Join us this week as host Donna DiMaggio Berger sits down for a fascinating conversation with Marvin Nodiff, a retired community association attorney and prolific fiction writer. Together, they dive into the world of Marvin's eight novels based on the trials and tribulations of a dynamic young St. Louis community association attorney named Joshua Fyler and the cast of condominium and HOA characters surrounding him. The plots of Marvin's novels will certainly resonate with boards, managers, condo and HOA residents as well as community association attorneys everywhere. Marvin and Donna discuss the various societal challenges he tackles in his novels including cybercrime, judicial corruption, surveillance drones, gun violence, populism, the pandemic and artificial intelligence. From generational gaps inside communities to drones, media and politics, the discussion with Marvin covers a wide range of topics related to community associations. Our host and guest explore legal issues associated with HOAs in different states, the importance of outside professionals for guidance, and the potential implications of artificial intelligence on association operations.
This episode aks you to consider if understanding and compassion might help resolve disputes and assist volunteer directors better navigate the complexities of community association leadership. What does the future hold for community associations and the legal profession? Tune in to this episode and find out!
Conversation highlights include:
BONUS: Find out how the various “quirky” names Marvin sprinkled throughout the Pinball Lawyer came to be and why
Related Episodes:
Join us this week as host Donna DiMaggio Berger sits down for a fascinating conversation with Marvin Nodiff, a retired community association attorney and prolific fiction writer. Together, they dive into the world of Marvin's eight novels based on the trials and tribulations of a dynamic young St. Louis community association attorney named Joshua Fyler and the cast of condominium and HOA characters surrounding him. The plots of Marvin's novels will certainly resonate with boards, managers, condo and HOA residents as well as community association attorneys everywhere. Marvin and Donna discuss the various societal challenges he tackles in his novels including cybercrime, judicial corruption, surveillance drones, gun violence, populism, the pandemic and artificial intelligence. From generational gaps inside communities to drones, media and politics, the discussion with Marvin covers a wide range of topics related to community associations. Our host and guest explore legal issues associated with HOAs in different states, the importance of outside professionals for guidance, and the potential implications of artificial intelligence on association operations.
This episode aks you to consider if understanding and compassion might help resolve disputes and assist volunteer directors better navigate the complexities of community association leadership. What does the future hold for community associations and the legal profession? Tune in to this episode and find out!
Conversation highlights include:
BONUS: Find out how the various “quirky” names Marvin sprinkled throughout the Pinball Lawyer came to be and why
Related Episodes:
Hi everyone, I'm attorney Donna DiMaggio Berger and this is Take It to the Board where we speak Condo and HOA. My guest today is retired community association attorney Marvin Nodiff, whose fiction and nonfiction work has been featured in national publications, magazines, print and press. Marvin's eight intriguing fiction novels are the result of his more than 30 years experience practicing community association law. Others were first introduced to St Louis Community Association Attorney Joshua Filer in Marvin's 2002 novel Special Assessment. By the way, those are two of the dirtiest words in community association industry, but we can talk about that later.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Following on the success of that first novel, Marvin wrote No Spitting on the Floor in 2011, the Dark Condoes in 2014, the Kondo Kerfuffle in 2016,. Hoa Gobsmack in 2017, the Pinball Lawyer in 2019, magnet for Murder in 2021, and his latest novel, the Great Kondo Heist, was just released in April. The themes in these books include a variety of societal challenges, including cybercrime, judicial corruption, surveillance, drones, gun violence, populism, the pandemic and artificial intelligence. And, by the way, for people who are frequent listeners of the podcast, you know that we've delved into some of these very topics on the episode before. One constant in Marvin's writing is that both our protagonist, Joshua Filer, and drones appear in all of his novels. Now I just finished reading The Pinball Lawyer a few days ago. Couldn't put it down, and I also have to mention that Marvin's character, Joshua Filer, is a total chick magnet and a bit of a commitment phobia. So if we have time, we're going to dig into that later. Again, welcome to take it to the board.
