Saturday, March 30, 2013
This new community
We can place a for sale sign in front of our house in our new community. Try doing that at Lake Ashton. Larry Maxwell wants 3 ½ % of the sale. He gets more than the person that sells the home. That is why you can’t place a for sale sign in front of your house. Its money in his pocket and he does not give a damn about you selling your home. No side walks at Lake Ashton. We have two wide side walks 7 ft. wide on each side of the road. Plus we have a standard wide roadway with a white line on each side of the main road for bicycles. We even have a walking trial with sidewalks. Not at Lake Ashton, you have nothing. Lake Ashton is a “Walk in the road community“. At Lake Ashton there are approx 75 homes for sale in a community of 1200 homes. Here in this community you have less than 10 homes for sale out of approx 1200 homes. This alone tells you something. People love it here and made a very wise choice. The driveways in front of each home are over 45-60ft long. Larry Maxwell tries to cut corners just to save money in his pocket. I had to park my truck in the arc of the garage door to make it fit in the driveway.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
one little word up
Read until
the end ... You'll laugh.
This two-letter word in English has more meanings than any other two-letter word, and that word is 'UP.' It is listed in the dictionary as an [adv], [prep], [adj], [n] or [v].
It's easy to understand UP, meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP?
At a meeting, why does a topic come UP? Why do we speak UP, and why are the officersUP for election and why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report? We call UP our friends, brighten UP a room, polish UP the silver, warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen. We lock UP the house and fix UP the old car.
At other times, this little word has real special meaning. People stir UP trouble, line UP for tickets, work UP an appetite, and think UP excuses.
To be dressed is one thing but to be dressed UP is special.
And this UP is confusing: A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP.
We open UP a store in the morning but we close it UP at night. We seem to be pretty mixedUP about UP!
To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP, look UP the word UP in the dictionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4 of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions.
If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a hundred or more.
When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP. When the sun comes out, we say it is clearing UP. When it rains, it soaks UP the earth. When it does not rain for awhile, things dry UP. One could go on and on, but I'll wrap it UP, for now . . . My time is UP!
Oh . . . One more thing: What is the first thing you do in the morning and the last thing you do at night?
This two-letter word in English has more meanings than any other two-letter word, and that word is 'UP.' It is listed in the dictionary as an [adv], [prep], [adj], [n] or [v].
It's easy to understand UP, meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP?
At a meeting, why does a topic come UP? Why do we speak UP, and why are the officersUP for election and why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report? We call UP our friends, brighten UP a room, polish UP the silver, warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen. We lock UP the house and fix UP the old car.
At other times, this little word has real special meaning. People stir UP trouble, line UP for tickets, work UP an appetite, and think UP excuses.
To be dressed is one thing but to be dressed UP is special.
And this UP is confusing: A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP.
We open UP a store in the morning but we close it UP at night. We seem to be pretty mixedUP about UP!
To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP, look UP the word UP in the dictionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4 of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions.
If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a hundred or more.
When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP. When the sun comes out, we say it is clearing UP. When it rains, it soaks UP the earth. When it does not rain for awhile, things dry UP. One could go on and on, but I'll wrap it UP, for now . . . My time is UP!
Oh . . . One more thing: What is the first thing you do in the morning and the last thing you do at night?
A picture is worth a thousand words
"Note: Stacked here are every page of
Obamacare regulations published through last week. The newest ones are
the stack at the bottom. On the chair, next to the stack is the original
2,700 page Obamacare legislation. This stack is 7 feet 3 inches
high."
