Posted on 11/28/2022 7:20:39 AM PST by george76
I own a second home in Pagosa Springs, CO. A couple years ago the HOA for Pagosa Lakes went full dictator and declared war on short term rentals in Pagosa Lakes. We home owners were not able to vote on this; they simply declared it with minimal input from the owners. When I sent a scathing letter that included the “damn” word I was informed of another policy they enacted without input. If they don’t like your correspondence you are subject to a $500 fine for the first offense, $10,000 for the second and $20,000 for the third. Gee, what kind of message is that sending?
You can still offer up your home in Pagosa Lakes for a short term rental, but first you must buy a special expensive permit from the HOA and the county assessor will reassess your home at TRIPLE the market value and you will be taxed accordingly. Mission accomplished: most owners opted out of short term rentals.
When I bought my place five years ago approximately 70% percent of the homes in Pagosa Lakes were second homes for people living elsewhere (mostly Texas, according to our real estate agent), and I doubt that has changed much. This is what is called a resort community. Many of us purchased homes here because we wanted the option of short term rental income. The Board of Directors for the HOA laughably tried to rationalize their decision. The real reason is pure NIMBY; they and their friends can’t stand Texas riff-raff in Pagosa.
The Board says local workers cannot find affordable housing due to the homes being used for AirBNB. Sorry Board, not my problem. You are my HOA, not a social outreach program that I sponsor with my dues. I drove an hour each way to my job for most of my life and I had roommates until I was forty years old. You want to live in a resort community or other desirable place you got to suck it up.
Does the Board REALLY think those AirBNB homes will convert to long term rentals? Of course not! Those idiots know we want to visit our second home frequently and don’t want someone living there full time (whoops, give me a minute while I whip out a check for 500 clams, or am I up to ten grand?).
So how has this played out? No post-Covid recovery for Pagosa. The short term renters used to come in and spend like drunken sailors. It being a vacation they would bring extra money. They’d load up at the pot shops and the liquor stores because you can’t get pot in Texas, and because beer, wine, and liquor costs 30% more in The Lone Star State. They would ski at the nearby resort, because, you know, skiing sucks in Texas and they would enjoy the famous Pagosa hot springs. Imagine the rage this causes the Board. Texans in our hot springs! Gross!
Now the small businesses still surviving are largely up for sale. On top of that, 70% of the homes and businesses going dark in Pagosa attracted the tweakers from Durango, Sante Fe and Taos. Our home was recently broken into by a pair of meth heads from Taos, one of whom is currently in jail there. They lived in our shed for a week or two getting high on hand sanitizer and leaving a pile of cigarette butts and beer cans and broken glass on two doors. The responding sheriff’s deputies said this problem spiked shortly after the Board’s decision to eliminate short term rentals and is a continuing problem throughout Pagosa Lakes.
...
So the geniuses solved the worker rental housing crisis by eliminating many of the jobs. I picture the Board members sitting blissfully on their deck in the pines, wearing their masks, relieved at not having to hear rednecks or local workers living it up next door.
I offered this story to two “newspapers” in Pagosa Springs and received no replies. It probably radiated like nuclear waste from their screens, a veritable Cleveland Steamer. You see, advertising (i.e., survival) for these corndog wrappers comes mostly from the huge number of real estate firms in town. God forbid word gets out to potential buyers that the local HOA is fascist as Hell and does whatever they want with YOUR home and your home is not safe from tweakers.
It distresses me that I cannot ask these town newspapers to pursue important stories that affect their community. Their interests lie elsewhere.
Colorado Ping ( Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from the list.)
First mistake: Buying property in a covenant-controlled community.
Every HOA eventually becomes a dictatorial fiefdom.
Without exception.......................
Never buy a residence subject to an HOA.
America would be way better if everyone on an HOA board and every HR employee were publicly executed…
Welcome to a great deal of Texas. We lived in a house for 32+ years as an adult in California, and not one damn HOA. It's real difficult to avoid them here in Texas. So much for freedom.
I'd sooner live in a one-room hut in the sticks with no plumbing.
HOAs are a double edged sword.
Yes they can be jackasses that overreach and selectively enforce the C&Rs but at the same time they can keep a neighborhood from turning into a shithole.
The trick is to get the right people on the board.......and that certainly can be a neat trick to be sure.
I also do t like having AirBNB’s in my small cup de sac, but we have one and no problems in over three years.
so no air b&b in that neighborhood?
Sounds like my kinda place.
I hate that my very nice neighbors rent out spare rooms in their home.
They are not very picky and i just don’t like it. But thats just me.
Also: Temp rentals are destroying lots of communities. You should see how my hood has changed after 13 years with people doing temporary rentals.
Especially “airbnb” that FACILITATES AND ENABLES HUMAN TRAFFICKING.
And it’s certainly enabling the drug trafficking industry, too. Nonstop - and I do mean NONSTOP - people babbling, ranting, making threats. Insurance rates going through the roof. Cooking meth and growing “legal weed.” Someone who owns a cabin in CA reports the same thing: Homeowners insurance UP 700%. And it’s like we’re a tourist attraction here - “Oh, who’s that?” *derogatory, slanderous remarks follow, then squawks of laughter* IT NEVER STOPS.
(And lately it’s been: “Isn’t she J3rry S3infeld’s mistress?” - NO FREAKING WONDER MR AND MRS SEINFELD SOLD THEIR COLORADO RANCH A FEW MONTHS AGO AND LEFT THE STATE.)
This was Mr K and his wife’s dream home. They raised their kid here. Mr K’s wife died of cancer in 2006. He almost lost his home and recovered when I moved in. Our lives have been affected in quite a dire way by this “bed and breakfast” BU11SH1T.
F*** EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU.
Please sell your property here and leave. Thanks.
I know some folks like living in a HOA community - its not now, and will never be for me.
Lots and lots of land around your house to be buffer from your neighbors eyes (and vice-versa) is my preference.
Not possible for everyone, I know, but I love not being able to see a single neighbor from anywhere on my property.
Or in leftist Colorado.
Not true, I can think of one.
It’s...
Ehrm..sorry.
They’re Nazis.
😜😎👌👍..............................
Yup. If where we bought had any more HOA type rules we would have bought someplace else. Our place has a “landscape maintenance assoc” and really the only way they can mess with an owner is if they don’t pay their dues. They supposedly maintain all the common areas. Eleven years and never been seen on our street. But, no “common areas” on our street.
I live in a HOA community here in SC. There are a lot of temporary rentals. I must be lucky. The HOA rules, dues and modification regulations are reasonable.
Democrats running HOA’s now.
So vote the HOA board out?
You own a unit, you vote on in the board .
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