A report from WFTV in Florida. "Residents in one Orlando condominium complex are fighting back after their condo association board asked each homeowner to pay more than $11,000 for a special assessment fee, due in just 3 months. Owners at the Regency Gardens Condominiums got notices saying their board planned to pass a special assessment on May 15th. Residents told Channel 9 they want to see that board replaced because of how they handled that special assessment and the association’s budget. 'This has caused a lot of people a lot of anxiety and sleepless nights,' said Bryan Pricher, a homeowner who led the effort to collect petition signatures. Channel 9 told you before that owners were worried about foreclosure and looking to sell their units after the special assessment was announced."

From Moneywise. "A young Florida woman is afraid she’s going to have to sell her home after her cash-strapped condo association proposed a one-off fee for unit owners of up to $22,000 to fill its reserve coffers. Orlando-based Britney Brawdy, aged 23, took to TikTok on Sunday, May 5, to share her horrific HOA (homeowners’ association) fee plight. 'Myself and hundreds of my neighbors need desperate help,' Brawdy said in the clip. 'We are facing something that is quite literally unfathomable, unimaginable.' Brawdy bought her 810-square-foot condo unit in 2022. She described the purchase as 'a huge deal' because she was only 21-years-old at the time and not many Americans of that age have the opportunity to buy their own property. 'It was great up until April 23 of this year when everything started going completely downhill,' she said. 'That’s when we were provided a letter in the mail that literally has pretty much changed all of our lives.'"

The Real Deal. "A receiver took over an embattled Pembroke Pines condo association that residents allege was long mismanaged by former board members, The Real Deal has learned. The lakefront Heron Pond complex, consisting of 19 two-story beige buildings, has been repeatedly slammed by the city over structural safety issues. Since last summer, Pembroke Pines officials ordered the evacuation of six buildings and 26 units in seven other buildings, rendering 122 of the 304 units uninhabitable, according to city records. Aging condo complexes across South Florida are grappling with paying for costly, legally mandated repairs and recertifications, as well as dealing with strict compliance deadlines imposed by new condo safety laws."

"But some Heron Pond unit owners say their complex is in disrepair due to a ploy by ex-board members. In court filings, Heron Pond unit owners allege individuals used a secret entity, Federated Foundation Trust, to amass at least 109 units, took a majority on the board of directors, and then mismanaged the complex as a possible scheme to drive down the value of units and the complex. In the meantime, unit owners like Clarissa Florival-Victor are reeling in the aftermath of the alleged yearslong mismanagement. 'Right now I am paying rent and my mortgage and association fees [of $540 a month]. I am paying over $5,000 a month, including everything,' Florival-Victor said. 'I just want this to be over soon. It’s financially devastating. The community is not what it was.'"

The Denver Post. "Coloradans looking to buy homes or simply hold onto their property face a barrage of challenges. You can add surging home insurance rates to the pile of problems eroding the landscape of affordable housing options. People are getting the bad news that their policies won’t be renewed. And condo owners are getting hit with special assessments and higher dues because premiums are skyrocketing for homeowners associations. The groups must often resort to non-standard carriers, which typically charge sky-high rates for lesser coverage. There were plenty of insurance options for Bryan Watts and his wife when they bought a house in Guffey in Park County, west of Cripple Creek. The premium was about $2,000 in 2019 and rose gradually to $2,522 for the 2023-2024 policy year."

"Watts found one of the big-name companies willing to write a policy for $4,800. Like a lot of people, Watts has a mortgage on his house, which means he needs to carry insurance. 'There are going to be very few people who are able to live out here without a mortgage,' he said. The HOA where Jon Christianson has a rental unit saw its insurance premium leap from the $167,000 budgeted last year to nearly $607,000. His fees doubled, 'with a special assessment coming,' he said. Then the insurance for Christianson’s primary residence rose by 40%. 'I’ve never filed a claim. I’ve been with same insurance company for five years,' Christianson said. 'This is becoming unsustainable.'"

