www.newszap.com: Older HOAs face problems with contradictory CC&Rs


Residents of Devonshire Estates are at odds over whether a neighbor should have been allowed to build a 950-square-foot RV garage in his backyard. The HOA board approved the project and the resident got the proper permit from the city. However, when Fannie Jones woke up to the sounds of construction on her birthday in April, she did not like the unexpected gift. "It's a barn in my backyard," said the 60-year-old Ms. Jones, who was one of the neighborhood's first residents when she bought her home in 1989. The RV garage, owned by Charles Baker, is about 18 feet tall and blocks his neighbor, Ms. Jones', eastern view.While some homeowners' associations vigorously enforce community laws, other neighborhoods are a bit more relaxed. Problems can develop as board members and policies change without updating the covenants, conditions and restrictions (CC&Rs). When HOA members attempt to enforce what they think is in their CC&Rs, they may discover the documents have outdated or contradictory language...



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This sort of thing is fairly common and it poses quite a problem. There aren't many lawyers who understand the law on CIDs, and even when they do the interaction between the language of governing documents and state law is often difficult to figure out. The CC&Rs may have been written 25 years ago, and since then a lot of things have changed.