Criminals Treat Condo as Giant Living Piggybank, Owners Attempting To Respond

The Estates at Westbury, Bluffton, South Carolina has a couple of issues. The first is crime, and the second appears to be a failure of the management company to respond.

The 300 unit complex is riddled with crime and negligent owners and tenants. And I get the feeling that criminals are treating the site as a giant piggy bank. Two (news, news) units have recently been home invaded by armed group of men – both times forcing the owners to lay face down while they rifle through the home for valuables.

Less heinous, one resident describes the building on goings as:

the Estate could be a beautiful and serene place to live, there are a number of facts that make this a less than desirable home. With a number of armed robberies, muggings, residents who are permitted to move in and hold drunken parties until the middle of the night, fist fights breaking out at said drunken parties, carloads of people coming in to the community who do not belong here, people driving at undesirable speeds through the community that are a threat to the children playing here, drug dealings going on that are known to both the Association Manager and to the maintenance team, and music so loud that it shakes entire buildings – the lifestyle and feeling of “home” at the Estate is in sharp decline

It is so bad that one elderly couple fear even their walk to collect mail.

Ouch. That means it’s time for the management to step up.

To their credit, it appears the management is improving lighting and putting in brontosaurus in size speed bumps to limit vehicle speed. Where they fall down is communicating with the owners, and supporting their actions.

Most importantly, when it comes to supporting a proven method to reduce crime in an area – creating a neighborhood watch – the management has been resistant to at each step. The residents put up over 500 flyers to communicate with the community, the management tore them all down. Owners and tenants try to engage the Association Manager; she has banned tenants from her office because they are not owners. Tenant Jennie Krogulski has gathered about 30 tenants and owners volunteers to start a watch; and the final message from the manager – the residents are not allowed to set up a Neighbourhood Watch.

I  would counter with the following: if serious injury occurs to any member of the community – which a reasonable person would deem a neighbourhood watch would have helped prevent – I would go after the resident manager. I would hold her responsible.

Neighbourhood Watch programs have existed for a long time and are supported by the police department. Volunteers receive training and support. Issues of liability have all been resolved over the 50 years the program has been in place. USAonWatch even has a copy of the Neighbourhood Watch Manual free for download.

A Neighbourhood Watch program for a complex with these issues is reasonable, accessible, and empowering for the residents. It is a great and awesome program to support, and should be seen as a progressive action to combat the real and tangible threat of harm and danger these residents have.

For up to date information, the active residents have a Facebook page for the complex that can be seen here.

HOA Literally Does a Crappy Job Whitewashing Hate in Their Neighbourhood

In Parker Colorado partners Aimee Whitchurch and Christel Conklin get to receive free community presents. One day it is “Kill The Gay” painted across their garage door, and another it is a noose laid at their front door.

Most HOA have rules about the appearance of garage doors. So when the HOA came over and painted (I use “painted” very loosely here) over the words in white paint (link to news video showing crappy whitewashing), where the garage door is otherwise brown, and obviously paid no attention to the work (there’s paint splatter all over the driveway, and the coverage is a mess) – it’s the little detail that says “this HOA are a bunch of shits”.

The HOA has a responsibility to make everyone’s lives safe, secure, and supportive. When a unit is targeted by hate (it is hate, plain and simple) – the board should be the first out there to offer whatever they can, and they should step up to the plate. The message should always be tolerance as an HOA is a communal living agreement, with many people, of all walks of life. If you fail to give up on one, you give up on all.

As a bonus gift, they are under constant surveillance from a neighbour who continually keeps a video camera pointed to their house! With such supportive neighbours who are so worried about the two women’s home and health, it should only me a matter of time before the footage is turned over and the culprits captured.

Board Insanity Stories #98457892374 – Only Allowing Rentals to “Families”

I’m not sure I want to even start with guessing what the definition of a family is – blood relationships, marriage, are adopted children ok, how about a two person same sex union, or one lady and seventy-two cats?

Thankfully a condominium corporation has been able to figure that out for me! Carleton Condominium Corporation No. 24 of Ottawa, Ontario, has been able to clarify that challenging definition:

unit owners can only rent to single families, which includes parents and children, married couples or people in a ‘conjugal relationship,’ two or more persons intending to live together permanently, two or more persons who own the unit, or someone who is a caregiver for someone else.

