Homeowner association boards often struggle with enforcing certain rules, such as improper parking, failing to pick up after pets, littering and similar conduct. Electronic surveillance can be a highly effective and cost-efficient tool for homeowner associations to use in enforcing their CC&Rs. read more

Status of H.R. 1106: "Helping Families Save their Home Act of 2009" is uncertain. The law would give bankruptcy judges the ability to 'cram down' the principal balance and monthly payments, wiping out tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars of money owed in an effort to keep more people in their homes and to stabilize the housing market. read more

The last few years have brought with them a substantial upturn in development of large tower condominium and multi-use condominiums in the Pacific Northwest. The interests of each sub-association, whether hotel, grocery store or residential homeowners, often conflict. In these instances, the homeowners should ensure they have well-qualified legal counsel in their corner. read more

A homeowner association board should conduct a basic level of due diligence prior to entering into vendor contracts. A board should obtain a referral or reference from its management company (if professionally managed) or from other association boards, and not just pick the contractor from the Yellow Pages or a Google search, or worse, because the contractor is the brother-in-law of a board member read more

Property management companies retained by developer clients often have to walk a tight-rope as they balance the interests of their two clients: the developer and the homeowner association. In the perfect world, this dichotomy of client interests would not be at issue because the developer and homeowner association would share parallel interests. But practically speaking, inherent conflicts arise between developers and homeowners regularly, which place the property manager squarely in the middle of an undesirable situation. read more