Monday, January 26, 2009
January Newsletters have been distributed.
The newsletters were distributed over the weekend. They were placed in the area of your front door (most on them near the door knob/some under the door mats). Those of you that share the fence along 41st street received a letter insert w/ the newsletter regarding the fence. If you did not receive your newsletter (or letter insert), you can view/print the newsletter from here or contact us and we will bring another one to your home. Thank you to Amy S. for distributed to almost all of Phase II and to the rest of you that volunteered.
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16 comments:
In response to the newsletter section "Dues are way past due for some of you!", you are stating that the HOA's plan is to have those who faithfully pay dues to pick up the tab for those who do not by raising rates. Then the article further states for us members to encourage those who do not pay to pay thus putting further burden on the homeowners who faithfully pay.
I just don't get it. In that same article you say you can go after those who do not pay through legal means. So why don't you? Leave the rest of us alone who faithfully pay our dues.
Rich, I wanted to address your issues on the dues. Do you think that the board members really want to raise the dues! No, but what else can we do? We are going to come up short when it comes time to pay the more expensive bills.I know you feel that we should go after these homeowners and take legal action but there are over 60 homes who owe dues and the board members do not have that much free time to go after all these homes.We all have jobs and families too.We have only been on the board since November and all these homeowners owed before we came on. These homes will be dealt with and it will take some time but until then, what do we do? I don't know about you, but I do not have a lot of free time! By the way, each of us who are on the board, faithfully pay are dues too and we would like to be left alone too. But, we signed up to volunteer to help better out neighborhood and make a difference! We care about what happens in our neighborhood! Maybe instead of complaining, you should volunteer and make a difference too!Other neighborhoods around us pay more than us. These neighborhoods also have pools.Glen Eagles pay $300 and Renaissance Park pays $300 too. We only pay $180! Dawn
I would like to add a comment as well, Rich. I am assuming that you do not understand the process of seeking legal action against the homeowners.
Option 1 - File a lien. We are not opposed to doing that, and are checking into that option. the biggest problem with this is that we do not get the money immediately. The homeowners have to sell the house, and we get the money (or maybe only a portion of it) during that process. That does not remedy our current situation, and that is very time consuming. Feel free to volunteer to help us with that.
Option 2 - small claims court. That costs us quite a bit of time and money to do that, and is really not a feasbile option at this point in time.
Please keep in mind that the current board did not create these problems, we have inherited them in the last couple of months and are trying to deal with them now, not sweep them under the rug like they have been in the past. We are always open to comments if you have a suggestion, but just complaining without a better solution wastes everyone time. We are definitely keeping the homeowner's best interest at heart. Also, any dues increase will have to be voted on by the entire neighborhood, so everyone's vote would count.
Rich,
In response to your comments:
- The dues may go up, regardless of whether or not past due dues are caught up. We are experiencing increasing costs w/ all of our expenses, yet, dues have not increased.
- Regarding your comment about "putting a burden on the homeowners who faithfully pay" - The Board of Directors members faithfully pay their dues AND are burdened by being forced to try and collect the dues from those that don't. EVERYONE in the neighborhood should assist the BOD with any tasks needed. This is not a voluntary homeowners association.
-Regarding your comment "So why don't you? (Go after those that owe)" - We were elected into office at the end of October. Since then, we have done numerous things - such as clean the toilets at the pool (left dirty from last summer), deal (on a daily basis) with the 41st street fence issue, communicate with homeowners regarding what has/will be done, etc. Not to mention, we do all have jobs, families and our own issues to deal with and this is a voluntary position. It is on our agenda to collect the past due dues (although, maybe you should be asking the previous board why they didn't do it - since NONE of the past due dues have been since we took office).
- Regarding your comment: "Leave the rest of us alone who faithfully pay our dues." - Wouldn’t we all just love to be left alone? However, sitting back and just paying dues does not run the association. It takes volunteers to do the work.
In response to "Jonathan, Alicia and Madison Green" and your ending post "Also, any dues increase will have to be voted on by the entire neighborhood, so everyone's vote would count." Thank you for the information. You will, of course, notify all which HOA meeting will hold that vote correct?
I am really suprised by the defensiveness of all your replies. We are all suffering from the bad economy and it should come as no shock to any of you the resistance of raising dues.
It's nice to see from the financial report that the HOA ended with more money than with what it began for November and December. So, you will not need to raise prices if you continue to be fiscally sound.
Rich,
In response to your reply – the Covenants/Bylaws outline the rules. If you need another copy, you can request that by emailing eagleridgeHOA@gmail.com and, yes, of course, notification will occur, as outlined by the ByLaws.
I am not sure how you expected us to react, considering your initial post. We all want to get the job done to the best of our abilities and feel we are doing that. It should not come as a shock that the proposal of raising dues has been brought up, considering the cost of running a business has increased.
Regarding your response to the ending balance being greater than the beginning for November – December – please review the additional financial information provided to you on page 4 of the newsletter. As you will see, the winter months we have very few expenses – it is the summer months that create the shortage.
In response to Choates, please reread my original post. Now, if you had made a case in the article that costs of running the HOA had gone up and leaving out ideas like "get others to pay or we will make you pay" then we would not be having this dicussion.
Bottom line:
-We provided financial info for Nov-Dec.
-We provided one of the major problems - 22% of homeowners have not paid.
-We provided a per month average.
-It's pretty much a given that operating costs have gone up.
I did learn a lot from just the conversation with you the HOA board. Thank you.
When people don't (or can't) pay for their groceries/bills/etc, do the rest of us not pay taxes to help pay for their welfare checks? When people do not pay for their items and steal from a store, do we not in turn pay higher prices so the store can recoup their loss? It is a shame that in the long run it hurts those that are doing the right things, but unfortunately, that is the world we live in. I feel your pain, Rich ... we are all living in a world where everything seems to be inflating EXCEPT our paychecks! But at the same time, I am proud of our neighborhood and I would hate to see it deteriorate just because those of us who can afford the extra $25 a year (or whatever the rate hike might be) refuse to carry the burden of those who cannot/do not pay. I for one am willing to pay a little extra to make sure our neighborhood stays maintained and my home value doesn't plummet.
HOA, if you need anyone to print up, address, or deliver letters to those who are not current on their dues, or anything else, I'm willing to lend a hand!
Sorry I thought that was an edit button, so I guess I will post again.
Blackford, I liked your response. You appear to be an intelligent person. You make a decent case.
This blogspot is a great tool. Too bad none of the homeowners that actually owe dues will ever read it, or care to volunteer to help with anything. I agree with the Blackfords, that I would pay a reasonable amount more for dues to take care of our many expenses.
I agree that it is a great tool. It gives people a means to communicate with the board and voice concerns openly.
Question, is there an increase in the number of houses for sale in our neighborhood?
There's 5 that I know of right now - that seems to be about the norm from what I've seen. You can keep an eye on what's on the market by going to TulsaRealtors.com. Will be interesting to see what the numbers look like as we approach the end of the school year.
Blackfords,
Thank you for the feedback and the offer to assist the BOD. We will definitely keep you in mind!
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