Landlord or Tenant, who’s right on this?

[sdrealtor]

Tg
Love my hoa too. We have a great clubhouse which has hosted many of my kids parties and will host one this summer for about 100 guests. Couldn’t do that at my house and wouldn’t want to. The cost to rent the facility complete with very nice catering kitchen is $100 for the day. Because we have so many guests they are charging us $10 per hour for a couple extra staff to keep an eye on things. My babysitters charge more. When HOAs are good they can be great too!

[TemekuT]

Morgan Hill has a very well run HOA. The board conducted an analysis of costs, figured out how to economize without compromising services and maintenance, obtained more competitive bids, and cut the monthly HOA fee prior to the new developer coming on board. When the new developers started building again and homes started closing escrow, the fee decreased more. When I purchased in 2004, the estimated HOA at buildout was $85 monthly, but that was projected on completion prior to 2010. HOA here fluctuates based on the phase and can actually go up temporarily when the first few homes of a new phase close because there is no developer subsidy agreement and the fixed costs increase with each new phase. I have paid fees as high as about $145, just for a few months. The current fee is $99.

The board also made the County of Riverside accountable for expending the bond money from CSA 143D to maintain the landscaping in that portion of the common area that is controlled by the county, so the landscaping is finally being cleaned up and replanted. Our property tax money for landscaping was being held in reserve and not expended to maintain our landscaping until the Board enlisted the help of a county supervisor.

[The-Shoveler]

Beware HOA transfer fees if you are thinking of buying.

I know of one HOA in a condo complex that charges $7,000.00 transfer fees to new owners, (it does have a really nice golf course where HOA members can play for free however, that’s what they use as the explanation for the high fees but still).

Best to get this info first beforehand especially if you don’t golf.

[sdrealtor]

This is the kind of nonsense that gives hoa’s a bad name. That is an extreme outlier. Most HOA transfer fees are a couple hundred dollars. Your example is more a country club membership than an HOA transfer fee

[moneymaker]

Off the top of my head I would agree with you TG. But. And here’s the big difference in my mind, in the long haul >30 years the SFR is the better buy, to live in or as investment. I can look out my dual pane windows and admire my wife’s beautiful roses, then go outside and cut some off and put them in a vase in the house. With a condo you can admire, but I don’t think the neighbors would appreciate you cutting off “their” roses and taking them into your home. Not saying it isn’t done, but that is how squabbles start with the neighbors. In a condo it is “look,don’t touch” in a SFR you “can touch all you want”.

[sdrealtor]

What if the view out your condo window is of the ocean and waves breaking on the beach like the one my family owned on the Atlantic City Boardwalk for many years. An SFR with the view we had would have been at least 10 times the cost.

[carlsbadworker]

TG/TemekuT:

Do you know why in Morgan Hills there seems to be variation of HOA fees from houses to houses? What is that based on? (I thought if you have the same fancy club house, you should pay the same).

I also have found a neighborhood in Temecula where one house has HOA in their listing, but the house next to it on the same street doesn’t. It kind of makes me puzzle.

[sdsurfer]

[quote=moneymaker]Off the top of my head I would agree with you TG. But. And here’s the big difference in my mind, in the long haul >30 years the SFR is the better buy, to live in or as investment. I can look out my dual pane windows and admire my wife’s beautiful roses, then go outside and cut some off and put them in a vase in the house. With a condo you can admire, but I don’t think the neighbors would appreciate you cutting off “their” roses and taking them into your home. Not saying it isn’t done, but that is how squabbles start with the neighbors. In a condo it is “look,don’t touch” in a SFR you “can touch all you want”.[/quote] Does your wife appreciate this as much as you do? My wife would kick my ass if I cut her flowers she grew in the yard to move them into the house.

I also just wanted to chime in to say how thankful I am for everyone’s thoughts through this discussion. I feel like I’ve learned a lot from everyone’s comments.

[TemekuT]

carlsbadworker:

The entire Morgan Hill community pays the same HOA fee, which is currently $99 per month. Perhaps you are confusing Morgan Valley with Morgan Hill. Morgan Valley’s HOA is approx $35 per month and DOES NOT include any use of the Morgan Hill facilities. Many realtors post incorrect information in their listings, such as indicating Morgan Valley has use of the Morgan Hill facilities, or failing to state that there is an HOA fee connected with a property. They also often misstate the amount of the HOA fee.

[moneymaker]

Yes I suppose there is always a higher power involved somehow. My wife has so many roses right now I don’t think it would upset her, besides she likes to smell them as well as look at them.

[carlsbadworker]

[quote=TemekuT]carlsbadworker:

The entire Morgan Hill community pays the same HOA fee, which is currently $99 per month. Perhaps you are confusing Morgan Valley with Morgan Hill. Morgan Valley’s HOA is approx $35 per month and DOES NOT include any use of the Morgan Hill facilities. Many realtors post incorrect information in their listings, such as indicating Morgan Valley has use of the Morgan Hill facilities, or failing to state that there is an HOA fee connected with a property. They also often misstate the amount of the HOA fee.[/quote]

No. I am not confusing Morgan Valley with Morgan Hill. I guess it was just agents posting wrong info in the listing. Like this one says $140:
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Temecula/33897-Flora-Springs-St-92592/home/12508581

I also got seller agent on this house explaining to me why this house HOA is $99 lower than other houses that are collecting $140 around it (he gave me reasons on different builders, etc, and I am still confused afterwards):
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Temecula/44795-Rutherford-St-92592/home/12509074

It is good to know that entire Morgan Hill has only $99 per month HOA.

[TemekuT]

carlsbadworker:

“I also got seller agent on this house explaining to me why this house HOA is $99 lower than other houses that are collecting $140 around it (he gave me reasons on different builders, etc, and I am still confused afterwards)”:

Those two houses are in the same tract – both are part of Artessa. That’s an ignorant agent spouting a stream of BS and hot air!

The clubhouse facilities manager tells me that occasionally local agents that have houses listed in Morgan Valley and below Morgan Hill tell their buyers that they are entitled to use the Morgan Hill facilities. She has actually had homeowners come in after close of escrow to register to use the clubhouse and she has to tell them that they are not part of the Morgan Hill community and not entitled to use any part of the facilities.

[Anonymous]

s

[no_such_reality]

HOAs can be capricious. A good one can go bad easily. All it often takes is one motivated individual selling their unit and leaving the board and the rest fall to bad practices with a newly motivated member pushing some agenda.

You also have two layer of complicity to deal with. There is the HOA board and the Property Management agency.

The PM’s job isn’t to get the community the best deal. Their job is to show reasonable diligence in executing the boards directives. Hence, they have stables of preferred vendors whose qualifications are often the working relationship.

As for the boards, conflicts of interest are so common it should be assumed.

[Author]

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