Residents of affordable developments such as Park City Heights and Central Park Condos told the Park City Council Thursday about unexpected HOA costs that are squeezing their budgets.
Luke McCarthy lives in one of the city’s 138 deed-restricted for sale units. McCarthy was able to get a condo last year after a four-year wait on the affordable housing list. At closing time, he said learning about the over $500 HOA fee he’d have to cover was a “rude awakening.”
“We’re the people greeting you at your favorite restaurant, and we’re tuning your skis, or in my instance, we’re cleaning your windows. $500 is a lot,” McCarthy said. “I don’t know which one of the dots is the right dot, but I feel like doing nothing is insulting to the hard working class that’s living in these affordable housing units.”
Thomas Eddington said many residents in affordable for-sale units also learned about underlying infrastructure problems after moving in.
“There were some issues that we had to take care of in terms of construction issues and upgrades that had to be taken care of in terms of roofing, etc.,” Eddington said. “Our challenge has been that we have had to utilize some of our reserves for things that were unanticipated early on.”
The council didn’t tackle specific solutionsThursday, but did conclude that the city should help out.
“I think the city has a role,” council member Ryan Dickey said. “This is sort of an inherent issue with for sale affordable housing and I think is tough to solve. This is going to be an ongoing issue. I think it validates our strategy to focus on rentals. But we have for sale affordable housing that we’ve built, and so we gotta keep it affordable.”
Dickey and other members of the council expressed interest in learning more about the concept of loan fund, which other cities have used. According to a staff report, the town of Jackson, Wyoming provided no-interest loans directly to homeowners in one HOA.
The council plans to explore specific HOA fee assistance options at a future meeting.
