Posted on 06/21/2003 3:44:29 PM PDT by Anthem
Sacramento, California -
Down through the centuries, relatively small groups of people have constantly stolen land from others - the Romans, Ghenghis Khan, Hitler and, in this country, the European settlers. As the 21st. century gathers steam, Americans can be forgiven for thinking that these historical atrocities are a thing of the past, at least in their own country. Modern day suburban America with its shopping malls and SUV studded housing tracts may, at first blush, appear to defy history - but a closer look reveals a very different picture.
Across America, an estimated 55 million people live in homeowner associations of one sort or another - more than one in every six citizens. This explosive growth has occurred in the past 40 years, and looks likely to continue unless homeowners band together to stop them.
Very few, if any, people want land for land's sake. People want land for what the land can produce - whether it is crops, animals or homeowner association dues and fines. The means of getting land may change, but the purpose is still the same. Violence has obviously been one of the preferred methods in history, but inducements have also been used.
The European settlers in this country - when they were not using violence - dangled beads and firewater in front of the Native Americans. In the modern day homeowner association, swimming pools, club houses, golf courses are all beguilingly displayed in glossy brochures to entice prospective buyers. The mantra of "Preserving the value of your home" plays persuasively in the background.
The reality of homeowner associations is that they represent the largest grab of land in the U.S. since the European settlers took it all. A coalition of developers, politicians, lawyers, insurance companies and other big money interests have relatively silently placed an economic and cultural stranglehold on one in every six Americans.
The central scenario goes something like this. Developers see that in modern industry, the mass production of products produces mass profits. Hence, they want to apply the techniques of mass production to housing. For this, they need large tracts of land and an infrastructure of roads and schools to support the burgeoning population.
Politicians, always on the prowl for a campaign dollar (and sometimes a bribe) lend a willing ear to the outstretched hand and whispered request of the developer. "You want funding to build the infrastructure, and a law to impose restrictive covenants on all homeowners? No problem!"
Simultaneously, those sharks of the public waterways - lawyers - saw a golden opportunity for more money. Require homeowner associations to be corporations and they will need lawyers. Create bewilderingly complex legislative schemes, and the economic manna will fall from the legislative skies. Build a rapid response defense force of lawyers with almost limitless economic resources in case any homeowner rises in revolt.
The insurance industry - always anxious to ensure its future with new markets - slipped even more money into the already bulging politicians' pockets and asked them to require homeowner associations to purchase large amounts of insurance. Hey presto! - the laws were created.
The hapless homeowner was left with the shell of a house. CCR's (the Covenants, Conditions and Restrictions that govern his property) hemmed him in on every side. He could not put up a basketball hoop for his kids, tree houses were anathema, the type of flowers and bushes were restricted to an "approved list", and he had to get permission for every planting. In essence, the rules and regulations were one big NO - no keeping your garage door open, no flying a flag (one lady in California was forcibly detained in a mental institution for flying the POW-MIA flag in honor of her missing husband).
But this stripping of property rights was a mechanism for stripping homeowners of their money and land. When you live in a homeowners association, you are on an economic treadmill - and you cannot get off it unless you get out of the association.
Monthly dues fund lawyers' fees, management companies, accountants, insurance companies, gardeners and a host of other vendors Those monthly fees can skyrocket if homeowner association boards decide to increase either the regular or special assessment. In Texas, one association went from $2,000 per year to $17,000. In California, one homeowner found his monthly assessment boosted from $200 per month to $900 a month.
But the routine can also become obscene. In many parts of the country, minor fines are imposed on homeowners that mushroom overnight into thousands of dollars.
In California, one homeowner was charged an illegal $5 late charge, which soon became $3,000 - and the association threatened to foreclose on her home. She eventually won that battle after several years of excruciating litigation - but she discovered in the process that the association's management company had a scam going of fining, liening and foreclosing on homes.
In the nationally infamous Blevins case in Texas, an 80 year old woman was evicted from her fully paid home by the sheriff for a few paltry dollars. At foreclosure, lawyers pick up homes for a few thousand dollars.
One association tripled its reserves to $300,000 so that it could sue a homeowner. The homeowner's house had slid 12 inches down a slope, and tilted 12 inches to one side. Despite a city engineering report, an insurance report and a detailed geological report - all stating that watering should be kept to a minimum - the association went to court to get an injunction to keep watering her home. Incredibly, the judge, a former board president of a homeowner's association, granted the request. That legal battle is now entering its fourth year.
These insidious schemes have added fuel to the fire of those who seek to either reform or eradicate homeowner associations. The burgeoning movement, now nationwide, has begun to document the fatal flaws in the homeowner association concept. They see it as the corporatization of the American home, where the tentacles of big money strangle the home in order to produce more money.
They have also come up against the incestuous marriage of politicians and lobbyists. In California, the current governor, Gray Davis, was one of the authors of the Davis-Stirling Act, the legislation that controls homeowner associations in California. (The other author, Larry Stirling, is now a judge in San Diego, and professes that everything is okay with homeowner associations - though he acknowledges that he receives calls from all across the state on the problems that they cause - and even admits that he moved out of one after he and his new wife had problems with his board. )
The Davis-Stirling Act was actually written by the former president of the major lobby group - Community Associations Institute (CAI) - Katherine Rosenberry. This is akin to having the owner of a nuclear power plant write the safety regulations. Davis has been amply rewarded over the years with campaign contributions from CAI lawyers. While his current war chest of $97 million did not come exclusively from CAI lawyers, most of it does come from the same modus operand; - give the lobbyists what they want.
