HOA - A Fascist Occupation

This is for homeowners living in a mandatory HOA who feel they live in a Nazi Concentration camp. You have left the "American Zone"...and entered an evil, dark world.  Each new home buyer becomes a slave to this Fascist form of government known as "Mandatory Associations Foreclosing in America".  The acronym M.A.F.i.A. will be used as simply mafia thru the rest of this blog. My fellow Americans, did you voluntarily surrender your constitutional rights in trade for a deed to your home?  If you "agreed to a contract" that puts your homestead/property up as collateral to insure payment to the mafia for "membership dues", then you effectively "waived your rights" since homesteads are expressly "protected from forced sale for debts", and only mortgages or duly executed mechanics liens have the constitutional right to foreclose on a homestead...oh and Taxes :) So if you are outraged about them stealing your constitutional rights, then we have something in common and I ask you to please put on your boots of democracy.  We the people must unite and  put this issue to a vote in our neighborhoods.  Together, we will stomp these grapes of wrath into a sweet wine of freedom. If you’ve asked yourself the question “How can they get away with this?” –you are not alone. A line from The Matrix says it best ..."It is like a splinter in your mind, but you cannot put your finger on it.” You seek an answer, but what is the question? "What is the will of the people?" you may say. Well, sort of, but be more specific. Try again. “To have an HOA or not to have an HOA?” Bingo!  Yes this is the question that must be asked of the people before their will can be done. IS MANDATORY HOA GOVERNANCE WHAT YOU WANT? (YES or NO). People do not "vote for an HOA" just because they bought a home in an HOA. This question has never been properly asked at the appropriate time - when the developer "turns the neighborhood over to the homeowners". This question is intentionally suppressed by the housing industry, in collusion with the HOA management industry.  This industry does not want you, the housing consumer, to be given any choice. They have arranged this so that you shall pay dues (their dues!) under the coercive threat of foreclosure, forever.  They get an income stream forever.  You get the shaft.  Forever? Welcome to the HOA Matrix, Copper top. I have heard howling and gnashing of teeth over the publication of these truths.  Those howling the loudest fear these revelations of truth, and know this will put them in the unemployment lines. There are some well-run HOAs in America - not all of them are run by abusive, self-serving tyrants (also known as HOA Nazis). This blog is not about those three or four mandatory HOAs. If your HOA is "well run, respectful and caring" then get back to your ice cream social.  Why are you interested in this blog anyway? Voluntary HOAs are typically not a threat to the quiet enjoyment of property. They do not  wield the powers to foreclose.   This blog is not about those many thousands of benevolent, voluntary HOAs. This blog is about all "Mandatory Associations Foreclosing in America" and hereby publish the acronym MAFiA as their evil trademark and namesake.  These are places where a $100 "dues bill" rapidly becomes a $1,000 demand.  These are places where the $100,000+ homestead is used as leverage to collect the $900 extortion payment, under threat of foreclosure and sale on the courthouse steps for pennies on the dollar.  This is where dirty deeds get done dirt cheap. It is my belief that most of the present-day “mandatory” HOAs should be converted into voluntary HOAs and do not even have a "Valid contract" when they use the legalized extortion and unconstitutional foreclosure authority found in the CC&Rs,  The lawyers of this mafia industry have promulgated evil, unconstitutional "contract scams" across America.   Pulte, KB Home, Centex and other big developers enabled these mafia organizations to infiltrate American Society and suck the liberty from our most precious location - our homesteads. We may need the help of successful Voluntary HOA groups to help guide our neighborhoods back into the American zone- after the deprogramming and exit counseling ;) Management companies and their lawyers have expressed that the sky will fall and we will live  in  ruins with cars on blocks and purple houses and unkempt lawns if their precious power to foreclose or levy fines is stripped by the legislature.   I have been looking at houses in some of the older, non-HOA neighborhoods and don't see any of these fantasy horrors. The fact is - there is no choice for Americans today.  All new housing products on the market come with mafia conditions.  Those who howl otherwise say there are plenty of options to buy houses that aren't in an HOA, but they can't show me one new non-HOA  house in a new neighborhood being built by the industry.  There isn't even one where the HOA will become voluntary when the big developer moves out. Not a single one is for sale in the north east independent school district of San Antonio. Are any of the big 3 housing manufacturing companies (Pulte, KB, Centex) building non-HOA property in your area? The foundation of American values rests on this basic question - "what is the will of the people". Why is this question never asked when the developer completes the development phase?  