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June 18, 2008
Renters - Minutes - Do the Two Go Together?
Here is a question that has come up more than once:
"Should the Board distribute minutes to renters?"
One reader says: "Our current Board of Directors sees nothing wrong with sending out our minutes to renters. I objected so the current BOD position is that they will send "sanitized" minutes removing financial information to the renters. ... Our CCRs do not address the subject, but I think all owners should be concerned about inviting the involvement of non-owners into whatever actions or issues are addressed in our HOA minutes. I believe that the HOA should restrict its contact with renters, and that contact should first flow through their owners or property management companies. What is your opinion on this?"
Another reader says: "Our board does not send any communications, including minutes, which are distributed regularly to owners (we are a small association) to renters. My tenants are very interested in what is going on in the association and are planning on buying the place as soon as they can. Should I not be able to give the board my permission so that they can include my tenants in the list of communications about the association, including the minutes?"
So ... what are ya going to do? Two views. Two positions. This is what I think.
The minutes contain information private to the association, and care should be given to handing them out publicly. There is generally no legal requirement to provide the HOA minutes to anyone, but owners in California do have the right to ask and when they ask, can get copies, at cost.
That said, HOAs do want tenants to have copies of the rules and governing documents and so do want them to know something about what is allowed and what is not allowed. And buyers tend to ask for a year's worth of minutes among the documents related to purchase of a property in an HOA these days (if they are savvy). Condocerts.com which is a website that serves as a source of HOA information and documents for lenders, title companies and others who need to obtain documents related to sales of condos and townhouses asks HOAs that list with them to provide minutes for availability of these entities.
Still, I do not see a good reason to go to the extra expense to provide minutes to tenants. It requires the Board, if they send them out, to keep a separate list of recipients as generally, the owner and tenant lists would be kept separate. Associations that post the minutes in the common area (many do) are in essence providing this private information to all who pass by. Good or bad? I would like to say open communication and transparency is good, generally, but when minutes contain sensitive information about HOA financial issues and the need to consider a special assessment, or other matters such as discovery of an association-wide problem, the duty to the owners is to be prudent and prudence I think suggests not to disseminate the information further than the owners.
And I would not be in favor of having two sets of minutes, one sanitized and one not. That could be confusing.
However, renters tend to feel more involved if they get news of association matters and events. Distribution of the HOA newsletter to owners and tenants could be a good thing for the community and could help bring the tenants under the umbrella of good citizenship by understanding the rules or procedures of the association. My recommendation would be to include them in distribution of the newsletter, if it does not contain overly sensitive information, but not if it involves considerable expense as the owner can always provide what they want to their tenants.
My two cents. No cases or laws that I know of on the subject.
Posted by Beth Grimm at June 18, 2008 10:24 PM