Published By: Michael A. Inman, Jeanne S. Lauer, Gregory J. Montero, Robert V. Timms, Jr., Matthew J. Weinberg

Legislative Issues

Subscribe to Legislative Issues via RSS

EFFECTIVE JULY 1, 2020

This summary is not a complete list of requirements for all types of businesses and activities covered by the COVID-19 reopening Phase Three Guidelines issued by the Commonwealth of Virginia.  It includes only those Guidelines that are most likely to affect community associations in order to assist associations in making decisions that can affect all of the owners and residents in the community.

The Governor of Virginia is stressing that this Phase Three opening does not mean that Virginia is out of the woods yet and is asking citizens to be responsible and follow these mandatory Guidelines in order to keep Virginia on a positive track and avoid what many States are currently experiencing with record highs in daily positive virus cases.

A complete copy of the Phase Three Guidelines can be found at:  https://www.governor.virginia.gov/media/governorvirginiagov/governor-of-virginia/pdf/Forward-Virginia-Phase-Three-Guidelines.pdf.Continue Reading SUMMARY OF VIRGINIA’S PHASE THREE GUIDELINES AFFECTING COMMUNITY ASSOCIATIONS

Hello, Board members and managers.  Next Thursday, June 18, our team member, Jeanne Lauer will be providing a legislative update on a webinar sponsored by the SEVA CAI Chapter.  The program will also deal with other legal topics. To sign up please go to the following website: https://sevacai.memberclicks.net/

All of us are looking forward to more normalcy in our day to day activities.  Thankfully we are about to enter Phase 2 of the Governors re-opening program.  To assist you to comply with swimming pool operations and rules below we share the information that is on line as part of a very lengthy document from the Governor’s office on Phase 2.  That full Phase 2 information can be found at:  https://www.governor.virginia.gov/media/governorvirginiagov/governor-of-virginia/pdf/Virginia-Forward-Phase-Two-Guidelines.pdf
Continue Reading LEGISLATIVE UPDATE AND SWIMMING POOLS

Recently we posted the first of two parts about the changes in qualifications for FHA loans for condominiums. In this part we provide information on the rest of the changes.

 

REDUCTION IN OWNER OCCUPANCY REQUIREMENTS FOR ELIGIBLE PROJECTS

 

FHA’s primary motive for requiring that at least fifty percent (50%) of the units in a project be owner occupied or secondary residences is because it is statistically more likely that condominiums with a high percentage of rentals will have higher foreclosure and assessment delinquency rates than condominiums that are primarily owner occupied. It appears that FHA has settled on a compromise in order to avoid penalizing projects with higher rentals but lower delinquency rates.  FHA currently requires that no more than fifteen percent (15%) of the units can be sixty (60) days or more in arrears in the payment of assessments.  Effective October 15, if only ten percent (10%) or fewer owners are sixty (60) days or more in arrears, FHA will accept owner occupancy rates of only thirty five percent (35%).  This could be a significant boost for Hampton Roads.  We have seen many projects with strong financials rejected for FHA certification simply because of owner occupancy requirements.  Because of the high concentration of the military in our area, many condominium projects can have a higher percentage of rentals but still maintain low delinquency rates.

FHA has also expanded on what qualifies as an owner occupied or secondary residence which we believe will also help increase the rate of owner occupancy in some projects and take the guess work out of defining which units qualify as owner occupied and which do not.  These expanded definitions include {emphasis added}:

  • “any Unit that is occupied by the owner as his or her place of abode for any portion of the calendar year and that is not rented for a majority of the calendar year;
  • any Unit listed for sale, and not listed for rent, that was previously occupied by the owner as his or her place of abode for any portion of the calendar year and that is not rented for a majority of the calendar year; or
  • any Unit sold to an owner who intends to occupy the Unit as his or her place of abode for any portion of the calendar year and has no intent to rent the Unit for a majority of the calendar year.”

 
Continue Reading FHA LOANS – MAJOR CHANGES REGARDING CONDOMINIUM QUALIFICATIONS – PART II EFFECTIVE OCTOBER 15, 2019

For the last several years I have been honored to serve as one of SEVA-CAI’s Delegates to the Virginia Legislative Action Committee (VALAC).  The VALAC does important work in educating legislators about the needs of community associations and in helping to craft or block legislation which affects those community associations.  The process begins each year in the Fall and the most significant work ends in the Spring, with new laws slated for implementation on July 1 of each year.  This year the VALAC started by evaluating hundreds of bills to see what would impact our constituency and then narrowed our focus to 134 bills, the majority of which we viewed as an unreasonable interference with the rights of community associations and which were subsequently withdrawn or defeated.  Significant among the defeated bills were those which would have (1) removed licensing requirements for community association managers (which have been in place for only a few years), (2) permitted the imposition of criminal penalties for violations of the Condominium Act by community associations (among others) and (3) established the right of political candidates to engage in campaign activities on condominium property.

A summary of the new laws which will be taking effect is provided below.

Last month we posted a summary of other new laws in Virginia to be effective on July 1, 2019.Continue Reading 2019 VIRGINIA GENERAL ASSEMBLY REPORT – (PART 2 OF 2)

WHAT YOU DON’T KNOW CAN HURT YOU!

The Virginia General Assembly has wrapped up another busy year so it’s time to take stock of what new laws and changes to existing laws will affect community associations.  All board members and association managers need to be aware of these new and revised laws in order to avoid the legal pitfalls of doings things “the way we always have” instead of the way the new laws require it to be done.  All of these new or revised laws have been passed by both the Virginia House and Senate, have been signed by the Governor, and will go into effect on July 1, 2019.  We will break the changes down into several categories and send you the “need to know” information in several installments over the next couple of months.  In this issue we will discuss resale disclosure changes and child care businesses in HOAs.
Continue Reading 2019 Virginia General Assembly Update

By: Jeanne S. Lauer, Esq.

 

The Virginia General Assembly and the Governor have agreed on several changes to the Condominium Act and the Property Owners Association Act (POAA). As a member of the CAI Virginia Legislative Action Committee I want to let you know about these changes of which you should be aware:

Continue Reading NEW LAWS FOR COMMUNITY ASSOCIATIONS EFFECTIVE JULY 1, 2015

The General Assembly finally heard the hue and cry from us about lenders abuse of associations in the foreclosure process. Unfortunately this new statute does not fully end the abuse. The key word in the title above is “occur”. The first benefit of the new law is that Lenders must now give associations notice at least 60 days in advance of initiating foreclosure.  How does this help us?Continue Reading Finally – a new law that helps Associations when foreclosures occur – House Bill 2080.

QUESTION: 

I understand that at this time all associations are required to have a complaint procedure in place in order for their members to be able to let the CIC Board know of issues they have with their association. I also know that the Annual Report form requires an Association to state whether or not it has a complaint procedure. What is the consequence if an association fails to comply after getting the DPOR’s letter about non-compliance when they have checked “no” on the Annual Report?Continue Reading Mandate from the Legislature-Complaint Procedure