Solutions for Mandatory Membership Clubs (Palm Beach Gardens, Lakeside: for sale, 2013, foreclosure)

[Hrhdoodles]

Mandatory membership clubs are completely unregulated and the Florida courts are not willing to intervene in private club business. This means a private club can infringe on your first amendment right to freedom of speech. For a case which illustrates this please read Shumrak v. Broken Sound Club, Inc. (There is a link here but if it doesn't work you can just Google it)

[url]https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1842091/shumrak-v-broken-sound-club-inc/[/url]

If you belong to a mandatory membership club and are interested in discussing problems and solutions please go to our Facebook group called Members of mandatory membership clubs. Here is a link
[url]https://www.facebook.com/groups/153713408771780/[/url]

Homeowners association's in Florida are regulated by chapter 720 of the Florida statutes. I propose that if you must belong to a club as part of homeownership, then that club must be regulated by the same chapter of the Florida statutes. The same rationale that caused our legislators to pass 720 which regulates homeowners association's applies to mandatory membership clubs. If you would like to help protect freedom of speech and property rights for homeowners in mandatory membership clubs, please sign the petition below and pass it along on social media.


[url]https://www.change.org/p/bill-nelson-help-protect-freedom-of-speech-and-property-rights-of-florida-residents?recruiter=134988775&utm_source=share_pet ition&utm_medium=copylink&utm_campaign=share_petit ion&utm_term=share_for_starters_page[/url]

[City Guy997S]

Easy solution.......DONT BUY IN A MANDATORY CLUB!

[howlinowl]

Originally Posted by City Guy997S

Easy solution.......DONT BUY IN A MANDATORY CLUB!

While I can definitely agree with the above quote, I wonder about existing homeowners in a community that already live in a community that suddenly decides to change their bylaws and become a Mandatory Club community. Are they suddenly required to come up with the manditory fee or are they grandfathered in and do not? Definitely not fair if they are required to pony up now if they were not when they originally purchased their home. Is there some kind of voting process that the community decides to do this or is it up to representatives that were voted in? If it is the later, you're kind of screwed....they were voted in to position by the residents.



I don't live in a planned community (golf, gated or otherwise) and purposefully bought a home outside to avoid any issues such as this, even though my wife really wanted the sense of security of a gated/guarded community. I am however interested in learning more about the processes from a curious point of view.


howlinowl

[City Guy997S]

Originally Posted by howlinowl

While I can definitely agree with the above quote, I wonder about existing homeowners in a community that already live in a community that suddenly decides to change their bylaws and become a Mandatory Club community. Are they suddenly required to come up with the manditory fee or are they grandfathered in and do not? Definitely not fair if they are required to pony up now if they were not when they originally purchased their home. Is there some kind of voting process that the community decides to do this or is it up to representatives that were voted in? If it is the later, you're kind of screwed....they were voted in to position by the residents.



I don't live in a planned community (golf, gated or otherwise) and purposefully bought a home outside to avoid any issues such as this, even though my wife really wanted the sense of security of a gated/guarded community. I am however interested in learning more about the processes from a curious point of view.


howlinowl

1st they have to vote to make it mandatory. The "pro club" team will say that it will make the facilities better since more people have to help pay for it. The "anti club" team will say it will hurt property values (which in most cases it does). Existing owners are exempt, but once they sell their house then the new members have to pay. The catch, existing homeowners usually lose badly on the sale of their home.

Case in point, Boca West:
2/2 condos (1000 sq ft) in a nice building: $395.....total price, less than $400 total. Why? Club fees to start are 70K down and about 15K a year plus the HOA fees in the building are a few hundred more. Condo should be about 200K but several are discounted to stop paying the fees/dues.
https://www.realtor.com/realestatean...-79531?view=qv

Over a dozen units for sale at $1000 or less, another dozen at $15,000 or less. The price is really just a number, if you showed up with a $10 bill I'd bet you could buy one, heck maybe two! The realtors really don't even want to bother trying to sell these.

[City Guy997S]

On the above unit, here was the sales history:


Sales Date Price
AUG-2013 $0
MAY-1998 $100
MAR-1988 $16,000
MAR-1984 $107,500
NOV-1980 $100
JAN-1979 $80,400

Sold new for 80K in 79, resold in 84 for 107.5K, couple of quick claim deed sales then foreclosed. Likely the owner died, heirs let it slip into foreclosure. Bank sees the problem and lists it for $395 to simply be the lowest unit for sale.

[howlinowl]

Wow. Seems like these were destined to fail. I could actually see that some of the existing exempt owners could probably support mandatory clubs to push the club costs on the next owners and not seeing that they were actually cutting their own throats on resale value farther down the line. I was trying to think of an escape plan if I'd owned one of these units, thought about a reverse mortgage, but I'm sure once the mortgage company saw it had manditory club membership, they'd probably back off.



I drive by Fisherman's Creek in Palm Beach Gardens all the time....saw that the club is now a Trump Golf Club. I'd almost imagine that community was probably in the same situation and sold off the club to Trump for a song. I remember when the Cobblestone Club in Palm City went private and became Fox something or another (don't remember the name) and that was over 10 years ago I'm guessing the same thing there. This has been a growing problem for quite a while I imagine.


Is it the HOA board that votes on this? Or do the residents? I'm imagining that if it is the board, and you had a few other residents run on a "No Mandatory Club" campaign, they'd be easily voted it. But afterwards, the whole problem of how to finance the clubs would fall into your lap.



Wondering how many of these communities will abandon the whole golf/country club idea and parcel out the courses into build-able lots in the future. The landscape of Boca/North Palm will probably look a whole lot different 30 years from now.


howlinowl

[wizrap]

I agree. SFLA is practically built up; golf is not the popular leisure activity it once was, so rather than continue to support a money pit, just build on these courses.

[City Guy997S]

Originally Posted by howlinowl

I drive by Fisherman's Creek in Palm Beach Gardens all the time....saw that the club is now a Trump Golf Club. I'd almost imagine that community was probably in the same situation and sold off the club to Trump for a song. l

Actually Frenchman's Creek is still alive and well. They did sell their marina to a developer about 10 years back. I think they sold it for 6mm and he ran it for a few years then sold the land around the marina to a condo developer for like 14mm and kept the actual marina. That influx of cash (6mm) surely helped the HOA fund the costs of the club but I think they sold too big of an asset for such a short term fix.

Trump acquired the Ritz Carlton property across the street from Frenchmans.

The big mistake as I see it is the "keeping up with the other clubs agenda." Clubs need to be renovated but in their quest for new members the clubs tend to try to outdo each other to have the latest, nicest remodel. This drastically increases the cost of the remodel and the cost of maintaining the new club. Mirasol just spent 40mm to remodel their 10 yr old clubhouse. The kicker, THEY FINANCED 30MM OF IT! So if the clubhouse was outdated in 10 years the first time, now they have to pay for it over the next few years there won't be much of a budget to remodel it again in 10+/- years. It also increased their overhead costs by 1.3mm a year. So more debt, more upkeep costs.
https://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/news...qUUXniaZrwUQP/

[City Guy997S]

Originally Posted by wizrap

I agree. SFLA is practically built up; golf is not the popular leisure activity it once was, so rather than continue to support a money pit, just build on these courses.

That creates backlash from the people that bought their homes on a golf course thinking they would never have a neighbor. Boca has had tons of trouble with that, I think 3 golf courses have gone defunct there and nobody wants more construction in their backyard.

[howlinowl]

Originally Posted by City Guy997S

That creates backlash from the people that bought their homes on a golf course thinking they would never have a neighbor. Boca has had tons of trouble with that, I think 3 golf courses have gone defunct there and nobody wants more construction in their backyard.

True, but if the club goes bankrupt, who owns the property? Unless the homeowners want to pony up to purchase and maintain it, I don't really see what say they have in it (unless there's something I'm not aware of). Everybody wants "not in my backyard", but it's not really "their" backyard. Unless you own it, I don't really see where you'd have a say in it. Same thing with folks who build on a piece of property for the view and get bent when the property between them and "their view" gets developed. You want to maintain "your" view, buy the property between you and it....Otherwise, butt out. At least that's "My View" anyway.



Frenchman's Creek. I called it Fisherman's Creek also. I knew it was near there.


howlinowl