Caregiver? Really – an assisted living support nurse can be family? The intention to live together permanently (really, how can that ever be challenged or proven) is a definition of family – so Felix and Oscar, or Bert and Ernie, those lovable non-gay roommates, would count?

What’s up is Carleton Condominiums attempting to remove student renters from their condos, whom occupy about 20% of the units. The board claims these student rentals are rooming houses renting by the room, with upwards of 8 people per unit. The condominium is close to transportation and popular with students.

I’m pretty sure this will be appealed to either a court or the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario.

As to that definition of family, I love the idea of “conjugal relationship” – does that mean if each of the eight students commit to some sort of regular orgy that they classify as family? Right on – I knew university is supposed to be an awesome experience!

Canadian Law Would Allow Condo Owners to Fly Flag In Face Of By-Laws

Ahhh, another person who feels that patriotism requires legislative support to survive. In Canada, Conservative MP John Carmichael has tabled a private members bill that will “protect the rights of Canadians to fly their national flag where they live.”  Ghaaa – really? Is patriotism in such a short shift that it requires legislation to ensure condo owners can display a flag on their balcony or in their window? Nay I say. Nay.

I will always stand on guard for Canada. I’ll do that forever, even without the need of being reminded by flags from my neighbour’s condominiums.

Banning People with Criminal Records from Condominium Residence

I recently wrote that US Home Owner Associations wield an inordinate and improper amount of ability to pry into the private life of purchasers. Potential purchasers providing inch think stacks of documents to boards, just for the right to purchase a property, seems to becoming (sadly) the norm.

There is a wedge issue would that, if supported, allow Canadian condominium boards the same sort of access to purchaser (and ongoing access to owners) personal information – that condominiums can ban residency and board participation based on a criminal record. Being able to ban on a criminal record would allow boards to start intruding on personal privacy in order to enforce the ban.

Denise Lash of Heenan Blaikie closes in a recent article that –

It is time for condominium corporations to look at taking more extreme measures to ensure that the safety and security of residents is not compromised and put into place restrictions in condominium documentation.  Of course, the documentation will have to be carefully drafted to avoid any potential argument as to its enforceability.

This is a direct call to bring rights of intrusion to privacy into the hands of a board. We all have stories of our boards  with the  powers they currently have abusing privacy, position and status already. Adding additional fodder – and more significantly – responsibilities that are more prone to court challenges and civil suits is a recipe for disaster.

Most importantly, Ms. Lash takes singles out condominiums to go after because they offer an additional level of legislation and rules – the corporation bylaws – as a wedge to invade privacy. At a condominium’s heart is that it is housing. We wouldn’t be able to argue that a community association (single detached housing) could deny the right to residence in their community based on a criminal record – but we do for condominium only because there are additional levels of rules around the management of the shared or common property.

That’s what “extreme” and “carefully drafted to avoid any potential argument as to its enforceability” is all about – it’s the caution that what she suggests is a strong warping of the intention and scope of condominium legislation. I would say she suggests a perversion of condominium legislation and pushes in into a realm of social engineering.

Massive Self Employment Available in High Density Condo Regions

Towns in Alberta generally range in population from 1,000 (minimum required under the Municipal Government Act) through 10,000 – at which point they can request a change to city status. Importantly, towns act as a rally point where citizens lay down roots and build livelihoods to support and better their neighbours – from beauty salons to registries, from mechanic to theater, restaurant to education.

In large municipalities – a condoized region could have several thousand people in only a few square blocks. A large municipality can have many, geographically dense, small towns.

Where most entrepreneurs look to services or goods to “millions of people” – or the whole of the metropolitan area, there is a huge opportunity to build services or provide the sale of goods targeted to just a few square blocks. By scaling your service to just a few condominiums developments (that could have five or six thousand residents), a new business could focus their advertising, build on word of mouth, and control their start-up costs. If instead of trying to conquer the world with their business, they target the town amidst the metropolis, there is a whole new set of competitive services that can be offered.

Imagine a plumber that specializes in the 6000 units that exist in a few square blocks around her – where she knows the boards of most of these buildings, their quirks, how to submit water shut off requests, and complete her service in a way that doesn’t violate any quirky by-laws or regulations. Sure she’s not running all over the city answering the call of a million metropolitan citizens. But in losing this approach to business she has focused on a huge economic area which she has become the local specialist that is literally just a few minutes away on foot.

