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STILL PAYING FOR THE GOLF CURSE?
By
Jan Bergemann
Published July 14, 2023
Towards the end of the last century a
community association with a golf course was the big attraction
for the retirees moving from the North to Florida. But these
folks, enthusiastic about playing golf, are now often too old to
play golf and the younger folks moving now to Florida have other
interests than playing golf.
And what was once a great attraction
has now turned into a money-eating curse. Homes in communities
with golf courses are hard to sell because of the very high
maintenance fees.
Costly fights have been waged in Florida’s courts by owners of
communities where golf-eager board members tried to create
MANDATORY GOLF CLUB
MEMBERSHIP (see our
Webpage
COURT OPINIONS).
Other
golf courses just go broke and developers are only too eager to
gobble up these areas in order to build housing. Suddenly homes,
who paid extra for a view of the 18th hole, are now
facing multi-story condos.
The media permanently reports about issues of
abandoned golf courses (see
GOLF CURSES) and many elderly folks trying to sell
in order to move into assisted living facilities find out that
their property values have seriously decreased.
CCFJ
always warned about buying properties with attached golf
courses, because the decline of interest in golf was
foreseeable, but many owners hadalready decided to be golf
enthusiasts.
But
what was once the happy meeting place for community members –
the golf course – has now turned into a GOLF CURSE!
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Jan Bergemann is president of Cyber Citizens For Justice,
Florida
's largest state-wide property owners' advocacy group.
CCFJ works on legislation to help owners living in
community
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associations. He moved to
Florida
in 1995 - hoping to retire. He moved into a HOA, where the
developer cheated the homeowners and used the association dues
for his own purposes. End of retirement!
CCFJ was born in the year 2000, when some owners met in
Tallahassee
- finding out that power is only in numbers. Bergemann was a
member of Governor Jeb Bush's HOA Task force in 2003/2004.
The organization has two websites to inform interested
Florida
homeowners and condo owners:
News Website: http://www.ccfj.net/.
Educational Website: http://www.ccfjfoundation.net/.
We think that only owners can really represent owners, since all
service providers surely have a different interest! We are
trying to create owner-friendly laws, but the best laws are
useless without enforcement. And enforcement is totally lacking
in
Florida
!
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