An Update on HOA Hell

Have you been anxiously awaiting my update on my HOA hell? I bet you have.

The HOA board elections results were announced earlier this week. My boyfriend and another neighbor were elected last year, so they’re in the middle of serving their two-year term. That left three open seats.

And the winners are….drum-roll, please:

1. The all-star candidate! The 70-something executive who knows business in and out, owns several properties, and has served on several HOA boards. I think he’ll be a great asset.
2. The woman who recently moved into the community, but whom we’ve befriended. She’s been disappointed with property management so far and seems committed to participating to make things better. Another win.
3. Finally, the highest number of votes went to the former president of the board. Due to a cease-and-desist, he’s technically not allowed to attend board meetings or utilize the tennis court (which he uses to run his tennis lesson business). During the meeting, he had the audacity to complain that the current board removed a camera that he installed (and only he could access) in the exercise room. Creepy, right? Although his win was a disappointment, the “let’s fix our community” folk have a majority, so “King of the tennis court” is outnumbered 4-to-1 and essentially powerless. Another victory, I suppose.

Also, after 14 month, the board finally approved remediation of our home. Why did it take so long? Laziness? Incompetence? Likely both. I really don’t know. Maybe our home will be saleable by the end of the year if they get a move on it. Maybe. Though the property manager seems intent on starting the process over because it’s taken so long and the quotes may no longer be valid. Sigh.

Finally, some interesting news regarding a legal case against our HOA. We found an attorney who will take our case on contingency*. According to the law firm, our home mold levels, labs, and brain MRIs are by far the worst they’ve ever seen. They feel confident that it’s a slam dunk case. However, when we received the contract, my boyfriend had a gut feeling that something was wrong, even through we didn’t notice any red flags. We had four attorneys in our network review the contract to make sure there wasn’t anything fishy. All advised us not to sign. Three of the four told us to run.

Did you notice that asterisk after “contingency”? While the law firm would cover their man-hour expenses, we would be responsible for covering the cost of expert witnesses, which run approximately $12,000 each. We would need a minimum of two, one to cover my medical issues as a female and another to cover my boyfriend as a male, though likely several more. $24,000 is steep, but I think we could swing it. The problem is that the contract does not specify a ceiling. The attorney could hire 100 expert witnesses ($1.2 MM) if they wanted and, if we were cancel the contract due to prohibitive costs, we would not only owe them for the cost of the witnesses, but also all man hours (say they invoice 3,200 hours at $400/hour… that’s another $1.3 MM). Basically, there is a great risk that signing that contract would bankrupt us, as opposed to helping us.

We’ve already lost our health and our home. We’ve spent over $175,00 out-of-pocket on medical care over the last nine years, and that’s just the receipts we found readily. We were gaslit and mocked for years over our “psychosomatic” ailments before discovering environmental mold was the root cause. Frankly, we’ve been dragged through hell. I’ve been saving aggressively since my teen years, doubling up on retirement since meeting my disabled partner. All we have right now is our hard-won savings, which we can’t afford to lose. Without financial security, we have no prospect of starting a family nor retiring semi-comfortably. We can’t afford the risk that comes with signing that contract and pursuing our supposedly killer lawsuit.

Our statute of limitations ends in June. There is not enough time to find a new lawyer. My boyfriend keeps saying, “we dodged a bullet” and he’s right. However, I’m still disappointed. It all seems so unjust. Like the medical system and educational system, the justice system is not set up to benefit those who are most in need. The attorney spoke of two other recent mold clients who are suing their landlords. Do they understand what they signed? Do they have tens of thousands of dollars lying around? I fear that they will end up in an even worse position than they’re already in.

I’m learning over and over again that it’s foolish to trust anyone but ourselves. No one will be a bigger advocate for me than I can be for myself, and the same goes for anyone else. And many people have no problem taking advantage of others if it will benefit them. It’s such a hard and painful lesson.

So, now it’s time to wipe of hands of the past and just move forward. Hopefully, we’ll have our latest mold labs back within two weeks, schedule an appointment with our doctor, start Sporonox, and begin feeling like ourselves again. I need to let go of the need for justice and move on.

Any Frasier fans here?

For God’s sake, Frasier, you’re forty-one years old – it’s time you learned something. The system ain’t perfect – sometimes the bad guy wins. And all those things you thought would be around to help you, the courts and the police department – well, sometimes, they’re just not there when you need them, so you can let it eat a hole in your stomach or you can just file it away under the heading “Sometimes life sucks.”

Martin

Martin is right. Sometimes life sucks.

As soon as the June statute of limitations date passes, I think I’ll feel better. There will be no more “what ifs” or “maybes” but instead the knowledge that we’re forever responsible for another entity’s negligent behavior.

Well, onward and upward. Things can only get better from here. I hope.