WCSC in South Carolina. "Homeowners in Berkeley and Dorchester Counties say their new homes built by D.R. Horton are practically falling apart, despite county inspectors signing off on them months prior to moving in. In April of 2022, Dave Preston and his wife spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and moved into the French Quarter Creek neighborhood in Huger. He says upon moving in, the house was horrific with toilets backing up, outlets not working and parts of the home unfinished. 'They [D.H. Horton] were trying to do too much, too fast. The quality’s horrendous,' Preston said. 'They played the blame game saying people were taking too many showers; the septic system couldn’t handle the load. I thought, ‘Wait a minute, this is a beautiful development.’ Well, it’s supposed to be a beautiful development, with houses that are fairly expensive, and things won’t work.'"

"In 2021, Scott Molway and his family moved into a Summerville neighborhood with their home being built in 2019. Two months after moving in, the roof buckled. The roof buckled again in February of 2023, and again in January of 2024. The Molways lost 70 shingles, damaging the inside of their office. The entire ceiling ended up needing to be replaced. The most recent roofing problem came with a $17,500 price tag. 'They don’t build these homes in months or years anymore; they build them in weeks. It’s crazy how quickly they pop up, and as soon as they pop up, the builders are gone,' Molway said. 'Everything’s on the homeowner, and they don’t know all the shoddy work that goes on behind the scenes. How are we going to afford to do this, again?'"

The Decatur Daily in Alabama. "Work on an already controversial addition of the Foxwood Farm subdivision in the Burningtree area has been at a standstill for close to six months, according to neighbors, and dozens of lawsuits have been filed statewide against the developer. Shells of close to a dozen unfinished homes, blue containers filled with wood and other debris, construction materials and portable restrooms line the new street connected to Foxwood Drive Southeast. 'Nothing has been going on for months. I don't remember the last time I saw something happening there. It seems like to me … it was before Christmas,' Kiowa Trail resident Faye Anderson said of Foxwood Farm. Her home is adjacent to the new subdivision. 'It's so ugly,' Anderson said. 'It's an eyesore. I'll have friends who come to visit, and they'll make comments about how ugly it is.'"

CBS Dallas in Texas. "Kim Kromdyk doesn't have solar panels. Not one. A couple of years ago, she did consider them. She even made an appointment with a salesperson. By the next morning, she'd made up her mind. 'I called him and told him that I had just thought about it, and I decided … I don't want to go through with this,' Kromdyk said. 'And he said 'fine.' That was the end of the story. Or so she thought. Earlier this year, when Kromdyk tried refinancing her home, her mortgage lender noticed a problem: all three credit bureaus showed she had taken out a loan for solar panels and there was a lien on her property. Mosaic provided Kromdyk's attorney with a copy of a contract for solar panels it says she signed. Kromdyk insists she didn't sign it. And when she saw it? 'Well, I wanted to cry.' For months, she says she's felt stuck unable to sell or even refinance her home, all because of solar panels she's never seen, never bought and to the best of her knowledge, never owned."

From Newsweek. "California homeowners are facing an ongoing squatter crisis across Los Angeles. Thousands of homes are being invaded by squatters who live in them without paying rent, and many cause major property damage or even physical injury to property owners, according to Daniel Yukelson, executive director of the Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles. Many squatters specifically go after homeowners who fell behind on payments and went into default and abandoned the property. 'Many of these homes never actually completed the foreclosure process, so the homes were left vacant with the lender thinking that the home is still occupied by the borrower and the borrower thinking they lost their ownership interest due to the default, therefore making them a perfect squatter's target,' said Alan Chang, founder of Vested Title & Escrow."

"The squatting crisis tends to be more challenging in blue states, which often pass laws advocating for tenant protection against what many perceive as overly greedy landlords. 'The generalization is that landlords are a faceless corporation that is out for profit, but there are thousands of mom-and-pop real estate investors that are getting hit hard and losing their principal income streams due to these more known tactics now,' Chang said."

