Cohousing-L Mailing List: HOA fees

[Denise Tennen (denisetennen]

Our community HOA fees are based 75% on SF of unit, 25% equal across all units

Denise
Monterey Cohousing Community - Minnesota


> On Oct 30, 2022, at 5:16 AM, cohousing-l-request [at] cohousing.org wrote:
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> Today's Topics:
> 
>   1. How to assess HOA fees? (karen kitchen)
>   2. Re: How to assess HOA fees? (Joel Bartlett)
>   3. Re: How to assess HOA fees? (Henning Mortensen)
>   4. Re: How to assess HOA fees? (jmcarle [at] gmail.com)
> 
> 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Message: 1
> Date: Wed, 26 Oct 2022 19:37:18 +0000 (UTC)
> From: karen kitchen <grcamom [at] yahoo.com>
> To: Cohousing-L Mailing List <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org>
> Subject: [C-L]_ How to assess HOA fees?
> Message-ID: <306942616.250261.1666813038643 [at] mail.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
> 
> Hi All,
> Our community, Bozeman Cohousing, is in the process of deciding the best way 
> to allocate HOA dues to each unit. We have heard that some communities base 
> HOA dues on square footage while others have a flat rate for each unit.
> We are wondering what basis other Cohousing communities use to determine HOA 
> dues? If you have reasons for choosing a certain method? And, if you have run 
> into any problems with the way HOA dues are distributed between units?
> We will have 18 3-bedroom units, 22 2-bedroom units, and 3 studio units. The 
> largest homes are about 1,450 sq ft. and the studios are under 600 sq ft.
> Thanks in advance for any insight into allocating HOA dues!
> Karen KitchenBozeman Cohousing
> 
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 2
> Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2022 11:18:01 -0400
> From: Joel Bartlett <altairecovillage [at] gmail.com>
> To: cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org
> Subject: Re: [C-L]_ How to assess HOA fees?
> Message-ID:
>       <CAEL1oedW7bdzvYeH9VwZTRqtzQuLNTRQT7kR02qhR2YXmpQ_ig [at] 
> mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
> 
> A suggestion: talk to Milagro Cohousing in Tucson.  They decided after a
> while to make every household equal.  You might want to find out their
> reasoning.
> 
> For our part, we have been able to convince our local utility company to
> have just one meter for electric.  But, we still have to submeter for other
> purposes - not necessarily billing.  The water company does not allow a
> single meter.  We also will have electric car charging, and we have not
> decided how to divvy that up.  To pay for the microgrid, each family will
> get a bill - not for usage, but for a loan repayment.  Per the IRS and our
> non-profit status, each homeowner is responsible for their exterior
> finishes and roof.  There are no lot lines, so there will need to be an
> agreed-upon landscaping maintenance that somehow will include common areas
> as well as "limited" common areas such as front, side, and back yards.
> Last I looked (years ago), only Trillium Hollow built common meals into
> their HOA dues. So many decisions!a
> 
> Meanwhile, there are previous C-L emails about this.  Go back to your
> emails in June, or I can send you threads - quite good information shared
> back then.
> 
> Yours, Joel
> 
> On Sat, Oct 29, 2022 at 10:18 AM karen kitchen via Cohousing-L <
> cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:
> 
>> Hi All,
>> Our community, Bozeman Cohousing, is in the process of deciding the best
>> way to allocate HOA dues to each unit. We have heard that some communities
>> base HOA dues on square footage while others have a flat rate for each unit.
>> We are wondering what basis other Cohousing communities use to determine
>> HOA dues? If you have reasons for choosing a certain method? And, if you
>> have run into any problems with the way HOA dues are distributed between
>> units?
>> We will have 18 3-bedroom units, 22 2-bedroom units, and 3 studio units.
>> The largest homes are about 1,450 sq ft. and the studios are under 600 sq
>> ft.
>> Thanks in advance for any insight into allocating HOA dues!
>> Karen KitchenBozeman Cohousing
>> _________________________________________________________________
>> Cohousing-L mailing list -- Unsubscribe, archives and other info at:
>> http://L.cohousing.org/info
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 3
> Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2022 10:10:20 -0600
> From: Henning Mortensen <hmortensen [at] gmail.com>
> To: cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org
> Subject: Re: [C-L]_ How to assess HOA fees?
> Message-ID:
>       <CAJ5CLqQj=AUguLvvu2sHt06BfHhoRxo=drJmYSwf15Tr74hJgQ [at] 
> mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
> 
> Hi Karen,
> Our community, Prairie Spruce Commons Cohousing, also has a large
> difference in unit sizes which means that using a square foot calculation
> means a big variation in condo fees. In the end we ended up deciding that
> some budget items be split by square foot and some items be shared equally.
> Some of the things that we shared equally:
> - Our membership in the Canadian Cohousing Network
> - Internet fees which were offered at a price per unit
> - Accounting fees which we argued were the same per unit
> and some others.
> 
> In total we pay about 95% of our condo fees based on unit size and about 5%
> based on equality. In our case there is still a huge difference between
> what the studios pay and what the rest pay. Still there is also a
> difference in the amount that the studios can afford to pay and what the
> rest of the unit holders can afford to pay. I think our little compromise
> made everyone feel better while not raising the studio condo fees more than
> about 10$ a month.
> 
> Henning Mortensen
> 
> ps. I lived in bozeman in 1976. It was a beautiful little town with lovely
> people living there.
> 
> 
> 
> On Sat, Oct 29, 2022 at 8:19 AM karen kitchen via Cohousing-L <
> cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org> wrote:
> 
>> Hi All,
>> Our community, Bozeman Cohousing, is in the process of deciding the best
>> way to allocate HOA dues to each unit. We have heard that some communities
>> base HOA dues on square footage while others have a flat rate for each unit.
>> We are wondering what basis other Cohousing communities use to determine
>> HOA dues? If you have reasons for choosing a certain method? And, if you
>> have run into any problems with the way HOA dues are distributed between
>> units?
>> We will have 18 3-bedroom units, 22 2-bedroom units, and 3 studio units.
>> The largest homes are about 1,450 sq ft. and the studios are under 600 sq
>> ft.
>> Thanks in advance for any insight into allocating HOA dues!
>> Karen KitchenBozeman Cohousing
>> _________________________________________________________________
>> Cohousing-L mailing list -- Unsubscribe, archives and other info at:
>> http://L.cohousing.org/info
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 4
> Date: Sat, 29 Oct 2022 11:20:01 -0700
> From: <jmcarle [at] gmail.com>
> To: <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org>
> Subject: Re: [C-L]_ How to assess HOA fees?
> Message-ID: <102e01d8ebc3$0fa4fa90$2eeeefb0$@gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain;     charset="us-ascii"
> 
> Skagit Commons opted for an adjusted-square-footage approach.  Each unit is
> assigned its own square footage plus 1/30th of the common house sf (we have
> 30 units).  This slightly compressed the spread of HOA fee responsibility.
> We felt that uniform assessments were inconsistent with the true burden of
> cost for building maintenance -- particularly exterior siding, roofs,
> windows -- since we had a spread of unit sizes from 600 sf to almost 1300
> sf.
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Cohousing-L <cohousing-l-bounces+jmcarle=gmail.com [at] cohousing.org> 
> On
> Behalf Of karen kitchen via Cohousing-L
> Sent: Wednesday, October 26, 2022 12:37 PM
> To: Cohousing-L Mailing List <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org>
> Cc: karen kitchen <grcamom [at] yahoo.com>
> Subject: [C-L]_ How to assess HOA fees?
> 
> Hi All,
> Our community, Bozeman Cohousing, is in the process of deciding the best way
> to allocate HOA dues to each unit. We have heard that some communities base
> HOA dues on square footage while others have a flat rate for each unit.
> We are wondering what basis other Cohousing communities use to determine HOA
> dues? If you have reasons for choosing a certain method? And, if you have
> run into any problems with the way HOA dues are distributed between units?
> We will have 18 3-bedroom units, 22 2-bedroom units, and 3 studio units. The
> largest homes are about 1,450 sq ft. and the studios are under 600 sq ft.
> Thanks in advance for any insight into allocating HOA dues!
> Karen KitchenBozeman Cohousing
> _________________________________________________________________
> Cohousing-L mailing list -- Unsubscribe, archives and other info at:
> http://L.cohousing.org/info
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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> ------------------------------
> 
> End of Cohousing-L Digest, Vol 225, Issue 21
> ********************************************
> .