Homeowners repeatedly discover that these lawyers, insurers and management companies form an unholy alliance with the very government enforcement agencies who are supposed to protect the public. In California, the Attorney General's office and the Insurance Commission refuse to enforce consumer protection laws "because it is not one of our priorities". The Department of Real Estate, run by industry insiders and political patron commissions on $150,000 salaries, refuse to support more disclosure in homeowner associations "because it will hurt sales".
All of the above - and more - represents a very disturbing trend among a whole series of very disturbing trends in modern society. The home - historically recognized as central to a person's cultural and psychological well-being - has now become a pawn in the machinations of lawyers, politicians, developers and the like.
Once bastion of a person's liberty, it has now been reduced to 4 walls and a roof that are hemmed in on every side, and that are a cash register for the new type of land grabbers. In our cyber world, brute physical force has often been replaced by the sword of law, the prisons of unjust institutions, legalized thievery embodied in statutes.
Physical force is always available to the new invaders, but they realized long ago, that the legal and economic nets that you throw over a society may be even more effective.
So as we begin the first few years of the 21st. century, homeowner associations careen down a road that leads us away from the fundamental vision of a home as being the place where a homeowner grows and has his being. A home is essentially a spiritual place - a place where the human spirit lives in peace. The home fostered by Davis and others invades the very sanctity of a person's existence.
Whatever wisdom is, it is certainly not wise to so damage a person's existence in such a radical way. History has shown that such actions reap terrible harvests. Until those of wisdom and courage take over the seats of power, human beings will simply be passengers in the back seats of vehicles driven by deranged and crooked minds. As such vehicles are certainly assured of coming to a horrible accident, you should either get out of the vehicle or replace the driver.
The big problems seem to occur when the homeowners' board turns matters over to an outside management company. The outsiders profit by imposing fees and fines.
Of course, if the buyer fails to study the CCRs -- and I mean really study them, carefully -- then I can't see much reason to sympathize with their whining after the sale. Nobody is forcing anybody to buy property with CCRs -- it is a free market.
I've got relatives that live outside of Houston, have heard way too many horror stories about HOA.
Before buying a piece of property, hire a very good lawyer to protect you against pitfalls. It's worth the money; budget it in with the amount you're going to spend on the property.
I don't know how to tell anyone how to find a very good lawyer, but it's important.
Also, make sure that there are no restrictions, covenants, or accesses on the property, and if there are, make sure that you understand them and can live with them.
I had to agree never to allow a mobile home on my property. It annoyed me even to have to do that, but it is really not a problem.
I looked for several years at property before buying, and I turned down many beautiful pieces of property because they were ruined (for me) by restrictions etc.
Some property is inaccessable because it is surrounded by federal lands, and it may not be possible to build a road and gain access to the property.
You must know about such things as this before you purchase the property.
Some restrictions can be negotiated out, but some, established before the present seller acquired the property, are irrevocable. Some prevent subdividing the land; so you can never sell off smaller parcels if you should need to.
On many beautiful pieces of property, there are accesses that cannot be removed. On one, several parties had right of access across the property, which meant that I could never have the privacy I wanted.
The man from whom I bought my present property wanted access accross it. I refused; he dropped this demand; and I placed denial of it in the contract.
I don't like any restrictions, covenants, accesses, or anything that interferes with what I might want to do with or on my own property.
Another thing to worry about--and one that cannot be anticipated--is the takeover of property by state, federal, and/or environmentalist organizations.
Governments confiscate property under a variety of ruses and strategies.
One, of course, is to take it my "right of eminent domain".
If your property is declared to interfere with "the public viewshed", they can and will remove your house and prevent you from building anything; so the property is useless.
We all know of situations in which property is rendered useless because some endangered species was found on it or because of the presence of "wetlands".
In some parts of the country, state governments have claimed--and confiscated--property unless the owner can prove that he owns the property by right of a grant from the king of Great Britain during the colonial period, with an uninterrupted chain of title. Since many records have been destroyed, i.e. courthouse fires etc., many such records have been lost, which merely gives government burocrats carte blanche to seize any property they want. This is usually done to satisfy extremely rich "environmentalist" organizations who can offer highly tempting financial rewards to those who cooperate with them (and can threaten those who don't).
Such tactics are merely the tip of the iceberg--and merely the beginning if they prove successful.
Obviously, if a British crown grant is necesary for proof of ownership to one piece of property, then proof of a Spanish land grant, a state grant, proof that the original owner satisfied homesteading requirements, or any other strategy can be used just as effectively to confiscate anyone's home or other property. It's just a matter of hiring lawyers clever enough to come up with an effective strategy, and state governments, the federal government, and radical ("charitable") environmentalist groups have enormous funds to pay for this.
The only way I know of to protect citizens from such abuses is to elect government officials who will protect us.
It is frightening and depressing, but this is yet one more reason to defeat "Liberals" and other forces of decadence at the polls.
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