{"id":14910,"date":"2011-03-22T10:00:35","date_gmt":"2011-03-22T17:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/?p=14910"},"modified":"2011-03-22T10:19:40","modified_gmt":"2011-03-22T17:19:40","slug":"how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/22\/how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified\/","title":{"rendered":"How Are High Condo HOA Fees Justified?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I received the following question about HOA fees and typical maintenance costs from a reader via email:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Why are so many condo HOA fees are so high?  Alternatively: are the maintenance costs of a small single-family home (SFH) much higher than most people assume, or is the monthly fee of a well-run HOA a great estimate of what it costs to maintain a SFH similar to the units in the HOA?<\/p>\n<p>In most discussions about the costs of owning real estate on Seattle Bubble, I see assumptions about monthly maintenance costs for smaller SFHs being something like $100-$200.<\/p>\n<p>But even though many HOAs should get good economies of scale for repairs, roof replacements etc. (as compared to the average SFH), and they don&#8217;t always include maintenance of pools, hot tubs and other possibly costly shared assets, many of them end up with HOA fees above $400.  This seems to be the case even for well run HOAs that don&#8217;t have lots of deferred maintenance without funds built up, empty\/foreclosed units, etc. Very few, if any, seem to get down to $100-$200 per month in fees.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Condo HOA fees are something that I have never really looked into closely, but I do know that they often include not only typical maintenance and shared space costs but also monthly bills like cable, trash, and sometimes water&mdash;expenses that can easily add up to an additional a few hundred dollars a month for a typical single-family home.<\/p>\n<p>Generally the number I like to use for estimating the ongoing maintenace cost for a single-family home is one percent of the purchase price per year.  A $250,000 home might cost about $2,500 a year to keep up, while a $750,000 home will be more expensive, running you closer to $7,500.  Of course, these costs are never spread out evenly throughout the years, so some years you may spend very little, while other years you may need a new roof (can cost $20,000+), new paint, and a bunch of new appliances.<\/p>\n<p>The benefit of a condo HOA is that unlike most owners of single-family homes, the HOA forces owners to save for these big expenses in small chunks every month.  That said, it certainly seems possible that some HOA fees are unnecessarily high.  I&#8217;m sure some HOA boards would prefer to err on the side of collecting a little too much each month rather than risk ending up with a burdensome special assessment.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps <a href=\"http:\/\/urbnlivn.com\" title=\"Urbnlivn\">Urbnlivn<\/a>&#8216;s proprietor Matt Goyer will grace us in the comments with some insights from someone who follows the condo market a lot closer than I do, and owns two condos of his own.  I&#8217;ll walk down the hall and ask him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I received the following question about HOA fees and typical maintenance costs from a reader via email: Why are so many condo HOA fees are so high? Alternatively: are the maintenance costs of a small single-family home (SFH) much higher than most people assume, or is the monthly fee of a well-run HOA a great&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[206],"tags":[4,756,757],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-14910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","tag-condos","tag-hoa","tag-maintenance"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How Are High Condo HOA Fees Justified? \u2022 Seattle Bubble<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/22\/how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"How Are High Condo HOA Fees Justified? \u2022 Seattle Bubble\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"I received the following question about HOA fees and typical maintenance costs from a reader via email: Why are so many condo HOA fees are so high? Alternatively: are the maintenance costs of a small single-family home (SFH) much higher than most people assume, or is the monthly fee of a well-run HOA a great...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@The_Tim\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@SeattleBubble\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"The Tim\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/22\/how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/22\/how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified\/\",\"name\":\"How Are High Condo HOA Fees Justified? \u2022 Seattle Bubble\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2011-03-22T17:00:35+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2011-03-22T17:19:40+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7de7c0dd14bee1a2c67f7ce86bc4505f\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/22\/how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/22\/how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/22\/how-are-high-condo-hoa-fees-justified\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"How Are High Condo HOA Fees Justified?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Seattle Bubble\",\"description\":\"local\u00a0real\u00a0estate\u00a0news, statistics,\u00a0and\u00a0commentary without\u00a0the\u00a0sales\u00a0spin.\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7de7c0dd14bee1a2c67f7ce86bc4505f\",\"name\":\"The Tim\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/seattlebubble.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/37756956c11dcc50d2559761ffa5ee70\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/19e5770990a1681615608091b2de571b10c3e03bbac7d07bb2ae15297ee72fbc?s=96&d=retro&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/19e5770990a1681615608091b2de571b10c3e03bbac7d07bb2ae15297ee72fbc?s=96&d=retro&r=g\",\"caption\":\"The Tim\"},\"description\":\"Tim Ellis is the founder of Seattle Bubble. 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