[az] [hoa/real Estate?] - 2008 Lingering Nightmare. Fictitious Hoa Board, No Meetings, Broken Pool, Empty Hot Tub, Broken Gate, Dying Landscaping. $15k In Fees In 5yrs

Apologies in advance for long read. I tried to leave the emotion out of my post but ANY advice would be appreciated. I have also posted this in the HOA subreddit.

I purchased my first home in gated community with less than 15 homes in an up and coming area in 2019. It is a three story condo with a neighbor attached to me on each side. My neighborhood amenities include a small lap pool, a hot tub, the gated entrance, and landscaping for the common areas. I had a short five day window to make an offer on a home so things happened fast and I saw at least five houses with my realtor. Before I moved in, I read CC&R’s to make sure I wouldn’t have issues AirBNBing in the future, or have problems with guest parking. I noticed almost none of the homeowners followed the rule of keeping their garbage cans in their garage and not parking their cars in their driveway. There is no other place to put the garbage cans other than in the garage which makes it stink, and personally, I’m okay with cars being visible in driveways until someone is working on their car or is parking in the guest or street parking. I’m prefacing that there is neighborhood neglect but it was reasonable when moving in.

After I moved in, I decided it was time to call my HOA to complain about the litter on these strange dirt areas in the community with random grass patches and weeds. This is when I found out that those lots were not common areas and were in fact owned by someone. My neighborhood was built in 2008 and the builder went bankrupt so there is another 25+ empty lots. I asked when the next HOA meeting was and they were vague and it was so long ago I can’t remember exactly what was said. What I did find out was that the people I was calling was a management company and not my HOA or board. They collect the money and “sometimes” take requests. They claim they are basically accounting.

About six months later when I went to use the hot tub in the winter, I noticed it was not hot at all, and I again call the management company. They said “the board voted to shut off the gas to the hot tub.” I said what board? When is the next meeting? Who is the president? They name dropped someone as president and refused to give me their information because it was “private” again evading my questions. I said I’m not asking for their address or cell phone number, if they are the president, I should be able to email them my concerns. They said they would contact them and give them my information. This happened a couple times and I never heard anything from anyone.

Less than a year of owning the home, there was some sort of leak from the pool that made them shut the water off. They emptied the pool and hot tub and it has never been full again. They claimed they were getting quotes but we never heard anything. I’ve asked about it and they do not respond.

Years have gone by and within the last few years, the gate has been broken for 100+ days at a time, no pool or hot tub for the last 4 years, full grown trees dying on my property due to neglect.

The management company claims there was one or two people who were delinquent. I have personally been delinquent because I didn’t understand what I’m paying for and I thought it would make them do something. They claim they’re “going above and beyond” by calling the gate repair people for us when it’s broken and that they really just do the accounting. They don’t want to take responsibility and refuse to give me “HOA President’s” information.

There is a broken wall on one side of the community that vagrants were going through. We started seeing uptick in crime and I got the police involved. They contacted the management company about the crime which I think got a fire on their tail. I mentioned that I was going to contact the city to have them figure out who wants to take responsibility for the side gate. I found out from someone in another community on the NextDoor app that our community went to court with the city for an area behind the bus stop in front of our gate that they claimed wasn’t our land so we weren’t responsible for picking up the garbage. We lost, we paid the fine, no one was ever notified. The side wall was shared with another property that contacted to notify them of the broken gate and crime happening on their lot. Turns out that lot owner was our original builder who went bankrupt and knew a ton about our community and the management company. He said the gate was 100% on our side.

Shortly after mentioning that I would contact the city and look into legal action for the thousands of dollars I’ve spent on fee’s for basically nothing to the management company, we got a notice they were increasing our dues by 15% starting January 1st 2024. The increase was to pay for the side gate (which all of sudden the management company decided we are responsible for), a new front gate, and something with the pavement. I noticed we started having a lot of visitors and people walking the neighborhood and even people unlocking the padlock on the pool gate and looking around in there. I stopped someone and found out that whoever owned the lots, was looking at selling them.

This is when curiosity finally got to me. I looked up the Lot Assessment on the city’s website where I finally discovered who owned the lots. It was the same individual who owned all 25+, but he also owned one of the condos. The other land which was owned by the “HOA,” had another persons name on the deed with the exact same business address and the majority lot owner. The 25+ lots were also previously sold from one of his businesses to another (I’m guessing to evade taxes). So now, I have discovered that the majority lot owner IS the “HOA president”. The moment I mention calling the city and taking legal action, the guy wants to sell.

I spoke to one of the neighbors who knows the renters living in the 25+ lot owner’s condo and he said their landlord told them the pool was closed because of homeless people sleeping in there. That was untrue. A pipe burst, no one cared to fix it.

When I was speaking with the gentleman who was walking the community for the lot buyer, he said when they’ve acquired other lots in neighborhoods like this, although the majority lot owner isn’t paying as much as us in HOA fees, they are still responsible for maintaining the amenities so sometimes they can end up paying more than homeowners. I do not know the legitimacy of that, but it seems logical.

Fast forward to January 1 2024, the builder closes on the lots. Mr. HOA has no interest in keeping up with neighborhood and only increasing our dues to pay for a face lift to make his land more appealing to sell. The builder had one meeting discussing their building plans with the community. The meeting had a pretty big turn out even with short notice but quickly turned into a venting session about our HOA and HOA issues which frustrated the builder on the call. 8 months into closing on the lots, I’m still in the email chain with the neighbors asking for updates from the builder and requesting they put together an HOA and consider removing our management company. It has officially been over a year the builder has had to organize at least one additional meeting, building has begun. We are all losing our view. We are all paying a huge amount of money per month and I just found out the builder shut off the water to the neighborhood. Now all of our landscaping is dead and everyone’s dog has to go potty on dirt.

I have paid over $15k in five+ years for an empty pool, hot tub, gate that works half the time. The management does not send me receipts and I know if they were audited, they would find fraud immediately. I am pissed and want to take legal action. The problem is I don’t know what my options are or where to go and I have neighbors that want to take legal action with me. I have been told I have to go after a specific individual. Do we go after the previous lot owner who created this mess and didn’t cover the difference of projects relating to keeping up with the neighborhood amenities? The guy sold the lots to himself and has pictures online in a private jet flaunting jewelry. Is the new builder partially responsible for not putting a board or meeting together after requesting them to do so for more than a year? They have almost a billion in assets and I’m sure they have an on staff lawyer that should have figured this out by now. What about the management company committing fraud?