Collecting HOA Data

MLS and Assessor’s data was used to calculate the geographic and quantitative scope of HOA foreclosures in Clark and Washoe Counties. Clark and Washoe Counties were selected because they comprise the vast majority of Nevada home sales and HOA foreclosures.

Data from the county Assessor’s office was used to identify HOA transactions. This data was limited to Washoe and Clark Counties from January 2013 through July 2016. The Assessor database also provided various characteristics of the homes, such as square feet, number of bathrooms, age of the home, addresses, etc.

For the southern Nevada market, the Clark County Multiple Listing Service (MLS) provided details of HOAs for a large sample of all home sales from January 1st, 2013 through June 30th, 2016. Phone numbers of the HOAs were used to identify unique HOAs. If management companies were listed instead of the HOA, they were cross checked with other home sales on the same street and cross-checked with the HOA phone number to identify the HOA. That is, if a street had multiple HOA phone numbers listed, the most commonly used HOA phone number on the street and township was applied to all homes on that same street and township.

This data was matched with the Clark County Assessor’s list of all home sales. These were cross checked using the street name and township to identify the HOA for these properties. All phone numbers that contained a large amount of transactions (over 500) were checked individually to ensure that the listed phone number was not a management company and was in fact an HOA community.

To calculate the effect of HOA foreclosures, hedonic regression was used. Hedonic regression is a time-tested statistical procedure that uses the method of linear regression to isolate the effects of different housing, neighborhood and transaction characteristics on the sale price of the house.

Survey Method

SGS conducted a Statewide Benchmark Survey on Homeowners' Associations, which interviewed registered voters in the state of Nevada. This survey tested attitudes toward homeowners' associations (HOAs) in Nevada. It asked questions about the perceived value of HOAs and included sections on “super priority” liens and the foreclosure process specifically. Weighting was applied to ensure representation with respect to age, gender, and geography. For results based on these sample sizes, one can say with 95% confidence that the error attributable to sampling for the survey was +/- 4.4%. In addition to sampling error, question wording and other practical difficulties in conducting telephone surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion surveys.