Foreclosure is a cruel and unusual punishment that does not fit the petty “crime” of making a late payment of an association assessment or failing to trim one’s bushes properly. There are other ways, more humane, to collect debts or judgments.

The state of Arizona recognized that a taking of a home or an equity in a home, or both, as a method of choice for debt collection, should not be used lightly. Accordingly, it enacted protections in the form of homestead exemption.

But in 1996, the Legislature passed a law that took away from homeowners in associations this very protection against their HOA. This was done in a sneaky way without ever stating it clearly and openly, as an insignificant exclusion of the assessment lien from Chapter 8 of Title 33. Needless to say, most legislators were not even aware of this exclusion.

It was not an honorable way of depriving homeowners of a basic right and protection. If this was not enough, the Legislature allowed homeowner associations to have automatic non-judicial liens, enabling them to place encumbrances on those homesteads as they see fit, without the burden of proving their claim in a court of law. It also gave HOA liens a priority position over all other liens, except taxes and a first mortgage. All these, together with the express right to foreclose, gave homeowner associations extraordinary powers that no other private entity has. What makes HOAs so special? Why do you treat those private organizations so differently than any other private entity? Why do you give them so much unsupervised power, and then wonder how come there is so much abuse of this power?

Citizens must have protections against extreme unrestricted and unsupervised powers. HOA debts are no different than any other debts. Please give homeowners in associations equal protection under the law and restore their homestead exemption.

Mika Sadai, Tucson