What is the problem with letting the consumers democratically choose if they want to continue this Fascist occupation by the mafia? Most people I surveyed have said they would vote “NO MORE HOA” if given the choice. When a vote on this subject becomes mandatory by law, these collections racketeers and their hand-picked boards will suddenly become accountable to the will of the people thru a democratic process and secret balloting. If the people have the opportunity to vote on this (without their votes being known by everyone else) then they will naturally chose to dissolve the Mafia condition in the vast majority of neighborhoods.  This means the law will automatically cancel the contracts that enable foreclosure on homesteads.  This means they lose the leverage to extort Mafia dues and the terror tactics will stop.  When they can no longer collect windfall profits over and above the pitiful "dues", these terrorists will be forced out of business. Most management collections operations would suddenly cease to exist so the management industry will not allow a democratic choice to be made.  Their cash cow will be sliced in half (conservative estimate).  Thus they - the CAI and the management industry- are the perpetrators of this scheme to deny finding and implementing the true will of the people. It is my belief that when the developer “turns the neighborhood over to the owners” the people should decide (via secret ballot -a serial numbered prepaid post card should be mailed out with the annual dues bills with the YES or NO question sent to a PO box where a neutral third party (perhaps the county election board?) will certify the results. If you and your neighbors democratically say you want the HOA system to continue maintaining the status quo and living under the developer’s Utopian set of rules, then you will be certified to live in a "good HOA" and you deserve this condition.  Those of us living under Fascist rule today will be free and you'll not have to listen to the screaming any longer :) This question/vote idea terrifies HOA managers, lawyers and the brainwashed Board members who have become drunk on powers that allow them to rise above the law and render the constitution null and void. The true answer to this question would likely cause the HOA pyramid scheme to collapse and vanish. Oh my, what would we do without the HOA to deny us our solar panels? Just ask this question in any board meeting but heed this WARNING! You will likely see a spewing of venom and maybe a head spin 360 degrees and lots of  growling hurled in your general direction from the beasts blinded by rage.  So bring goggles and a long, sharp pair of tongs and a cross. But do try asking this in front of your next HOA metting - you might even have someone video tape it so you can share the reaction on youtube.  It’ll be great fun! Ignoring the will of the people is “absolute despotism”.  Refusing to measure the will of the people and preventing the question from being asked is Fascism. It’s that splinter in your mind – inserted when you closed on your first HOA house. You thought living in an HOA would bring good social gatherings at the clubhouse. All was peaches and cream until you went to your first HOA meeting or applied for that ARC approval, or got that first “violation letter” because you painted the trim on your front door without their bloody permission. Utter a word of disagreement with any of the sacred rules of the CC*R and you’ll find yourself chastised for Heresy.  How dare you challenge the validity the contract or the wisdom of the supreme writer of the sacred CC&R? It is written and so it shall be complied with. ACHTUNG!! YOU AGREED!! "The number one tool of an abuser is isolation" - Doctor Phil Anyone who challenges the status quo is subjected to goupthink behavior (see footnotes) and made to feel unwelcome, isolated and outcast. Welcome to the Fascist Occupation – But don’t despair!  The path to freedom is clear. It may not be simple – but this question must be asked of your neighbors and everyone in your community.  YES or NO.  What is the score in your HOA - what do your neighbors think of converting to voluntary association and ending the fascist behaviors? Find the answer and please share your finding with me on this blog! There are hundreds of thousands of HOAs in this country – I cannot realistically get to every one of them and impose this voluntary question.  Therefore, I believe the answer is to take this up at the legislative level and mandate this simple democratic question be binding on the mandatory condition for all detatched family homes in the USA. This is not applicable to condos or places where all the yard/building maintenance is funded by the dues.  IF it's a gated community then it still should be questioned to see if the people want to remove the gates and force the county/city to maintain their roads...it's something for the people living there to decide, not the dicators who came into power via the magic process found in the fascist propoganda called the CC&Rs. I'll be working on the Texas legislative process - to inflict democracy on the Facist Occupation. Some of the problems to consider when the occupation ends: Legislators want to know what will happen when the sky falls (as the HOA pundits claim will happen). First, we need to take care of our neighbors who are currently on the boards. We'll need to either convince them to seek “exit counseling” or send them to state hospitals for deprogramming. These are simply brainwashed clones - "volunteers" who sincerely wanted to serve the community, but were trained by the perpetrators to treat homeowners like inmates in a Nazi stalag.  