Marvin Nodiff:Thanks for the invite, Donna.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So you've written a lot of great books and I mentioned in the introduction. They all follow the exploits of a young St Louis association attorney named Joshua Filer. I have not read all of your eight books, although I plan to read more. I'm going to ask you which one I go next, But let's focus on The Pinball Lawyer, which you published in 2019. That book was actually sent to me, Marvin, by another podcast guest. I had Neil Johnston on the podcast with Chris Ton. That episode involved drones And after the episode, Neil sent me two gifts.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:One was a little mini drone and the other one was your book, The Pinball Lawyer, And it took a little while, but I started reading it and I said I've got to get this guy on the podcast. And then I looked you up. I went to your website. I saw how prolific a writer you were And what I love is that you've written fiction books. So there's a lot of people in our industry that write books about association governance and boards and what to expect, And those are all very useful books. But I love that you wrote fiction books And you would think that for those of us who do this as a living, why do we want to read a fiction book about it, But I can tell you it's great to read fiction about what we do. So you've covered a lot of familiar territory in that book and I want to talk about it today.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Let's talk about the association battles you outlined in The Pinball Lawyer. Let's start with the Crevecore HOA. So when the book opens, we find that this homeowners association is in the midst of basically a generational fight. Right, You've got the board that has decided to specially assess, to install a tot lot in the common areas, And now you've got this other group of folks older folks, the baby boomers who don't want to pay the special assessment, And they say you know why we're not going to use this. How'd you come up with that? And is it because you did handle generational gaps in your own practice when you were practicing?
Marvin Nodiff:Right. This particular HOA I use as a platform to demonstrate down to the qualities that an HOA leader in this case her name is Caitlin can implement And the empathy that she has in dealing with different people, welcoming them, in making them feel a part of the community. And it's her leadership. And she deals with a difficult developer because there's a couple of unbuilt lots, And she's able to negotiate, with Joshua Filer's help, the attorney, negotiate a deal where the developer donates the unfinished lots to the community. Now, what are we going to do with this land? And that's where the tension between the older folks, the baby boomers and millennials, younger generation, the renouncers, know this community as.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Stroller land.
Marvin Nodiff:Stroller land because all kids. I think it's important first to recognize them, to appreciate them, to listen to the parties, because listening is half, is half of resolving a dilemma And listening is half of that, and Caitlin does a good job of that. She's able to win over the vast majority and that's a victory. Some people will never pay because that's just who they are.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You mentioned empathy as a hallmark of good leadership. Now you practice community association at Mount Marvin for 30 years or more, correct?
Marvin Nodiff:Yes.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:How many of your boards exhibited empathy and used that leadership style? would you say Some Some Okay? No, i mean. Why do you think there is lack of empathy in community association governance? Because there is. Look, we both I've been practicing almost as long and we've both seen it that there is a sometimes a strict adherence to rules or a willingness to shut out conflicting opinions. Why do you think there is a lack of empathy? Particularly because these are your neighbors. It's a living together relationship. What do you think drives that?
Marvin Nodiff:The attorney's role and the manager's role really is to work with the board and to identify. I think what makes our practice so much different from other fields of law is that we're dealing Decisions are made by groups of people. We either have a board which is three or five or seven people, or we've got the entire community of homeowners. So we have lots of personalities, different agendas, and that's what I think. So the decision making, a lot of it comes down to the social behavior, the group decision making process, and it's important for each person on the board, i think, to be recognized. but the attorney's got also recognized. is this member not participating? He or she is more passive and the board is dominated by somebody with a very strong will. So you've got to balance that. You've got to recognize that.
Marvin Nodiff:And some boards just kind of view their role as by God we're going to make the decisions and they don't consider the impact on the other members. They don't consider that home ownership is one of the highest values in our society. One attorney gave me some wise advice years ago it's not how it looks, it's how it lives that counts. And board members don't take that into advantage enough And they're kind of afraid to have what we call town hall meetings, just their open sessions. they're not open, they're not transparent. And the important thing when you make a decision is you expect that people will comply. If you're increasing assessments, that people will voluntarily pay, that they'll understand, that they'll buy into the concept that they're getting value for this. additional assessment Boards need to understand that rather than just be dictatorial. I think they need to have more empathy, because it is a community and if you forget that, then you're on the downhill slope.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Listen, human nature is, we know, not everybody's a rule follower right. We also know that sometimes the wrong people get elected to the board. So one of the things I've pondered is how do the members make an informed decision about who they really should elect assuming that they're actually Marvin even participating and casting a ballot for their directors How do they decide who's the best person to put in those seats?
Marvin Nodiff:That's a dilemma that I like to explore in my novels because it is so important and it is very random.
Marvin Nodiff:A lot of people run for the board for the wrong reasons And I don't have to go into all that.
