Community Association Governance

The owners in a Kentucky subdivision came out on the wrong side of a court case over their use of their property for short-term rentals. Although the community association wasn’t involved in the litigation, the ruling sheds some light on the arguments associations can expect when trying to block short-term rentals in court — and…

We're willing to bet that very few of your clients' budgets are on track for 2020, and figuring out how to adjust and plan for 2021 is complicated. “We’re looking at all those odd pieces, the additional costs associations have borne since March,” says Paul Grucza, director of education and client development at the Seattle-based…

The Kentucky Court of Appeals has rejected a community association owner’s arguments in yet another battle over owners’ right to use their homes as short-term rentals. The court’s ruling, based on a recent decision by the state’s Supreme Court, could provide some useful guidance for your clients that would like to implement enforceable restrictions on…

A federal Court of Appeals recently ruled that a community association manager wasn’t a “debt collector” for purposes of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), which strictly regulates the conduct of general debt collectors. (Bates v. Green Farms Condominium Ass’n, 6th Cir. 2020). But managers shouldn’t take too much comfort in the decision because…

A Texas Court of Appeals has found that the failure to enforce a subdivision’s restrictive covenants constituted an abandonment of the restrictions as a whole — despite the fact that the covenants included a severability provision intended to protect the other provisions if one or more were struck down as unenforceable. (Densmore v. McCarley, Tex.…

The Fair Housing Act may prohibit racial discrimination, but a surprising number of community associations’ deed covenants still contain racial restrictions — and some of your clients could be among them. With civil rights a mainstay in the media since the death of George Floyd in May 2020, associations with such restrictions should take action…

Your clients may be worried that the COVID-19 crisis threatens their financial stability, but you need to help them avoid going too far in their efforts to protect their bottom lines. One path to steer them away from, for example, is becoming overly invasive in their financial screening of prospective buyers. An association in Florida…

Depending on the governing documents, community associations may have some say on the buyers to whom owners can sell their properties — but, even armed with that authority, they can go too far and create problems for their associations. That’s what happened in a recent case in Florida, where the court characterized the association’s requirement…

The COVID-19 crisis left many boards of directors scrambling to handle a variety of novel issues, sometimes based on uncertain or questionable authority. This has led some associations to consider amending their governing documents to better equip them to deal with similar (or lingering) issues in the future. And, if they’ve already started the amendment…

Community associations across the country are weighing amendments to their governing documents. While the initial impetus may have been some problematic gaps that handcuffed boards of directors as they tried to respond to COVID-19, these associations realize this also may be an opportune time to act on other issues that have been percolating for a…