It's not completely their fault so we must show compassion and encourage these people to seek exit counseling and abandon their Nazi behaviors before taking the more radical approach of deprogramming. Another problem will be to have homeowners learn to think for themselves again: They will have to choose paint colors without the ARC being there to prevent faux pas. They must learn to read their own plats and understand setback lines so they can go down to the city office and get permits to build fences without making a mistake and building it on the wrong lot. I think they will regain these skills without any serious harm to themselves or their neighborhood. The dawn of Fascism: HOA rules were written without representation by democratically elected representatives of the governed (thus they fail to have a legislative branch - one leg of a three-legged republican form of government).  The processes for selecting these board members do not resemble state election codes, so don't even get me started on the validity of elections in HOAs. The "governing documents" literally create an adhesion contract that forms a corporation that is governed under this Fascist form of governance where all powers (legislative, judicial, executive) are in the hands of the developer at conception of the organization. This is perpetuated as long as the corporation stays solvent and static.   Since the process to change rules is so difficult, 99.9% of all mandatory HOAs never changed any of the rules. The governance becomes a good ole' boys club where the incumbent board/manager/lawyer enforces only what they want to enforce. Often, selective enforcement is done based on disagreements those in power had with certain individuals.  Enforcement has less to do with "maintaining property values" and becomes an abusive tool to cleanse the neighborhood of anyone a board member doesn't like. By harassing and intimidating those hapless homeowners, they usually find a home elsewhere and move just to escape the abuse...rather than stay and fight.  I think maybe they are the smart ones, I should have ran like a scared rabbit 10 years ago, but something inside me just cannot bow down to tyrants. Anyone who's served on a board for a few years know how easily this can happen. It does happen, this is not disputed by honest people. The really disturbing problem begins when the developer sells his last house and "turns it over to the homeowners". While lots of problems happen during the developer control period (example - developer changes the rules on a whim without the consent of the existing homeowners and starts building $150,000 "shacks" in what was $599,000+ McMansion neighborhood), the developer does need to impose rules and enforce them as long as he’s building houses and selling them in the neighborhood. The disturbing problem begins when the developer leaves or is at least 90% complete and should no longer have any control over the neighborhood governance. What's disturbing about this transfer of power to the people? "To have an HOA or not to have an HOA" is never asked of the people. Instead, at this juncture, the "boards" are typically made up of hand-picked cronies who were in bed with the management company while the developer was in control. The management companies have a conflict of interest in this special occasion because they want to convince the “board” to continue their "services" in perpetuity and during this critical time they lobby these board members and shower them with gifts (free meals, etc) and friendly persuasion to continue the status quo – all behind the back of the majority of the homeowners who do not have a say in this special “transfer of power”. There are no election standards that resemble state election codes in 99.99% of these HOA CC&Rs.  This is by design - a democratic decision made by the present-day homeowners would likely destroy the cash-cow and dissolve the vast majority of these money-sources for the management industry. When fascists control any HOA in America, we must treat it as we would any fascist occupation on our sovereign soil. Don't pass this off as rhetoric or a bad joke - this is serious.  Americans are suffering under the yoke of abuse and oppression. We are denied practically all freedoms "not enumerated in the constitution" - by this occupation. WHAT TO DO? How should we, civilized people, deal with this situation? Do not be silent - apathy is the friend of the abuser and the enemy of freedom.  Do not leave hapless homeowners to fend for themselves against this well organized industry. I have testified to the Texas Senate that “this is the largest organized crime gang in the USA". (written testimony and links to the video supplied on request). The most despicable and abusive practice is using foreclosure threats to extort money by running up outrageous "late fees" over trivial amounts of "dues". The lawyers then threaten foreclosure as leverage to extort hundreds and sometimes thousands of dollars when the initial "dues" are under $200 and the homes typically worth over $100,000. Does the "crime" fit the "punishment"?  No.  This is causing unreasonable harm for trivial “rule breaking”.  