After reading an article on deed-restricted communities having their annual fees raised in the St. Pete Times this morning, I was shocked that it never crossed my mind that this would be an issue.

It appears that after homeowners foreclose within these communities, the annual fees that were once collected from them now become the responsibility of the rest of the community. Therefore, these residents are forced to pay higher fees to cover those homeowners that have foreclosed. Normally, the assessment fees cover the maintenance and repair of the common areas including the tennis courts, pools and other recreational facilities, however, due to the high number of foreclosures, new fees have been added to the list, such as legal fees to compensate lawyers for homes in foreclosure, postage and...cable bills?

In the case pointed out in the St. Pete Times article, this community in Tampa, Hillsborough County, Florida, is charging homeowners for the cable that these vacant homes are using, forced into an eleven year cable contract that they had no control of. Forgive my lack of understanding, but it would seem to me that the object is to get more homeowners into the community, not force those that already live there into a situation where they can no longer afford the fees and have to leave as well.