This does not bode well

I had posted earlier this week about a condominium in my neighborhood that I was going to visit tonight. The real estate agent called earlier today to cancel. He said there are currently tenants living in it (WTF?) and no one could get ahold of them to let them know we were coming. Uhhhh, ok? He’s going to try and reschedule me for next week. Nice.

I was wondering why an east side SLC condo had been on the market since January at a seemingly reasonable price. Now I know. No one can ever schedule a time to take a tour.

Also, it’s a short sale. Hmm. (It's in pre-forclosure and there are still tenants living there? Really, WTF?)

This new information is not very promising, and I’m starting to get concerned. But the location is too perfect not to at least look at it.

Anyway, in an attempt to not come across as a clueless moron for my (cancelled) tour, I Googled “how to buy a condo.” It was extremely educational, as well as slightly horrifying.

I learned that:

• Some HOAs are run like a communist dictatorship, Nazi Germany, etc. For example, a man in CA lost his home because he planted too many roses in his yard. Seriously. The HOA fined him and “watched monthly as the fines mounted. When they slapped a lien on his home, he went to court and lost because he'd transgressed the board's architectural design rules. He was stuck with the board's $70,000 legal fees and lost his home to the bank.” Scary.
• Buying a condo is not like buying a house. There are legal differences. The author of the linked article even suggests hiring a real estate attorney to help with the process.
• HOAs can make up/and or change the rules as they go along, and there isn’t much that home owners can do about it.
• If the HOA runs out of money they can charge home owners an “assessment” to pay for repairs. And this can be any amount of money, on top of the monthly fees that people are already paying. Yikes!
• Basically, if the HOA is badly managed in some way, the homeowners get screwed.

Disturbing stuff. One of my friends at work bought a condo two years ago, so today I asked her how she likes it. I told her I was looking for a place to buy, but that I had heard and read lots of horror stories about HOAs from hell. She looked at me like I was crazy and said that she loves the place she lives. In the past year, fees at her complex have stayed the same, and the homeowners have been charged one assessment: $500 for some unexpected repairs. Not too bad.

I would’ve asked if there were any places for sale in her complex, but she lives in South Jordan and I’m too lazy to commute that far.

So I guess I'll have something to look forward to next week. I just hope it's not like this: