While owning a home can come with many perks, it sometimes means dealing with an HOA and its rules. That seemed to be the case for a North Carolina couple who found themselves embroiled in a legal battle with their HOA over a $100 parking fine.
Jeffrey Baldwin and his husband were almost at risk of losing the home they’ve lived in for 20 years over an incident that had absolutely nothing to do with them. Apparently, the HOA mistakenly labeled the couple’s pickup truck a commercial vehicle and silently kept fining them until they faced a foreclosure.
An HOA tried to foreclose on a couple’s house over a $100 parking fine for a vehicle they didn’t even have.
According to Action 9 WSOC-TV, Baldwin and his husband had lived in The Settlements in northeast Charlotte for almost 20 years. The couple said they always paid their dues on time and, for all intents and purposes, were perfect residents. Until suddenly, seemingly unbeknownst to them, they weren’t.
During an interview with Action 9 attorney Jason Stoogenke, Baldwin admitted that while owning a home “was the American dream,” HOAs are slowly taking that away from people.
In 2022, the couple received a $100 fine from their HOA over a parking issue. The association fined the couple for having, what it thought was, a commercial vehicle, but the couple argued it was not commercial. Either way, the couple didn’t know about the fine until the following year, when they went to pay their annual dues, and that $100 fine had turned into thousands.
“The letters would mention around [$]1,300, but then other letters would say it was $4,800,” Baldwin said. “This is not just about saving my home. It’s about changing the laws so that we have HOA reform and accountability.”
The couple refused to pay the fine, and the HOA immediately began foreclosure proceedings on their home.
Under North Carolina law, Baldwin told the Charlotte Observer, a lien based solely on fines must be enforced through judicial foreclosure, meaning the HOA used the wrong legal procedure from the start. It wasn’t long before the couple entered a legal battle with their HOA.
“HOAs are empowered. HOAs are fearless. HOAs really have very little checks. The nonjudicial foreclosure process doesn’t start with a judge like this, it ends with a judge. And the amount that an HOA has to prove is so little,” Baldwin’s attorney Jim White said. “I personally think HOAs should not be permitted to use the nonjudicial foreclosure process. They shouldn’t be able to have a streamlined way to get someone’s house. They should have to work for it.”
The outcome of the case ended up being the HOA withdrawing its foreclosure petition, and the case was effectively dismissed. Baldwin quickly became an advocate for HOA reform in North Carolina and said the win was a victory for homeowners across the state.
“I’m hoping that it gives them hope that they can fight their HOAs, that they can show some accountability. That’s something that I think we’re lacking, and that’s what I think I’m working on, is accountability, and specifically to end the use of nonjudicial foreclosure to take somebody’s home,” Baldwin said.
Most homeowners are strongly opposed to having an HOA.
Jose Calsina | Shutterstock
According to a survey from home repair and maintenance service company Frontdoor, via CNBC, an estimated 85% of Americans are currently part of a homeowners association, but 70% would prefer to live without one. Of those who are part of an HOA, many reported having both good and bad experiences.
Sixty percent said they have had positive experiences with their HOAs, and 54% said they have had negative ones. Despite that, the positives of HOAs don’t really outweigh the negatives. Approximately 1 in 3 said they have had an HOA experience that made them want to leave their community, and 63% would not recommend joining a neighborhood with one.
While the intent behind most HOAs might start off putting the homeowners first, the fact is that creating blanket rules for large neighborhoods and selecting a small group of people to enforce said rules can often leave a lot of room for problems. Not every homeowner fits into the cookie-cutter rules prescribed by the association, and not every homeowner is lucky enough to have the resources Baldwin and his husband had to fight the injustice.
Perhaps it really is time for homeowner advocacy and reform. Considering how expensive it is to even become a homeowner, the possibility of foreclosure over something as ridiculous as a parking fine should not be in the realm of possibility.
Nia Tipton is a staff writer with a bachelor’s degree in creative writing and journalism who covers news and lifestyle topics that focus on psychology, relationships, and the human experience.
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