Marvin Nodiff:But owners, i think, need to recognize that they all have a stake in the community and that what you want on the board is someone who will listen and consider the options and listen to the manager's advice, listen to the attorney's advice. He's got to be receptive, not have some preconceived notion of what things ought to be, and very few people I found on boards read the governing documents, read them in terms of understanding how to implement, read them with the task of saying okay, i'm going to identify here for the board what we must do, what we may do and what we cannot do. Those are basically three categories, and I can't tell you how many meetings I've had with boards that come in say, well, we've got this terrible dispute with an owner and we decided to do this and so, and now he sued us. So my first question is can I see the minutes? Let me see the records, And they look down and say minutes Well, they're sketchy, they don't have sufficient training to go into that position.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Well, and also it's been my experience, marvin, that when you get newcomers to the board, there's no onboarding process. Nobody really sits them down and says OK, you know, susan, this is your job now or this is what we've done in the past. Very rare for there to have any sort of unlike it, unlike when you're hired in your professional career and there's some sort of onboarding When you get on these boards. A lot of times it's just you're just thrown on the board and nobody sits you down, nobody talks about what the expectations are.
Marvin Nodiff:No transition, no orientation session. Here are minutes for the last six meetings. Just for a small example.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So in Florida we have a mandatory certification requirement for board members. Board members can either sign a form saying they've read, understand and will agree to uphold the governing documents, or they can attend a training session which has been approved by the Division of Florida Contos. Our firm has done hundreds of these each year. These board certification classes, other law firms do it. I think the management companies may even offer them. We've got the division. The state offers them.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So, yeah, there is training here in Florida, but every state's different to your point. And I wanted to talk about every state being different because when I was reading the Pimba lawyer and Charlie and his gang of baby boomers who said we're not going to pay this special assessment for the top lot because we're not going to use it, joshua, your character talks about the legal options. What he didn't talk about was simply leaning in foreclosing, which is what we would do in Florida. If a special assessment is duly passed, assuming the board had the authority to pass it and they followed all the statutory protocols Somebody doesn't pay it, even if they don't like what the purpose of the special assessment. The consequence in the state of Florida would be a lien on your home or unit and ultimately foreclosure. Is that not an option in Missouri?
Marvin Nodiff:Well, look, joshua the attorney likes to have buy-in And he could be Machiavellian like anybody, dropping the hammer and starting legal proceedings, starting with a lien. That's always an option based on your governing documents, but he'd rather have voluntary buy-in. It's better to have the assessments paid with a voluntary understanding of here's what it's going for, here's why it's necessary, and paid in full as a voluntary thing, rather than have the tension of a collection action. As far as state law goes, missouri's a UCA state, not HOA.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So explain that to our listeners.
Marvin Nodiff:The statutory authority for liens and the priority of liens comes from the state statute. because condos are a creation of statutory work, hoas are more de-restriction derived.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So you have no separate HOA act in Missouri.
Marvin Nodiff:We don't have an act covering. We don't have an equivalent statute for HOAs. Say, here's the definition of an HOA, here's the association, here's what it's comprised of, here's the board and it's how they're elected, and all that level of detail and the collection procedures and rights that boards have.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You talked a few minutes ago about getting buy-in and understanding And I 100% agree with you that when boards are looking to update their rules, i once had a client come to me. They had a 120-page rule book, a 120-page rule book, and I said the first thing we're going to do is you're going to tell me whether or not any of these rules are still needed. How many of these are still needed? Again, if people one was, you had to park head in as opposed to back into a parking space. What's the rationale? Now, once upon a time there had been landscaping there. There was a rationale That landscaping no longer existed. That rule needed to go.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:But the point you just made Missouri doesn't have an HOA act, florida does. We have all different states with all different statutes. I know there's been a push for years to have a uniform common ownership statute but we're not there yet. Do you think? part of the issue, marvin, is we've got people who, particularly in Florida, a lot of times these are second homes for people, vacation homes where they may have a condo, or home in a HOA elsewhere or in another country, and they come down and it's just a cultural difference because they're doing something different in someplace else with their condo or their home, and so it's very hard for them to understand when they go into a new state with different rules, different statute, different administrative code. Do you think that's part of the hurdle?
Marvin Nodiff:That's part of it, because condos and HOAs how they're treated varies a lot state by state, And Florida has one of the highest populations of people who live in community associations, So I understand why your laws are more.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Robust, a little more robust.
