Read a lot of the threads thoroughly and scanned a lot of the rest and I see one thing that is confusing. Seems like y'all started out talking about HOA and then condo associations got thrown into the mix. Two different animals but with the same purpose in mind--protect the value of the associations through maintenance. If your board doesn't do this, you must elect a board that will. Recall the present board if necessary. Tougher in a HOA because the Association doesnt own the "buildings". The maintenance of those is only controlled by the documents, rules and regulations. Ya'all need a good management company and a good attorney. Nothing is better than home or condo owners that want to be involved in maintaining to value of their property.
Gosh, that makes it all sound so simple.
I've served my time in a HOA with only 60 units, and I think that the board's talent gene pool is pretty shallow for anything under 500. We were lucky to have a manager who had the credibility to tell his clients what worked, what didn't, and what lawsuits could be expected. Just the neighborhood's repainting and a developer lawsuit were painful enough without the added distraction of bad reserves and an incompetent board. The "best" solution isn't "you must elect a board that will"-- the best solution is to sell and get the heck out of that situation.
The concept of HOAs is workable with sufficient size & funding. Today we're living in a community of 15,000 homes with one of the state's largest HOAs. Management is professionally run (for the most part) and the largest part of the payroll is grounds maintenance of the common areas. The newsletter attracts enough ad revenue to pay for itself and they even have their own plant nursery to cut down on costs. The board is populated with residents who've lived here for decades-- 30 years or more-- and in some cases their kids & grandkids are in the same community. The "rules" book is pretty thick but it's wielded effectively and the talent pool of serving/prospective board members keeps egos pretty much in check. Enforcement is pretty consistent and the processes are reasonably transparent. At this scale of population, it's pretty easy to slap a lien on a homeowner.
Our rental home is in a smaller community where HOA participation is so low that the board was able ram through a rules change allowing initiatives to pass when "yes" votes outnumber "no" and are at least 35% of the total. No simple majority system here, no anarchy, just apathy. In fact I think some of the board seats would go vacant if the incumbents didn't rotate the presidency among themselves. The only thing saving this HOA from disaster was being able to sell off some extremely valuable land to fund the reserves nearly in perpetuity.
The best validation of our residence's HOA is the higher prices of our larger community compared to adjacent (non-HOA) neighborhoods. Even the crappy HOA at our rental neighborhood is keeping home values above those in the adjacent non-HOA communities.
No, I've never served on the boards or committees of either of our current homes, and I doubt that I ever will.