
What BS. Where does a city get the right to tell me I can't put junk on my lawn? Give me liberty or give me death!
Maybe you want the government to wipe your ass when you take a too?
Preach on! HOA's wouldn't be in positions to exploit homeowners if the people didn't agree to live in the area. People should wise up and understand that if they want to live in a specific neighborhood, they better be willing to put up with EVEN MORE bull bureaucracy and taxes and fees than they already do. It's fair and it's American!
Let's go freedom! *clap clap clap* Let's go freedom!
And your point is?
maybe you are reading differently, but the basic point I got from that post was that WC is an idiot.
Who's watching the Watch Men???
Was my point to simple for you to understand?
Where do you draw the line of having government protect you from your own stupid decisions?
Are you a big fan of JP Morgan? Honest question, not trolling this time.
I guess you are either going to have your idiot neighbors telling you how to mow your lawn or idiots in Austin. Why some people preach about the evils of big government yet somehow don't seem to notice that it is the big government that is protecting the HOA is beyound me.
Since when is buying a house a stupid decision?
Seems to me you want no government intervention on anything at all.
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