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, robust, it takes the AI to sort them out. But no, i hear stories all the time about people who have gone down to their second home in Florida And the story is basically go there, get involved in the board And it's like well, this is how we did it back home.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Bingo. That's the issue. I mean. I had a woman, a realtor, at one of my meetings to end up years ago and say, well, the board can't foreclose on homestead property And she had told a lot of her neighbors that the board could not, the association could not foreclose. In fact that was misinformation, because associations in Florida can foreclose for delinquencies, as can banks, regardless if it's homestead property. So I think a lot of that misinformation does play a role in terms of the challenges boards face and managers face when they're attempting to enforce things.
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, yeah. I had one board in the city where a sitting judge was on the board. a real judge was on the condo board. So we'd have a meeting and issue ABC would come up And I would explain here here's the law, here are your options, here's how I think we should deal with it. And it was all very rational And I showed the benefits and the downside. And then everybody returned to the judge. who says one of the three board members, and the judge would say like two sentences. and then everybody said OK, we'll go with that.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So it's good to be a judge.
Marvin Nodiff:Well, not from my standpoint.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I'm sure, listen, i'm sure you do what I do with my boards when they have attorneys or engineers or CPAs on serving on the board, to try to tell those directors not to wear two hats, that you're wearing the director hat right now. You don't also want to find yourself in the uncomfortable position of being the director on the board and also serving as the de facto association engineer, because if you do that you've got no safety net. To me, the professional advisors that the board hires whether it's attorneys like us, engineers, architects, accountants those are their safety net, bringing in those outside professional advisors to guide them.
Marvin Nodiff:Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, it's a major mistake, serious mistake, i think, for lawyers and other professionals to get on the board and start giving advice. Having a board and an attorney is fine with me. Their role, however, should be to know the right questions to ask and to be able to say this is something we need outside counsel, we need independent counsel to help us to guide us through this, because it's a serious question. They should have the expertise and knowledge and professionalism to be able to spot an issue that needs outside counsel, and the managers as well.
Marvin Nodiff:The managers and I don't want to generalize too much, because some are very bright and they know when to call the lawyer Others, however, are affected by the need to keep the client, the need to impress the client, so he or she doesn't want to be threatened by an attorney coming in and wants to kind of impress the board with his or her own knowledge. I had a manager once who kept a three-ring binder of legal opinions from different attorneys on a whole range of stuff. So when a question came to the board, this manager would go through her notebook and find an opinion letter from some other attorney about something else. But she said well, here's how it goes, and this is like the unauthorized practice of law. Rather than seek an independent opinion about that particular matter, they deferred to the manager, who had all the wrong instincts.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Well and without the benefit of the framework of decades of case law in Florida, arbitration decisions, the administrative code, and to your point I'm laughing because I've had the same challenges when it comes to this. But sometimes, marvin, it's because the board is pressuring the manager. They don't want to pay the lawyer right. When they pick up the phone and call us or email us, they know they're going to get a charge because that's what we do. We bill for our time. So if they can kind of pressure the manager to serve as a quasi attorney, they'll do it.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:But to your point, a lot of times because our practice is so commoditized and they want to keep costs low. That's what's happening there And I think it is dangerous. And I have seen some associations It just happened last week where they've relied on a manager to give advice about a contract dispute And it's cost them. And what I tell clients is listen, if your question starts with is there liability? if That's a legal question, anything pertaining to liability, it's going to be a legal question. Does Joshua confront that in any of his books?
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, yeah. And confronts the question. Because if you follow that story to the next step, where the manager is giving what amounts of legal advice to the board and the board takes that advice and it turns out to be wrong And now there are serious ramifications, the board's been sued, yada yada, the manager goes to an attorney. Now the attorney, be it Joshua Fyre, joshua's been in this situation where he's conflicted because he relies on the manager for a lot of referrals and wants to protect the manager and protect the manager's backside and get the manager out of the middle of this problem where she's misinformed the board, misadvised the board, so it creates a dilemma down the line.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Let's get back to the HLWA battle at Creve Core, because we're getting to the point where the drones come in At the park where they're having their ceremony for the new tot lot, and the drones drop paintballs. Some residents are hit with the paint And then sometime later, joshua's BMW is hit. His lovely BMW is hit with paintballs, his two lovely dogs are hit with it. I noticed drones play a recurring role in all your novels, so why Tell us what the fascination with drones is?
