If any community is exploring for "the best in community solutions," the LAST company you should consider is Goodwin & Co.! Some 5 or so years ago, in my small home community of 97 Garden homes in East Plano, Texas, called Peachtree Village, where many of our residents are retired and living on fixed incomes, a small group of people illegitimately usurped control of our HOA Board with the direct help of Goodwin & Co., likely because they were way overly concerned about the shifting demographics of our community from a nearly all white population to an even mix of Latino, Asian, Black and white residents. Even though our original HOA documents, specifically, define our HOA as a a NON-PROFIT corporation, Goodwin & Co. came in and assisted several "Boards" since then to shift the entire focus of their duties AWAY from what the same Articles of Incorporation state is the general purpose for creating our HOA in the first place--to take care of our Common Areas (a greenbelt, the private streets our homes are located on, some auxiliary parking, a few sidewalks and some retaining walls), all of which are now in a horrible state of disrepair! Instead of spending the 10s or $1000s the HOA had collected over the years on the real needs of our community, after Goodwin & Co. took over, almost all they did on behalf of the "Board" was to mount a very aggressive and invasive (and most likely, illegal) spying campaign on our private homes in order to generate all sorts of highly subjective allegations of having committed "violations," which were then very selectively enforced, followed up by threatening letters of fines, up to $500.00. Moreover, Goodwin & Co. also charged the accused homeowners an extra $25 per letter, and if not paid by a certain date, late fees on top of that! Of course, Goodwin & Co. not only collected a handsome general service fee each month, but a sizable percentage of each fine they collected! To make matters worse, they began pushing our Board to increase our monthly dues which, had it not been for the fact we had already reached our CCR's maximum, they would have surely done so, even though the majority of our residents are struggling just to make ends meet, as food and utility prices are rising, while they are worrying about whether or not their social security checks are in jeopardy! When some of us homeowners began to realize how Goodwin & Co. was, callously and deliberately, doing all they could to extract from us for every dollar they could, all the while, we've been having to drive around ever-enlarging potholes on the small streets leading to our homes, and organized to call them to account and tried to replace the "Board" they had placed in power, they used OUR HOA funds to mount a vicious, misinformation campaign against our nominees, in order to frighten our neighbors into thinking all hell would break loose unless we re-elected the same people. But just to be sure if that didn't work, of course, Goodwin & Co. conducted the entire board election, including the ballot count, with the name of THEIR chosen "President" printed on the proxies used OUR money to pay for his campaign letter mail outs with all sorts of lies and misinformation about the opposing candidates. Of course, we're doing everything we can to hold them accountable though, so far, Goodwin & Co., who possess all of our HOA records, have blocked us from inspecting them (which is a right, not a privilege, according to Texas Property Code Law), and we need that evidence to present to Law Enforcement whom we hope will, eventually, indict them for their role as accomplices in the manipulation of our HOA and the resulting misappropriation of our funds, just so they can make a profit! It's not clear to us if there are any honest HOA management companies out there who would actually serve the interests of all the PEOPLE who live in a given community, but we have learned from bitter experience Goodwin & Co. is definitely not one of them!

Rick Lannoye, the Peachtree Village Neighborhood Union