This is an infestation of liberty sucking parasites and it must be addressed. A fellow who's got an IQ of about 145 came up with this idea: Enact a law that allows as few as three homeowners to compel a "renewal referendum" when they feel abused and treated unfairly by their HOA. (not more than once per year). In other words, create a law that will force the HOA, upon complaint/affidavit filed to the district court by at least three owners, to pass this test of "democratic consent" to be governed by the HOA corporation that's acting under this color of authority. Most CC&Rs require a minimum of 66% to change any rule. So since this is the percentage of owners who must agree to change the rules it stands fair reason that 66% shall be required to vote FOR renewal of the HOA's corporate charter, and validate "the contract" this authority is based upon.  Failure to obtain agreement shall cause the corporation to dissolve and the contracts called the CC&Rs to become null, void and unenforceable. The validity of this "contract" hangs by a flimsy thread today but it is the foundation of the entire HOA scam. The law regarding the formation of the mandatory HOA "contract" alludes to a democratic process whereby all the present-day owners would sign a petition, and "a majority" of the governed or those controlling at least 75% of the total area of the neighborhood would have to sign this petition for it to become a valid contract. This petition process has never been followed to create any of these occupying regimes.  Nobody signed such a petition.  When we bought a house, the developer didn't offer such an opportunity - it was strictly "take it or leave it", a housing vendor's adhesion contract. This is the deception of the century in Real Estate and it's finally coming to light and we must end this occupation and prevent future Fascist occupations. The law must be changed so that: 1. A petition to create the "homeowner owned HOA" is required by law when the developer leaves the neighborhood. 2. Void the developer’s "automatic renewal" clauses. These equate to perpetuities which are unconstitutional.  Most of these "contracts" now contain automatic renewal clauses - these must be rendered null and void by law and all Mandatory HOAs comply with #1. 3. The term of these "contracts" must be fixed so that there is never more than 10 years between referendums. 4. HOA can operate without such a test for up to 10 years - UNLESS three people complaining of unfair treatment compel a vote to ask this question.  To be fair, owners should not be able to compel such a vote more than once per year. When these become law, the existence of the HOA regimes can instantly be put to this "democratic consent test" by three owners, the HOAs will stop treating homeowners like prisoners in a Stalag. Democracy is the way forward. Abusive boards are typically surrounded by powerful cottage industry experts trained in extortion racketeering.  These people are trained control freak advisors. It is in their best interest to control any "uprising".  Homeowners find themselves a maze -seeking answers and "the truth". All HOAS that have paid off their construction debt (all the common areas fully funded by the developer and paid off when the last lot is sold) should undergo this test. Properties with substantial common debt still outstanding are not within the scope of this idea, but the common debt might simply be divided and placed as mortgage liens on all the homes if the HOA was to be dissolved. ALL OWNERS MUST PARTICIPATE in this process and what if no ballot is returned by an owner? That equates to a "NO" vote. WE did not "agree to a contract" when we bought a house, it was shoved into the pile and we did not have a choice to negotiate any of the terms, but the constitution is clear on this point: Perpetuities are expressly forbidden and shall never be allowed.  So to restore this right, we must end this occupation and find the will of the people. Is your HOA a Democracy or absolute despotant? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfrQalpmdqk Rich

FOOTNOTE:

Groupthink, a term coined by social psychologist Irving Janis (1972), occurs when a group makes faulty decisions because group pressures lead to a deterioration of “mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral judgment”.  Groups affected by groupthink ignore alternatives and tend to take irrational actions that dehumanize other groups.  A group is especially vulnerable to groupthink when its members are . . .  insulated from outside opinions. . . ."

Janis has documented eight symptoms of groupthink, some of which include:

1. Collective rationalization – Members discount warnings and do not reconsider their assumptions. 2. Belief in inherent morality – Members believe in the rightness of their cause and therefore ignore the ethical or moral consequences of their decisions. 3. Stereotyped views of out-groups – Negative views of “enemy” make effective responses to conflict seem unnecessary. 4. Direct pressure on dissenters – Members are under pressure not to express arguments against any of the group’s views. 5. Self-censorship – Doubts and deviations from the perceived group consensus are not expressed. 6. Illusion of unanimity – The majority view and judgments are assumed to be unanimous. 7. Self-appointed ‘mindguards’ – Members protect the group and the leader from information that is problematic or contradictory to the group’s cohesiveness, view, and/or decisions.