No matter how you feel about your HOA, they unfortunately have a lot of power over you.  This is even more true if you are trying to short sale your property and have gone late on your HOA dues because of your inability to pay.

HOAs are insensitive creatures.  Unlike banks, the management companies in charge don't seem to care about the reason for your hardship.  They are usually more than willing to let your home foreclose before they will take a lesser amount.

They do not see that they are better off having a new homeowner in the home who can, and will, pay their dues on time.  How is forcing a homeowner into foreclosure, so the home remains vacant for longer, better for the surrounding homeowners?  Well common sense says it's not. 

We have a short sale that has been approved by both the first and second lenders.  The family has experienced incredible hardship involving job loss and loss of health.  The HOA management company, in a popular area of Northwest St. Johns County, told us 2 months ago that the amount due was around $1,700.  They drug their feet in getting an actual payoff letter to the title company.  We had allotted $2,000 in the deal to go to paying off the HOA based on what they stated.  The day before yesterday, the number all of the sudden miraculously hit $4,000.  Well, that tooka little bit of wiggling on the HUD to figure out what could be reallocated or renegotiated.  Imagine our surprise when we got another call last night stating that the HOA had added more fees and they were now saying the payoff was $5,000.

The numbers have been established for weeks and we have just been waiting for the buyer's loan to come through.  Can the HOA just randomly add fees and continue to increase the balance?  We can't even get a straight answer and itemization of what is included in the $5,000.  From our understanding the homeowners quit paying roughly a year ago when their extreme, very legitimate, hardship hit.  Even if they haven't paid for a year the deficiency should only be around $1600-$1700.  Where did the rest come from?  We may never know.  We have to try to figure out a way to make the numbers come together even though the fees may or may not be legitimate.  The homeowners can't even pay their mortgage anymore.  They definitely can not afford to hire an attorney to fight the questionable fees. 

The HOA will not take a settlement amount...even one of a few hundred less.   The first lienholder is getting roughly half of what is owed.  The second lienholder is only getting $2,000.  Both are settling for much less, the HOA won't.  The only other option is for the poor family to foreclose in which case the first mortgage holder won't even recover but half of what they are owed.  The HOA said they would rather have the home foreclose and just try to collect after that than take less than the high amount they are quoting.

So yes, the HOA can really wreck your short sale deal.  Don't let it happen to you.  Because of our training and experience we will be able to keep this together.  If you are comtemplating a short sale, do not trust it to someone without extensive training and experience in short sales.  A short sale has many obstacles that an educated agent can manuever.