Victoria Place Homeowners Association

For the past 3 ½ years, I have served on the board of our local homeowners association.  I came in to replace a treasurer who was very sick and soon died.  Then was elected to the board and served another year as treasurer.  Then in my last two years, I was president of the board.  It is a three person board and I had great people to work with.  After the first year, we voted to hire a management company to assist us, and the biggest help of all was to the treasurer, who no longer had to send out statements and collect dues.  My tenure ended in December, 2013, and at the end of the annual all homeowner meeting, they held a little party for me.
"Job Well Done"

The cupcakes were arranged to look like a house with a chimney, red front door, and flowers out front, with autumn leaves and acorns on the roof!

I will continue to be the HOA Blog Editor, as I started the blog five years ago.



5 comments:

anne marie in philly said...

nice cupcake cake; pity you cannot eat it.

I served on an HOA when in VA. never again. my current location is not in a development; I got damn sick and tired of being told what to do. I hate rules.

Anonymous said...

I understand the need for HOAs, but won't buy a house with one again, if I have any say in the matter.

Obviously, they appreciated your efforts! That's awesome! I can't do treasurer, but other jobs are OK.

Peace <3
Jay

Ur-spo said...

It must be fascinating to be on the HOA board; headaches? power galore? what's it like I wonder.

David Jeffreys said...

To some extent, the job is what you make it and what kind of leadership you have, especially when the board only consists of 3 members. In the past, we had one president who was power hungry, enjoyed fining owners for the least transgression, and taking them to court. Obviously, he became very unpopular. During my tenure, we had to place only 3 liens on property because the owners completely ignored paying dues and keeping the exterior of their house in good condition. Having a professional management company helps tremendously with this letting the HOA board play "good cop" while they played "bad cop" when necessary. Our association is fairly small with only 103 homes, some common areas which require landscaping (one long block along a major street), but no clubhouse, swimming pool, tennis courts, etc. Our properties are relatively small from 50x100 feet to some a little larger; so living so close together, it is probably necessary to have some control.

However, this is the first and last homeowner association that I have had a home in. I agree with Anne Marie and Jay that I do not like to follow too many rules. There are already city, county, state, and federal rules to comply with and I think that should be enough.

Spo, do you have a HOA where you live? It seems that almost any development in the last 20 or so years now has one.

David Jeffreys said...

I ate part of one of the chocolate ones and it was delicious. The VP arranged it at Harris-Teeter supermarket, where they had made a sheet cake for us last year. This year when she went in, they had a Christmas tree done with cupcakes, which gave her the idea to ask if they could do one in the shape of a house!