BofA Walks Away & Refuses To Pay Their HOA

Banks Are Now Walking Away From HOA Fees

In an eye opening interview by Chicago Public Radio on Friday, I learned of a Chicago condo owner whose building had turned into an absolute nightmare – 2/3 of the residents were gone, the utilities had been shut off, the place was literally crawling with maggots.

Of the 27 unit building, Dee Hutchinson and two of her neighbors were left with the sole burden of all the HOA fees, leaving them virtually helpless to take care of even the most basic of necessities like heat and extermination.

What really caught my attention about the story, the problem wasn’t that the residents of the building weren’t paying their dues – that problem had come and gone… the interesting, albeit not really surprising fact about this story was the fact that almost all of the condos in the building were owned by banks, mostly large ones like B of A.

Listen to the full interview here…

This story is yet another in a string recently that illustrates the fact that despite banks trying desperately to paint the picture that defaulting on one’s financial obligations is immoral, they are the first to do it when the tables are turned.

Paul Leonard is with the Financial Services Roundtable, a banking industry trade group. He says banks aren’t set up to handle this.

“The entire issue of a bank as landlord is a very challenging one, because they’re not in the business, nor do they want to be in the business of being a landlord. You know, they don’t have “Oh, we’ll just switch over to our system to pay condo fees.” They don’t have that.” said Leonard.

Aren’t set up to handle it eh? Yet they are set up to call and harass a family who’s main breadwinner has just lost their job, or just found out that they had cancer, or had just died? These stories are a dime a dozen, meanwhile while the banks are raking in record profits and charging ridiculous interest rates and fees to everyday folks just trying to get by, yet they see no moral responsibility to their new neighbors in the condo to help pay their share so the residents who have heeded their plea to do what’s right and keep paying, can have heat, and a fridge that isn’t infested with maggots.

But of course, far be it for us to ask them to “switch over their system to pay condo fees”, because that would be just unreasonable, immoral even. Boo-freakin-hoo guys, if you can dish it out, you should be able to take it. That’s kindergarten stuff.  I don’t EVER want to hear an executive from B of A or one of these banks say anything negative about someone walking away from their underwater mortgage again.  Hypocrites!

Jon Maddux

CEO

www.YouWalkAway.com