Marvin Nodiff:Fascination right, they pulled the word out of my head. Believe it or not, yeah, i write fiction, but there's a lot of research behind the fiction. And on drones, when the FAA, i was fascinated by drones, but when the FAA came out with their draft rulemaking to create this kind of registration certification for drone operators back in 2015, i read the entire rulemaking process. Neil and I are probably Neil Johnston, one of your former guests And I probably want to to a few attorneys who actually read the entire thing.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:But how long I have to stop you, How long was it?
Marvin Nodiff:It was over 600 pages.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Did you have insomnia? You were reading the entire It was fascinating.
Marvin Nodiff:Questions like, well, federal airspace is down to you. Start with, i think it was 500 feet, 500 feet, and then they lowered it and the final rose 400 feet, And there's this whole discussion about why they lowered it. And then who has jurisdiction over over the first 200 feet, and so on. I mean it was you know, and whether he had to have line of sight and blinking lights and all that stuff. What fascinates me and I turned it into an article for the Fordham Urban Law Journal on drones and privacy, because there's nothing in the federal rules that said you can't have a drone fly close to a home where there's occupants. So that produced a whole article. I co authored it with a professor and you mass Amherst, hillary Farber. That was back in 2017 or so.
Marvin Nodiff:So I've done a lot of research on drones and what's fascinating is that they have such a promise to deliver good things And drones are like like your cell phone. The basic function is for a cell phone you make calls and you receive calls, you have conversations, you communicate. They become great tools because of the apps you can add onto them And you can do drones. Drone's just fly from here to there, but when you start adding sensing devices and imaging capability to them and cameras and everything. They are terrific. So they can do a whole range of things. Just think about a simple thing a board needing to evaluate gutters and the roof surface on a taller building. Well, the old way is to get a ladder and then somebody's spending a whole lot of time and risk of safety And then you have a drone flyover and give you some great images for less risk.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Well, same thing if we have Mrs Jones and we believe, and we believe that she may have flammable materials on her 12th story balcony, but she's not going to let us in the unit to go check it out. So drone could be useful in that regard. I mean, you use surveillance drones. Some of my communities use drones for inspection, for architectural control inspection purposes.
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, i have that scenario in one of my books, where the board uses surveillance drone to look for violations And of course, that turns into how you can misuse a drone as well.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Of course, in the pinball lawyer, the drones were not friendly. They weren't dropping care packages, they were splattering people with paint.
Marvin Nodiff:Well, i think it was in Central America or South America. Some public official. there was an attempt on his life using a drone, so I researched that as well. You know what technology is available off the shelf to turn the drone into a weapon.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Those four children in Columbia that just survived 40 days in the jungle. They're plane crashed. I'm pretty sure that is incredible. I'm pretty sure I read that drones had dropped. The military had used drones to drop care packages and the kids actually found one And they yeah. Yeah, yeah So to your point that they can be useful. You're right.
Marvin Nodiff:Oh, absolutely, yeah, Yeah, and I think Neil Johnson references or one of your guests referenced it in emergency situations where the power goes out, there could be temporary cell functioning with drones They can look for. In terms of disaster, they can look for survivors and evaluate flood conditions, for example. They're extremely useful. At the same time, in the wrong hands, they can be weaponized.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I want to talk about the role of Hannah Hancock, the reporter who's covering the Grieve core debacle, and she covers a lot of the different things we're going to talk about. I used to be in the book Marvin, subtly on Joshua's side Okay, subtly, But you know, listen, I've been interviewed extensively over my career. I was interviewed in connection with the Champlain Towers collapse. I had a plane fly into one of my buildings, one of those charter planes I've had a car drive in. I mean, lots of things happen in these communities.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I've had a massive experience being interviewed by the media. I will tell you my experience has not always been positive because some reporters they've got that story written before they even come to you. They know the angle they want. By the way, they know you know what they're going to cut out of what you're saying to make it fit, what the angle is. What do you tell? and I know Hannah plays an important role in your book. So I know you've got experience with media. How trusting do you think volunteer directors should be, and even their counsel, when it comes to the media and its role in reporting HOA issues?