CTV News in Canada. "An Ontario man found out that a line of credit he thought was insured actually isn't after his wife of 50 years died. 'When I found out I wasn’t insured, I was just devastated,' said John Richards of Uxbridge, Ont. Richards said he and his wife Sandra wanted to take out a Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOC) for $150,000, but they said they also wanted to have life insurance on the loan in case anything happened. It’s estimated about eight million Canadians have a HELOC as a way to tap into the capital of their homes and access money for renovations, trips or general expenses. In 2018, Richards said, his wife was 69 years old when she signed for a $150,000 HELOC and he said they both thought the line of credit came with life insurance."

"But when Sandra died in November of 2023, Richards found out the line of credit was not covered by life insurance. Their bank has a policy to terminate life insurance when a customer turns 70 years of age. 'I had no idea they could say, 'At 70, well we are not insuring you anymore,' said Richards. who explained he was not aware he wasn’t paying insurance premiums because he thought the insurance was included in his monthly interest payments which are now almost $800 per month. Richards said he wishes he would have known about the policy as paying the money back will be difficult. 'I can't pay that off. I’m sitting here on a fixed income. If I have to pay that off I could be dead by that time,' said Richards."

From BBC News. "Kasun Kalirai feels 'stuck', struggling to sell the flat he loves, that he would never have put on the market had it not been for the service charge of £4,300 per year - up more than four times since he moved in. He has become numb to the bills and admits feeling powerless in the face of the increasing costs. So why have these eco apartments in Peterborough been left with service charges 'spiralling out of control?' The increase in service charge Kasun pays to the management company appointed by the developers, Premier Estates - one of the UK's largest - has been 'really significant.' It has risen from about £900 a year when he moved in to where it stands now."

"Donna Nicholls bought her flat under a shared ownership scheme run by Cross Keys and had a leak on-and-off in her flat for about four years, before it was fixed in December. Donna, 40, said last year it was £87 per month, down from an average of about £250 per month, so she had been expecting a rise, but when she opened her letter in March it was £445. 'I was upset, angry, I just couldn't stop crying. I got on the phone straight away to Cross Keys. I just knew I was going to struggle,' she said."

"Back at Spring View, Kasun said it was the second time in three years he had put his flat on the market. But viewings are low and the feedback is the same. 'It's too expensive - £4,300 a year is out of a lot of people's budgets, so it's becoming increasingly difficult to sell,' he said. People questioned him about speaking to the media while his house was on the market, but he said: 'I feel the information needs to be out there. A lot of leaseholders, there's four million of us out of there, feel like we're stuck because the flats are becoming unsellable.'"

One Roof in New Zealand. "Some New Plymouth homeowners are slashing their asking prices by tens of thousands of dollars and those who bought at the peak of the market are selling at a loss if they need to move now. Agents told OneRoof the market is flat and buyers are in no hurry to buy because they have so much choice and might be able to pick up a bargain. First National salesperson Jamie Gemmell said some people were losing up to $150,000 if they bought two years ago in 2021 and had to sell now. While it was initially a bitter pill for some sellers to swallow, she said they eventually got their heads around the fact they were buying and selling in the same market so were also paying less for the next property. Other homeowners had been forced to reduce their asking prices, she said, and even then some were struggling to attract buyers who had plenty of choice and were in no rush to buy."

"Gemmell is also selling brand-new homes such as the executive three-bedroom, two-bathroom home at 35 Sycamore Grove, in Vogeltown, priced at $1.095m, which she believes would cost more to build. 'You couldn’t build them for what they are asking. The owners are not making anything, they are losing and even then we are not getting offers.'"

"ReMax New Plymouth sales manager Angela Maindonald said people were finding it harder to get finance and were having to sell their homes before they could move. In some cases, this had created long and complex buyer chains and meant houses were staying on the market for longer. 'People by nature are at the moment very cautious and spending their money very carefully. They don’t want to buy what they perceive might be a lemon. So, if it’s an older home people don’t seem to want to do any work, they want everything modern and new and done.'"