After a judgment and decree of foreclosure was entered, a sheriff's sale was held where you were the winning bidder/purchaser, but when do you actually become the legal, title owner of the property? read more

Under Oregon state law, condominium associations and homeowner associations have an automatic lien against the unit or lot for unpaid assessments. In Washington, a condominium association has a lien on a unit for any unpaid assessments levied against a unit from the time the assessment is due. Unfortunately for Washington homeowner's associations, the state law is silent and does not specifically provide that the homeowner's association has a lien against the lot for unpaid assessments. However, most of the time, the association's specific governing documents will create a lien for the unpaid assessments. For Washington homeowner's associations, you will need to look at your association's governing documents to determine whether your association has a lien for unpaid assessments. read more

This week, I am digging deeper into the bankruptcy world to discuss the Automatic Bankruptcy Stay. I'm guessing you are not a stranger to this term and that at some point you have been told that you cannot do "XYZ" because of the Automatic Bankruptcy Stay. But, what is that? read more

One of the benefits of being general counsel for many community associations—both HOAs and condos—is that we can recognize frequently misunderstood, confusing and difficult issues, and help our clients avoid them. One misunderstanding that arises quite frequently is the failure to properly distinguish between directors and officers. With election season approaching for many of you, we thought a short discussion about a few director v. officer distinctions might be helpful.* read more

Since I worked as in-house counsel for a debt collection agency prior to joining Barker Martin, I find I am uniquely situated to provide input on whether to turn a particular account over to a collections attorney or to collections agency to recover the delinquent amounts owed to an Association. read more