Marvin Nodiff:This spokesperson needs to be careful and wary. But really the last thing you want to say is no comment. Why? why? because it feeds the message that you're hiding something. It's better to say we're looking into it. I don't know yet, We're just starting our inquiry, We're figuring out. You know it's better to be open, available and open, And I mean, you're right when you you know. One unfortunate thing is and this has come up for decades in our practice field is that community associations get a bad rap in the media. If it leads, it leads, And that's the type of thing that we have to battle, not in the negative sense, but we have to deal with, because some reporters are looking for that story, They want to find a villain, They want to find blood And that's, that's a story. I carry this, this relationship, I think, that community association, in particular Joshua the attorney, have with reporters into the next couple of months, And then we're just expanding like four years. The book that follows pinball is called maintenance for murder, where we get into more of the journalism.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:That book dealt with the pandemic Correct.
Marvin Nodiff:And about issues that come up during the pandemic and the role of attorneys in that and also, significantly, the role of journalism, because I personally am very concerned about the loss of independent local community journalism. And we introduce these issues and we introduce a character named Phoebe as a, an investigative reporter who is, you know, very familiar. She's done the research and all the reports about community associations are that they're crazy And they do crazy things And so she considers Joshua to be an untrustworthy investigative collaborator. They're thrown into kind of forced marriage and working through COVID related issues like insurance scams that come up and a whole series of suspicious murders. So they're thrown in as two people who didn't know each other previously. Strong egos, they're both proud of their profession and they don't trust each other. And then we see how that relationship works through as they work on on this discovery investigation.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So that's okay, that's my next week because I've had, you know, for most of my career I had a very, very positive relationship with reporters who are looking, i think, to give fair and balanced pictures, stories of what happens, you know. But when the Champlain Towers hit, it was crazy down here and you had reporters at all sorts of tricks, all sorts of misreporting, miscommunications, you name it. It was. It was very unfortunate behavior. Rushes to judgment Again, writing the stories before it was even written And as we sit here two years later, most of the things they said have not even been proven. So my, yeah, that's going to be my next book, because is there some scarring after dealing with the media that I dealt with then, because previously it had been a very positive relationship. But but yeah, i'm going to be honest, I was a little scarred and taken back by some of the journalistic behavior I saw.
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, yeah. Well, journalists want to get you know, they want to get their, their byline.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:And I don't know if it's going to be edited. if it bleeds, it leads Well, and I know that there were journalists in that looking for a Pulitzer.
Marvin Nodiff:Well, you know, surf side made enormous impression on me and just trying to understand what happened and why it happened and to translate some of those lessons into fiction and I look at my fiction data as as a way to inform more people about how associations work, to kind of push back this negative image, because I want to have examples of how they do good things and how people are happy. Yeah, there's controversy and there's problems, but they will come up. Here's how I try to create information about how community associations work and, given that you know, like a fourth of all Americans live in some form of condor, HOA or co op, there's a big market out there to deal with. And now I you know that so informing, and I want to do it in an entertaining way. I've had lots of comments from readers saying I recognize that character, she's on my board, I recognize that manager. That person is in our community, So it's resonating. It's resonating with the audience out there.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:And the reason that you do it with humor to you use these quirky names. Right, you got snapper for the office manager. You've got the law firm of boondoggle flap. What is it, braggadocio? do boondoggle? do so flap doodle and doofus or BFD.
Marvin Nodiff:BFD. That's where I was headed.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:BFD. You've got snapper the office manager. You got a state rep named LeRoy. Blow hard chippy. Kim bro is Joshua's nemesis.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I do it with humor. I love that. I love that because I think you're right. I will tell you listen. Whenever I've had challenging things in my life, i read that to me is is my therapy, if some, if I'm going through a challenging time, i may pick up and read. I've got a little you're looking at me in my office but I've got a little book of Winston Churchill here And I feel like if Churchill could do it, you know, we're probably going to get through this. So books really, really help. You're normalizing a lot of this.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I want to talk about the. Let's turn to the condo issue, because we talked about Creef core and what their issue was. The condo in your book pinball lawyer is Artemis condo And they're doing something that so many of my clients try to do, which is pass an amendment. Right, and their amendment they want to pass is they want to put a cap on the amount of leases permitted. I loved every.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You know Joshua was argument about why when he was asked about this. Why are they trying to do this? They're trying to do this because the feeling is, if you get to a certain point and you have more rentals than people living there as their, as their, you know you've got a complete change in the culture of the community. Hence the reason to potentially, you know, pass this rental cap. Of course, this does not sit well with the investment owners at Artemis condo and they want to. You know, they want to squash it. The board in your book tries to to mediate this dispute, to resolve it through mediation. When you're practice Marvin, how successful have mediations been in terms of, you know, putting out small skirmishes, preventing them from turning into full blown conflocrations?
