I recently bought my first home in a CCM community. I thought my mortgage payment was supposed to be taking care of my HOA dues (it was my first home and the dues were mentioned in the mortgage papers- I didn't know!) so when I got a letter from an attorney's office I was shocked. With zero notification about my balance, a lien had been placed on my property. I immediately paid what I owed plus interest because I did owe them money, but I refused to pay the collection costs because all they had to do was send me a letter saying I hadn't paid, but they didn't. From reading these posts- they apparently do this a lot. I will admit that I was in the wrong for not paying, but they need to admit that they were in the wrong for not notifying me. After denying to pay the fees I received a letter from the lawyers office with documents showing that they did notify me, but all of the copies say "sample" and do not have any information on them except that the dues cost $X. Nowhere on any of them did it say that my account was past due. If I did get these letters- which I do not remember- then I probably thought 'my mortgage is taking care of it and this is just a reminder notice' and threw them away. Does CCM go out of their way to make life difficult for us? Or is it ignorance on how to properly run a property management group? Either way, something needs to change if they do not want to go bankrupt from the class action lawsuit which is undoubtedly coming their way. I am still holding my ground that I do not owe them collection costs and I can't wait to be heard by the board and confront them face-to-face with my lawyer present. Maybe this is the only way they will listen.