Maryland Condominiums Have Right To Force Homeowners to Carry Insurance

I am humbled that there is a US state that has given the power to condominium boards to make carrying a homeowner insurance policy mandatory. For a country that often talks about the absolute right of the individual to make their own decisions (any anything, forbid, otherwise is some strange form of socialism, communism, or other ism), a collective has been given the power to require an owner to purchase specific insurance.

With condominiums, may people think that the insurance policy purchased by the condominium covers their units, when in fact this is normally not the case (there are exceptions).  Normally the insurance policy held by the condominium only covers damages and repairs to the common elements – the building envelope and grounds. It does not cover inside the owner’s unit.

For example, if you owned a unit in a condo that burnt down, and the condo is repaired, the corporation policy would rebuild the structure, but not the interior of your unit – the “betterments and improvements.” What’s a betterment or improvement – anything inside your unit. That would include the toilet (yup – the piping would come in, but the actual porcelain toilet is a betterment). It likely wouldn’t include your cabinets, your flooring, your paint, your sinks, and all sorts of stuff. You would have a shell, to fill as you would.

Additional insurance, bought properly, would cover those betterments and improvements (seriously, we don’t see the toilet as an improvement – we think it’s part of the unit, but it is). And because of the danger of fire or water or other loss, I always encourage people to buy the additional insurance.

It’s nice then, having been in the industry long enough to see several major losses, that Maryland will allow the boards to make this additional insurance required to be purchased by their owners. I’m not sure how they will enforce it (it seems a little toothless – what are you going to do, evict the owner?) – but it is good intention.

Some may wonder how few people actually pass on buying insurance – I have a great example. In Calgary, March of 2010, a massive condominium fire in the Millrise left hundreds homeless. Less than half, half, of the owners had additional insurance. That meant more than 100 people would have been left with just a shell of a unit when they were rebuilt, and would have had to pay the additional living expenses of shelter during the months and months to rebuild. Fortunately, the board had made a decision to carry the additional insurance for everyone – which allowed all the units to be rebuilt completely, and the homeless have their expenses covered during the rebuild.

Maryland’s insurance requirement is slightly different than what I described, as it’s a requirement to carry insurance against a deductible (of the common property insurance) for damages originating from their unit. But in general it is the same idea – forcing insurance and reducing the risk of catastrophic loss.

Living Close With People and Restaurants

I’ve often mentioned that condominium living is communal living, and part of buying into a condominium is realizing that you’ll be living in close quarters with people of all types. With that in mind, you’ll have to learn to live with the idiosyncrasies of others to some extent.

There’s another level of communal living with many condominiums though – and that’s the location of the building. Often condominiums are used to infill downtown cores and beltlines, substantially increasing the core population density, shortening work commutes, and breathing new life into a city. In one aspect then, the building is part of a local municipal community/zoning area which may include non-residential businesses including, but not limited to, restaurants.

Well built condominiums will over pressurize hallways to keep individual unit cooking smells in the units and not propagating to others in the building. But keeping out the smells from neighbouring buildings is much more difficult.

Cities are not blind to the issue of a neighbourhood pub with an extensive menu of deep fried food, and the venting issues of the fryer. Modern technology can do a pretty good job a scrubbing out the smells from the exhaust.

But it is something to keep in mind when buying a condominium in the city – your neighbours are not only your actual within-the-building owners, but the shops, residences, and businesses around. Building a condominium does not generate a sudden onus on existing businesses to move or upgrade their site, and you may be living with a smell for some time.

When Lonnie and I were looking for our current condominium, there was a nicely located unit 10 floors above a commercial floor that was the ground for the building. While I was happy with the unit, when we left she noticed one of the establishments was a pub, and the back outside wall was dark with fat staining around the kitchen exhaust. If we had been there in the evening, we would have likely been made very hungry by the smell, and very put off living in that building. It was a nice spot.

In that case the restaurant was in the building, but it could have easily been next door or a street over. And it doesn’t have to be smells (for instance, dry-cleaners) but sounds – manufacturing, vehicle repair shops, or even a very busy intersection that runs at all nights.

When taking the condominium route, remember that you may be living with two different neighbours – the owners in your building, and the buildings and infrastructure near by.

Seniors Frustrated By Resturant Smoke