Membership assignments back before the board

Linda Mayhood

The POA's Linda Mayhood made a clear and concise presentation to the POA board regarding membership assignment programs. The POA has tried several tactics to make foreclosed lots profitable or at least to move them out of the POA inventory.

Membership assignment is the right to use POA facilities at property owner rates. Currently there are 486 property owners assigning their rights to interested parties. The cost of assigning privileges is $100. There is a form online at www.hsvpoa.org to facilitate assignments.

The brief but ill-fated one-day campaign in the Sentinel Record and Democrat Gazette to sell membership privileges last year netted nine assignments. There was an uproar in the Village because the perception was that the POA was devaluing the Village. The campaign was put on hold.

The POA changed tactics and sold foreclosed lots to 72 property owners. The POA sent out letters to property owners with an adjoining foreclosed lot. They sold ten lots by that method. They raised the cost of the lots from $500 to $1,500 and sold an additional 34 lots. Contractor Bob Malt bought 20 lots at $850 a lot.

The POA offered an incentive plan for real estate companies to sell lots and none were sold.

By May of this year there were 5,721 lots in arrears. Last year foreclosures and legal costs were in excess of $510,000. In January of this year the POA suspended foreclosures. So far this year $128,000 has been spent on lot related expenses.

This year there is a projected loss of $292,464 in assessments for lots. There will be 850 additional lots in POA inventory at the end of this year. Mayhood said, "we need the cash in the lots in inventory. We don't want to flood the market with cheap lots."

Memberships (assignments) are selling for $535 a year. Of that proposed figure, $432 goes to pay the POA assessment.

There are no preferential treatments given with the purchase of a membership. No one will be given special tee times, etc.

The membership is good for 12 consecutive months. The membership is non-transferable and non-refundable.

The application process takes two to three weeks.

Mayhood suggested marketing this plan in a 300 mile radius of the Village. She believes the program can pay for itself. She also suggested funds to make the program viable could come from the Chamber's A&P fund allocation.