River Trails Homeowners Association

Hello ALL,

I have a question for the HOA. I ran into into a gentleman the other day at a conference who lives in South Arlington. He says that his neighborhood who doesn't have a HOA and they just negotiated $22,500 per acre. Why didn't RTHOA hold out for that rate or something near that rate? Did you really negotiate the best deal?

We asked for bids from 7 different companies and got serious responses from 3. Out of the 3, Carrizo was the best offer. We then gave each company the chance to counter-offer. There was also the fact that many residents were anxious to sign something to get their bonus check in the mail. We are pleased that owners waited as long as they did - 5 months - so that we kept our negotiating power - but each day we prolonged an agreement made it harder to keep that group together. We were careful not to rush into an agreement. Each lease was reviewed very carefully for economic and environmental impacts to our neighborhood. We worked to get the best overall package we could.

On a side note - from reading about other offers in Arlington and other cities, most are negotiating for neighborhoods covering 3000+ acres. River Trails covers approximately 350 acres. That may account for the difference in offers that we were given.

Here's a question to anyone who may know:

Years ago, we signed with Dale.  That has now expired and there is no mineral lease on my property.  Can we go with the group here now and sign up again?

Yes, you are free to sign with any company that you wish. Carrizo has signed about 80% of River Trails and they will be drilling soon. The Carrizo lease that is being used in River Trails provides for a lot of extras that most other gas companies can not offer. If you want to sign with Carrizo just send an email to rivertrailshoa@yahoo.com. There is more info on the web site www.RTHA.org