Search results for: rental

Room For Rent

Facts

Association Board adopted a resolution that unit owners in the Association who self-rented but did not join the rental pool would need to pay 20% of their rental income to the Association because the self-renters “did not contribute financially for the extra expense of their leasing activity or for the beneficial services provided by the rental pool.”  The resolution also 1) disallowed future self-rentals; and 2) grandfathered in the current self-renters.

The Suit

Claims

The Association sued the self-renters seeking a declaration that its resolution disallowing future self-rentals and imposing a rental fee was enforceable.  The self-renters counterclaimed alleging: a) breach of contract; b) injunctive relief; c) that the resolution was arbitrary and unenforceable; and d) that the Association was improperly allocating certain fees on the self-renters. Continue Reading Fees for Self-Renters Who Don’t Enter the Rental Pool are Legal

Devil in Suit

Courts across the country have been hearing cases about short-term rentals of homes and condominium units, and there is not much consistency in the decisions made. Sometimes, it is the homeowners’ association that is trying to enforce its covenants in a manner that prohibits short-term rentals, and sometimes it is a municipality trying to enforce its zoning ordinances.  In the two cases discussed below, we have one of each—and in both cases, the language of the covenant and the ordinance made all the difference. Continue Reading Short-Term Rentals—A Tale of Two Cases

Do Not Distrub Guests

A Court in Louisiana recently tackled the issue of short-term rentals (New Jax Condominium Association, Inc. v. Vanderbilt New Orleans, LLC, 219 So.3d 471). A Condominium Association adopted an amendment to its bylaws during its annual meeting prohibiting short term rentals. When a Unit Owner continued to engage in short-term rentals, the Association sued and received a permanent injunction, preventing the Unit Owner from continuing to engage in short-term rentals. The Unit Owner appealed, alleging that the amendment to the bylaws was invalid because certain board members had conflicts of interest, and because one board member changed his vote during the voting. Continue Reading Banning Short-Term Rentals

Sold Sign

A condominium association in Milwaukee has historically faced heavy delinquency issues. Through The Husch Blackwell Condominium & HOA Law Team’s assertive collection methods, the firm collected more than $290,000 in assessments, interest and legal fees for the association since 2013. A substantial portion of the $290,000 resulted from the sale and/or rental of 10 units that became owned by the association. Continue Reading When an Association Owns a Unit – Recouping Delinquent Assessments Through Unit Rental/Sales

Room For Rent

Those of us involved in condominium management, whether as board members, officers, property managers or attorneys, know that VRBO and AirBnB have changed the way units are rented. Short term rentals are viewed by many associations as a problem that should be solved.  Specifically, these associations and managers would prefer that short rentals (most often defined as less than six months or one year, but I have seen it defined as less than 30 days) be prohibited.  The problem is getting enough people to agree on the various issues: Continue Reading Can I Use the Prohibition on “Commercial Activity” to Preclude Short Term Rentals?

If you are seeing a lot of unfamiliar faces coming and going from a unit in your Association, it is possible that the owner is renting his unit on a short term basis. The Short Term Rental (“STR”) market is thriving worldwide, through such well-known websites as AirBnB and Vacation Rental By Owner (VRBO) to name a couple. But what does this mean for your Association and how do you deal with it?

Continue Reading Dealing With Short Term Rentals/AirBnB

What you need to know: In some States amendments to a HOA declaration that was not reasonably foreseeable is not enforceable. 

MacLeod v. Mogollon Airpark Inc., Not Reported in Pac. Rptr., 2023 WL 2582622 (Cal. 2023)

Issues:

  1. Was the CC & R amendment prohibiting occupancy of certain guest houses to less than 4 months a year? 
  2. Was the owner entitled to attorney fees for winning the appeal?
Continue Reading An HOA Amendment that was not Reasonably Foreseeable under the Original Declaration may not be Enforceable Without the Consent of 100% of the Owners

What you can’t do:

  1. Breed, size, and weight limitations may not be applied to an assistance animal.
  2. Pet conditions and restrictions such as pet deposits cannot be applied to assistance animals.
  3. You may not ask an applicant or tenant to:
    • Provide access to medical records or medical providers or
    • Provide detailed or extensive information or documentation of a person’s physical or mental impairments.
  4. A request for a reasonable accommodation may not be unreasonably denied, or conditioned on payment of a fee or deposit
  5. The response to a reasonable accommodation may not be unreasonably delayed.
  6. You are not entitled to know an individual’s diagnosis or require disclosure of:
    • Medical records,
    • A diagnosis or
    • The severity of a disability.
  7. You may not insist on specific types of evidence if the information which is provided or actually known to the association meets the requirements of the FHA (Fair Housing Act).
Continue Reading 7 Things You Need to Know about Emotional Support Animals in 2023

Recently, Attorney Naomie Kweyu Husch Blackwell LLP, scored a huge bench trial win in a southeastern Wisconsin circuit court on a foreclosure and money judgment action.

Summary

If you want the best chance of collecting outstanding assessments, late fees, interest and attorney fees, you need to be organized, have a collection policy and follow your documents. Doing so can make a big difference to your association, as one of our clients recently learned – read more below:

Continue Reading Association Successfully Recovers ALL Attorney’s Fees From Unit Owners Who Refused to Pay Attorney Fees
This is too Much

Facts

Montana Developer of three condominium-hotels at Big Sky Ski Resort sold units subject to Declarations that required “all unit owners to use [Developer], or an agent designated by [Developer], as their exclusive rental agents,” when renting out their condominiums.  The Declarations also provided that “Unit owners may decline to renew the rental management contract with [Developer] after three years, but only if 75% of unit owners vote to end the contract with [Developer].”  Of course, Developer also owned all of the commercial units, which constituted 22% of the voting units, and several residential units, practically making it impossible for 75% of the unit owners to do anything that the Developer didn’t want.

Continue Reading Claims for When Developers Have TOO Much Control of Association