No Sidewalks
Walking in the road is like walking in a bowling alley lane, you never know when your going ton get hit. You got to keep an eye in front of you and in back of you. This is a 60 Plus community with NO sidewalks? How dumb can you get. Anything to save a buck Mr Developer.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Bingo Paul Pontious
Where is Bingo Pontious? Did he get sick from all that food he bought with all that Bingo Money? He spend well over $50,000 for dinners for himself and all his dear crooked friends. He couldn't get enough of his friends in his car so he hired a bus. No, he didn't take them to McDonald's but to the finest Brazilian restaurant in the state. Anything to get their vote. That is why, they control the community, the CDD and the HOA. Yes Paul is very sick. I guess I won't hear him call me a idiot in front and in back and at the clubhouse. I have not gotten any more nasty letters from Paul! What the matter Paul, you writing hand is getting weak? BINGO
June Young and the HOA
If you should forget to pay your HOA bill for $60.00 you will be fined $50.00 by the HOA. If you have a question about the fined you must call JUNE YOUNG. The bill is only $60.00 but the outrages fined is $50.00. What a hell of a place Lake Ashton is.
Monday, March 25, 2013
Margo Steavens
I wonder what she is doing now? Having fireside meetings why she lost? She had to be one of the dumbest person ever to run on the CDD. I hope I never see that woman again. I see that her husband is not taken any more pictures! I wonder what he is doing now? Maybe someone stole his camera.
F15
There I was, just flying along, enjoying the flight at 20,000 ft, minding my own business
And what's so cool is they actually pay me to do this!
When……Hmmm... What's that strange sound? Something feels different!
Hey, why am I looking up?
Whoa there. What the hell?? Controls aren't working.
Time for a mirror check... Hey, where's the rest of my F-15?
Uh oh, it's over there... I think I've got a definite'………………. Aw, sh*t' What the hell is going on here.
I gotta wonder, am I the first guy to ever experience a 'cockpit-airframe separation anxiety attack'??
OK, enough is enough!... I'm outta' here! But first, the canopy has to go.
Phew…………. At least that’s now out of the way……
OK, now it's my turn. I'm gonna be gone as soon as I find that frickin' lower handle.
Got it…… I’m gone !!!!!!
This 'incident' caused the USAF to ground its fleet of F-15's.
How about the guy who took these pictures? Just when it looks like it's going to be just another 'average day at the office'..What caused a mid-air break up?
The main "longeron" (stringer) behind the cockpit failed due to corrosion. Talk about being in the right place at the right time (the photographer)...or the wrong place at the wrong time (the pilot)..... AMAZING PICTURES.
Sunday, March 24, 2013
Jack Van Sickle
Jack and his wife are very good calling the police. On me, the poker players at the HFC and on Dick Ralls when he lost the election at the HFC. This is all this guy can do. Why don't you put a white hood over your head Jack.
Article
Courtesy of The Orlando Sentinel
By Lauren
Ritchie
Published
March 19, 2013
Sixteen homes, 16 sets of panicked owners.
The residents of a Leesburg subdivision that went belly up during the real-estate bust face a financial dilemma that's the result of greedy investors, a failure by lawmakers to think ahead and maybe the alignment of the planets.
Unfortunately, the same the thing could happen to homeowners across Florida.
The retirees at the Cottages of Sanders Grove at the Heritage report that they've just had their homeowner-association fees jacked up from $180 a month to nearly $500. And that's just for this year.
If they can't — or won't — pay, the association can foreclose on them. And guess who controls the association? The investor who just bought the project. What a clever idea. Raise the rates, and when people can't pay, take their houses.
In addition, New Jersey resident and new owner Hans Hsu has found a way to force the homeowners to cover the legal cost of foreclosures and any fight they might want to put up over the higher fees.
Here's the story:
Pringle Development had just begun selling and building the 182 retirement homes on 58 acres off County Road 48, south of Leesburg, when the real-estate bubble burst. There was one model home, 16 resident-owned houses and a clubhouse.
Pringle went out of business, and a bank took control of both the unbuilt subdivision and its homeowner association. The way the association was formed under Florida law — and this is typical of most homeowner associations — the developer controls the board of directors until three months after 90 percent of the homes are sold. Then, seats on the association's board pass to the people who own property in the community.
The purpose of the association is to levy fees to take care of the subdivision's common areas and buildings, such as a clubhouse.
