Bright future for professionals behind the communal garden gate / Homeowners groups in need of managers, lawyers
This is an article by Deborah Rich that just appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle. She graciously quoted me:

Looking for a surefire way to make money over the next 10 to 20 years? Try homeowner association litigation. Or if you don't cotton to going back to school and cramming for the bar exam, become a professional property manager instead. No degree or certificate necessary; a business card will get you in the door.

Both lawyers and property managers are certain to be in high demand as the number of Americans living in developments owned and managed by homeowners associations swells.
...
"Homeowners associations, being private organizations, cannot violate the Constitution, no matter what they do. They can tell you to take down your Christmas decorations, your American flag, whatever," says Evan McKenzie, political science professor at the University of Illinois, Chicago, lawyer and author of "Privatopia: Homeowner Associations and the Rise of Residential Private Government'' (Yale University Press, 1995)
...
"People go to see a new development and say, 'Wow, isn't this beautiful,' " says McKenzie. "They say, 'We have a pool, we have this, we have that, and it's all clean and neat because someone is enforcing all the rules and nobody is going to put a trailer in their front yard. Isn't this wonderful?' And, yeah, it is. And guess what? You have to run it. And the other thing is, isn't it nice that your neighbor's house looks so clean and neat and orderly and uniform. And guess what, yours has to look the same way."

----------------


It's a long article, and I think it is interesting and well-written. And this McKenzie fellow sure seems to know what he's talking about.