Recognize the positive efforts by HOAs and how homeowners are part of the solution

I have been a volunteer HOA board member in 3 different HOAs across two states, and I am currently in a HOA board member in Colorado. These have all been in subdivisions with stand-alone homes so I am commenting from this perspective.

Where I see HOAs fail is HOA board members forget they are representing their entire subdivision and start to pursue their own personal agenda and/or tend to be very rigid with HOA rules. I’m not certain how to improve this, but I have always been a proponent of interpreting HOA rules and regulations as the spirit of the law, not the letter-of-the-law.

I feel in general there is a focus on issues HOAs cause with homeowners. I want to ensure there is also a focus on issues HOAs (and HOA management companies) have with homeowners.

Through my experience, majority of HOAs work as intended who volunteer board members have a genuine interest in having a great community for all its members. What I’ve observed there is always a very small minority of homeowners that feel nothing applies to them and point fingers at the HOA (and others) why they can have significant lack of property maintenance. Note I’m not talking about random lawn not being mowed, some weeds, yard maintenance bags in the driveway for a while, trash cans left out for a few days, and so on. Although small repeated and multiple offenses over and over can add-up, I referring to larger stuff like big trash items left in the yard, defunct cars parked in the driveway for many months, yard completely dead and full of weeds, fences collapsing, and similar where such items have decent to significant impact on others’ property values. Moreover, I’ve also observed that some of this minority has a tendency to harass HOA board members and employees of any management company the HOA board may be using. This harassment tends to be in the form of repeated e-mails and phone calls making all sorts of non-supported accusations.

I agree there are certainly some HOAs that could use assistance with properly representing their homeowners, but I want to ensure we recognize the positive work HOAs are doing and how homeowners are part of the solution as well.