While the subdivision is being constructed, the developer wants the place to look pristine so that customers will buy. Makes sense. People living there want the same thing, so the interests of the two parties coincide. Lawmakers apparently couldn't imagine a scenario in which they wouldn't.
Until now.
While the bank controlled the subdivision, residents continued to pay the homeowners association $180 a month, and residents say the bank paid the fees for the unbuilt lots, so the place stayed in semi-respectable condition.
Then Country Estates South, whose president is Hsu, bought the subdivision Jan. 30 for about $1.1 million. As the new owner, he also chooses the new board of directors for the association.
Over the past month, the new board decided to make some changes in the rules that govern the association. The rules specifically state he can make changes while he continues to control the association.
Hsu's board wiped out a provision that prevents the association from raising its annual fees by more than 15 percent; gave themselves the power to meet in Orlando instead of at the community; handed the directors the power to approve or reject any sale in the community and to evict a new buyer who is unapproved; eliminated the veto power of the homeowners over the budget; and established the board as the sole authority to raise fees and direct expenses.
As if those changes weren't draconian enough, residents say the owner announced the higher fees to them recently during a "conference call" that amounted to one of his employees holding up a cell phone few could hear.
That's when he dropped the news that he wouldn't be paying any fees on the empty lots he owns. He justified that by saying he'd have to cover the reserve for emergencies, residents said. What he did not mention is that one of his new rules eliminated the requirement for the homeowner association even to maintain a reserve fund. So, covering emergencies is optional for Hsu.
The full cost of the budget, he said, would be borne by the residents, according to those who attended the meeting. Hsu did not return calls asking him to explain, and staffers at the office of his lawyer, C. John Christensen of South Milhausen in Orlando, said he was on vacation and declined to provide any contacts for Country Estates South.
And here's the vicious kick: Hsu threw into the budget a new expense the homeowners have to pay — $10,000 in attorney fees. So, if they decide to fight the higher fees, they'll be funding their opponent's defense. That's just plain wrong.
This is not a fancy subdivision. There's a clubhouse where residents say two of the three air conditioners are broken. That's it. There's not even a community pool.
Homeowners are furious and terrified, and no wonder. Dick Dekowski, a 67-year-old retired computer programmer, summed it up: "We're sitting here with houses worth zero."
Another homeowner, Carol Chastain, said she left the recent meeting because she was so upset she was afraid she would vomit and didn't want to embarrass herself.
A nationally recognized expert on homeowner associations, Evan McKenzie, an associate professor of political science at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said that across Florida, new investors are taking over associations and increasing the fees. Sometimes, he said, an increase is needed.
But this situation, he said, is "very, very nasty." He said he'd never seen a new investor shift the financial burden to the homeowners.
"If I were living in one of those units, I'd be getting myself an attorney," he said.
And there you have it. A relaxed retirement for folks who worked hard their whole lives just vanished. Now, they're going to have to fight, thanks in part to the power that legislators handed homeowner associations years ago. Just more victims in a long, shameful legacy of land controversies in Florida. When will this state ever learn?
The residents of a Leesburg subdivision that went belly up during the real-estate bust face a financial dilemma that's the result of greedy investors, a failure by lawmakers to think ahead and maybe the alignment of the planets.
Unfortunately, the same the thing could happen to homeowners across Florida.
The retirees at the Cottages of Sanders Grove at the Heritage report that they've just had their homeowner-association fees jacked up from $180 a month to nearly $500. And that's just for this year.
If they can't — or won't — pay, the association can foreclose on them. And guess who controls the association? The investor who just bought the project. What a clever idea. Raise the rates, and when people can't pay, take their houses.
In addition, New Jersey resident and new owner Hans Hsu has found a way to force the homeowners to cover the legal cost of foreclosures and any fight they might want to put up over the higher fees.
Here's the story:
Pringle Development had just begun selling and building the 182 retirement homes on 58 acres off County Road 48, south of Leesburg, when the real-estate bubble burst. There was one model home, 16 resident-owned houses and a clubhouse.
