3 ms·

I chose to buy my first house in a townhome complex with 100 units. Why? Maintenance was outsourced, and at a lower price than I could pay for myself (100 hou

I chose to buy my first house in a townhome complex with 100 units. Why? Maintenance was outsourced, and at a lower price than I could pay for myself (100 households at once get a good group buy price!) Everything on the exterior of my house was taken care of. The complex has 2 shared green spaces, one for dogs, one for people. The large green space for people is bigger than the yard in my current single family home. All year round weatherproof commercial yard furniture was already on the property. Every year my windows got cleaned, the deck power washed. Landscaping was professionally handled, trees trimmed, pests removed, all w/o me having to worry about any of it. I'd buy another unit in complex with that design again w/o issue or hesitation. With proper construction techniques (which sadly that complex didn't have), sound is not an issue. Sound dampening is a solved problem, and I've lived in other complexes that had the same sound leakage from connected neighbors and I have from my neighbors right now in the house on the lots around me.

mattlondon 3y ago
This is all fine while the management is fine. As soon as the company or people change, it goes to shit. The next thing you know you've been trying to get the broken communal door/gate/sewer/extractor fan/lights/electric/gas/whatever fixed for months if not years and no one at the management company is even returning calls, and you sure as hell can't fix it yourself since you are not legally allowed to do it (and you can guarantee that if you were to do something yourself the dormant management company would suddenly spring to life and sue you to hell and back). Then next summer they hike the management and maintenance prices 500% and there is fuck all you can do apart from suck it up because now you can't sell because no one wants to pay the high fee, and you can't not pay it as you'll be taken to court for non-payment of contract within days (and P.S. their contract says they can hike the prices as they please because wow look at that cool yard for dogs! I totally forgot to read the entire contract.whatevs.) TL;Dr it is great while it is all working fine. IME after a few years once the initial glean and glow has worn off and things start to naturally wear out and break, it will go to shit. It will start small with broken lawn furniture that doesn't get replaced, then before you know it the roof is leaking and there is nothing you can do apart from hope the people you pay to look after the place but are not responding to emails or calls actually do something. But hey good luck with your place anyway.
- com2kid 3y ago
  > This is all fine while the management is fine. As soon as the company or people change, it goes to shit. HOAs are member voted, it is a thankless job and improving things is as simple as running for the board, every time someone has wanted to take over they have been welcomed on. The HOA there has been going strong for almost 25 years, doing a great job managing the place. The HOA did indeed fire their previous management company for incompetence, since the complex is in a large metro area, there is no shortage of competition in that field. Edit: Oh and it isn't like people I hire myself are super reliable! I've had vendors working on my house ghost me, sometimes in the middle of a job. And there is also the cost of my time in learning about different fields (e.g. yard irrigation), collecting multiple quotes, and trying to do background checks to ensure the people giving the quotes do good work.

mattlondon 3y ago

This is all fine while the management is fine. As soon as the company or people change, it goes to shit. The next thing you know you've been trying to get the broken communal door/gate/sewer/extractor fan/lights/electric/gas/whatever fixed for months if not years and no one at the management company is even returning calls, and you sure as hell can't fix it yourself since you are not legally allowed to do it (and you can guarantee that if you were to do something yourself the dormant management company would suddenly spring to life and sue you to hell and back). Then next summer they hike the management and maintenance prices 500% and there is fuck all you can do apart from suck it up because now you can't sell because no one wants to pay the high fee, and you can't not pay it as you'll be taken to court for non-payment of contract within days (and P.S. their contract says they can hike the prices as they please because wow look at that cool yard for dogs! I totally forgot to read the entire contract.whatevs.) TL;Dr it is great while it is all working fine. IME after a few years once the initial glean and glow has worn off and things start to naturally wear out and break, it will go to shit. It will start small with broken lawn furniture that doesn't get replaced, then before you know it the roof is leaking and there is nothing you can do apart from hope the people you pay to look after the place but are not responding to emails or calls actually do something. But hey good luck with your place anyway.

com2kid 3y ago
> This is all fine while the management is fine. As soon as the company or people change, it goes to shit. HOAs are member voted, it is a thankless job and improving things is as simple as running for the board, every time someone has wanted to take over they have been welcomed on. The HOA there has been going strong for almost 25 years, doing a great job managing the place. The HOA did indeed fire their previous management company for incompetence, since the complex is in a large metro area, there is no shortage of competition in that field. Edit: Oh and it isn't like people I hire myself are super reliable! I've had vendors working on my house ghost me, sometimes in the middle of a job. And there is also the cost of my time in learning about different fields (e.g. yard irrigation), collecting multiple quotes, and trying to do background checks to ensure the people giving the quotes do good work.