Reston Association — Local services in Reston

We heard rumors that Reston had serious HOA bureaucracy but naively thought that it wouldn’t be a problem when we bought our home. We just have to keep our property in good repair and pay the HOA right?

A very incomplete list of problems we’ve encountered so far:

Common areas disrepair. Our home backs up to a common area that should be maintained by the HOA. Due two decades of neglect, the soil has erroded to the point that a small lake forms every time the area receives more than 0.5 inches of rain. This intermittent lake has caused enough damage to our fence that the HOA has notified us that we need to replace our fence more than once. We’re perfectly willing to do so, but we’ve met with four contractors and they’ve all told us that replacing the fence is pointless because the drainage problem and a HOA tree that is growing into the fence would destroy a new fence within 2 years.

We asked the HOA to repair the common area and remove the tree .... 6 years ago. The local HOA points to the Reston Association. Reston Association points to the local HOA. Except for an occasional notice that we need to replace our fence (and sometimes an apology when we forward the lengthy correspondence regarding this mattter) we haven’t heard from the HOA regarding this issue.

Trees. Reston Association does not allow removal of living trees without prior approval. Apparently someone removed a tree from our property before we bought the property. This missing tree was not disclosed in our HOA documents and we looked all over our property and couldn’t find a tree stump or any other indication of where the missing tree may have been. Nevertheless, the association kept threatening to fine us until we replanted the tree. Took about 2 years to sort that out.

Parking. The HOA is suppose to coordinate parking and maintain the parking lot. They have giant maple trees planted all around the parking lot. Pretty, but those trees drop copious amounts of sap onto vehicles. Had a minor fender bender a few years ago and took my then 1 year old car in for repair. The auto body shop looked at the car and said the fender bender was so minor that it could be fixed within 2 hours, but the sap had done enough damage that I may need to repaint my car in a couple of years. I contacted the HOA and asked them to remove the maple tree hanging over my parking spot. No response in the last four years.

Design review application. We needed to change our exterior doors. Another house in the community has a beautiful red door that we thought would look nice on our house. Our home is also somewhat dark so we wanted to install a full lite patio door. Apparently, our HOA has strict requirements regarding both color and door style. You can have a white or beige door. Patio doors (that no one sees but the homeowner) can only have a half lite.

If you want a variance, you need to submit a Reston association design review application. The application process requires numerous items that may take a few weeks to gather. Once gathered, you submit to Reston Association only to be told that because the color and design requested are not on the HOA approved list, your application will likely be denied by the consult board. Ummm. . . If I wanted something on the HOA docs, I don’t need an application. Why do you have a consult board at all if its only purpose is to deny all changes that need an application and approval changes that do not need an application? And if these applications are routinely denied, why couldn’t you have told me that during the four weeks and 2 dozen emails we exchanged about this application instead of waiting for me to waste time and money getting paint chips and schematics?

Getting frustrated with the Reston Association employee is pointless because she is only the messenger. You can attend a full HOA board panel within 2-3 months of submitting your application for a review. Or you can petition your local HOA to...

Just finished with a hearing about our trim paint color and I am beyond dissatisfied. We had our windows replaced last year, and I confirmed over the phone with one of the associates that our trim paint would need to match the new windows in order to be in compliance, and she confirmed. Our windows came in Euro White as a pre-fab color without the ability to be painted. This color, while not listed in the approved colors, WAS approved by the board. Hence, since we were told to match the trim, we painted our trim to match the new windows. The board sent us back our approval, but changed the color they approved us for. They approved for Amber white rather than the color they approved for our windows and what we were told needed to match. So, they filed that we were non-compliant. We just attended our hearing, and the board was not at all interested in our case. It was merely a formality. We brought evidence of another home with trim the same color as ours, and they only said "well, that home may not be approved." In which case, why when they do their numerous neighborhood reviews was this not brought up? Why only our home? Then they claimed they did not have the power to approve a new color. Despite the fact they approved our windows in another color (came board) and ARE THE ONLY ONES WITH THE POWER TO APPROVE! Now we have to pay yet another $1,000 to repaint our trim, and since it won't match our windows our home isn't going to look as nice with the mis-matched color. Everyone hates this board. I have yet to meet a resident that has had a good experience with this board. They bore no responsibility for what their associate said over the phone. They didn't even seem to have read our request, and they didn't bother to consider anything. We had to interject because they weren't even considerate enough have what we had to say about our own property as a part of the procedure. We have a very expensive lesson to take away from this- this board is the worst I have ever been forced into a relationship with. I don't understand what their purpose is if they can't be consistent or actually consider nuances of the cases...

I am having major issues with incompetent employees that work for this organization. After purchasing my home 12/19/19, I tried to contact them FOR MONTHS to log in online to pay my bill and received zero follow up. I literally called every week from January to March and someone would take down my name and number and no one would ever get back to me. I also sent several emails with no response. Mid-June I received a bill for $480, the amount owed after what I payed at closing and a $70 late fee despite dozens of unanswered calls and emails. I contacted Reston HOA again via email to remove the late fee and finally received a response. I gained access online where I was told I owe the full amount plus a late fee because they lost one of the two checks that were sent during my closing (one for transfer costs in the amount of $305.17 and one for half the annual HOA fees for $297.00). I sent proof of my closing documents reflecting the checks. David Honeywell (head of their finance department) called me and said that they have been having issues with employees completing work since COVID began. He assured me he would handle the matter directly..... on 6/24/20. Again, I received no response despite sending additional emails and leaving voicemails (what is the $300 transfer fee paying for again?!????????) Then, today I received a $780 bill in the mail, which is SHOCKINGLY the wrong amount, missing the payment from my lost check.

This organization is a total scam, trying to rip people off by not honoring the amount they paid at their closing and hoping they just crack and pay more than they owe because no one will ever return their...