Pringle went out of business, and a bank took control of both the unbuilt subdivision and its homeowner association. The way the association was formed under Florida law — and this is typical of most homeowner associations — the developer controls the board of directors until three months after 90 percent of the homes are sold. Then, seats on the association's board pass to the people who own property in the community.
The purpose of the association is to levy fees to take care of the subdivision's common areas and buildings, such as a clubhouse.
While the subdivision is being constructed, the developer wants the place to look pristine so that customers will buy. Makes sense. People living there want the same thing, so the interests of the two parties coincide. Lawmakers apparently couldn't imagine a scenario in which they wouldn't.
Until now.
While the bank controlled the subdivision, residents continued to pay the homeowners association $180 a month, and residents say the bank paid the fees for the unbuilt lots, so the place stayed in semi-respectable condition.
Then Country Estates South, whose president is Hsu, bought the subdivision Jan. 30 for about $1.1 million. As the new owner, he also chooses the new board of directors for the association.
Over the past month, the new board decided to make some changes in the rules that govern the association. The rules specifically state he can make changes while he continues to control the association.
Hsu's board wiped out a provision that prevents the association from raising its annual fees by more than 15 percent; gave themselves the power to meet in Orlando instead of at the community; handed the directors the power to approve or reject any sale in the community and to evict a new buyer who is unapproved; eliminated the veto power of the homeowners over the budget; and established the board as the sole authority to raise fees and direct expenses.
As if those changes weren't draconian enough, residents say the owner announced the higher fees to them recently during a "conference call" that amounted to one of his employees holding up a cell phone few could hear.
That's when he dropped the news that he wouldn't be paying any fees on the empty lots he owns. He justified that by saying he'd have to cover the reserve for emergencies, residents said. What he did not mention is that one of his new rules eliminated the requirement for the homeowner association even to maintain a reserve fund. So, covering emergencies is optional for Hsu.
The full cost of the budget, he said, would be borne by the residents, according to those who attended the meeting. Hsu did not return calls asking him to explain, and staffers at the office of his lawyer, C. John Christensen of South Milhausen in Orlando, said he was on vacation and declined to provide any contacts for Country Estates South.
And here's the vicious kick: Hsu threw into the budget a new expense the homeowners have to pay — $10,000 in attorney fees. So, if they decide to fight the higher fees, they'll be funding their opponent's defense. That's just plain wrong.
This is not a fancy subdivision. There's a clubhouse where residents say two of the three air conditioners are broken. That's it. There's not even a community pool.
Homeowners are furious and terrified, and no wonder. Dick Dekowski, a 67-year-old retired computer programmer, summed it up: "We're sitting here with houses worth zero."
Another homeowner, Carol Chastain, said she left the recent meeting because she was so upset she was afraid she would vomit and didn't want to embarrass herself.
A nationally recognized expert on homeowner associations, Evan McKenzie, an associate professor of political science at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said that across Florida, new investors are taking over associations and increasing the fees. Sometimes, he said, an increase is needed.
But this situation, he said, is "very, very nasty." He said he'd never seen a new investor shift the financial burden to the homeowners.
"If I were living in one of those units, I'd be getting myself an attorney," he said.
And there you have it. A relaxed retirement for folks who worked hard their whole lives just vanished. Now, they're going to have to fight, thanks in part to the power that legislators handed homeowner associations years ago. Just more victims in a long, shameful legacy of land controversies in Florida. When will this state ever learn?
Foreclosers
Article Courtesy of The Palm
Beach Post
By Kimberly Miller
Published March 18, 2013
Florida
metro areas accounted for seven of the top 10 regions nationally for
high foreclosure rates:
1. South Florida (Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties)
2. Orlando
3. Ocala
4. Tampa
5. Palm Bay
6. Las Vegas
7. Rockford, Ill.
8. Jacksonville
9. Naples
10.
Chicago
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