Marvin Nodiff:My read is that attorneys get the worst of the worst cases. Maybe it's 2% of the worst, 10% because managers and boards are able to resolve a lot of the internal disputes. They're more jolted in terms of because we get the worst of the worst cases, the most difficult, the most complex. And I mean I've had, i've had my my experience with serial serial filers, owners who had on their computers they had, you know, form petitions and they just filed, and so we've seen a lot of that. It's really the lawyer's job first to try and resolve the dispute before it goes further and it can go to mediation and it's been successful from my standpoint, my experience, and as long as the board members have an understanding of how to deal with the process of mediation, that you know you can have a position or you can have an interest.
Marvin Nodiff:Forget the position. What you want is is something that that is good for your community. And I told boards who say you know we need to have consensus on this. I said no, you don't. You need to have alignment. The question is not do you approve 100% of this, but can you reach a resolution that you can live with? That's alignment And that just tilts the table in a whole different way, a whole different perspective And that kind of way of dealing with disputes I found is successful.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:To that point though, because I had a retired judge on the podcast and he talk and he's now a mediator. He talked about how important preparation is for the mediation and how important it is to bring the right people to the mediation table. So if you're bringing a board member who's completely entrenched, that may not be the right pick. Would you agree for the mediation?
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, yeah, it's up to the attorney to to, and that's what's so different about our practice is that you know, decisions are made by multiple people and they all have personalities, agendas, summer passive, summer dominant, someone to win at any cost by God, and you've got to filter those people out.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Sometimes the person with the director with the worst communication style is the one who is spearheading all of the communications. That's been, that's been. That's been one of my challenges. You also in the book you deal with another condo in. That's the electric fan condominium and it's leaking windows. You deal with construction defects Again. I'm reading this book over the last couple of days and I'm like, well, marvin, did it again. That's another issue I'm dealing with right now. Yep, did it again.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So what intrigued me about your inclusion of the construction defects case in your book is the fact that our Florida legislature, marvin, just passed a bill that has drastically reduced our statute of repose, which is the longest statute of limitations in Florida to be able to bring a claim for a latent defect. And for our listeners, a latent defect is a defect that you is not readily apparent to the naked eye. Okay, so the statute of repose in Florida used to be 15 years when you found that hidden defect to bring a claim. This last bill reduced it down to seven and it also changed the triggering of the clock from the latest of a series of events to the earliest, which could include a temporary certificate of occupancy. And in Florida associations are not able, they don't have standing to bring a construction defects case until they've transitioned from developer control. So ostensibly, with this new law, in some HOAs they mean by the time they turn over. Seven years later, the clocks already run for any hidden defects.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:My question to you, because I know you've got a lot of government interwoven into your books Okay, and we'll get into that. Caitlyn's running for mayor. You're dealing with legislation. How are developers still convincing state legislators to chip away at consumer rights when it comes to construction defects?
Marvin Nodiff:I can really speak from the standpoint of my home state, my adopted state. I grew up in Arizona but I've lived here for 40 years. I worked in state government long before I went to law school. We're for about eight, 10 years. Eight or 10 years I started in the state auditor's office interesting, because I had a policy background. I was hired because I could read and write and we started doing This is a major innovation. My boss, kat Von, started doing performance auditing, not just financial. So we asked the questions what are you supposed to do? How well are you doing it? How effectively, how efficiently are you carrying out your job, whether it's inspecting widget manufacturers or hog forners, you know, and my job.
Marvin Nodiff:I met with the field examiners when they came in after looking at all the records, and I sat down with them and said what do you guys find? And they gave me their findings and I said what are you trying to say here? What's the big story? And one told me, after an examination of the division of finance, that it was easier to open a bank in Missouri than it is to get a loan. So my job was to write the report for public view, for write the report into plain English And it was a great spot to see how government worked, and I didn't know at the time how much those lessons would translate when I became a lawyer in this type of law, because dealing with boards is much the same because the factors, the stakeholders, lobbyists from trying to influence, and so I looked at state government.
Marvin Nodiff:I had a lot of interaction with the legislature over the six or eight years that I worked in government. I worked in governor's office and their parmination resources. So I had a lot of interaction with the legislature and I can look and compare what we have now. Now we have term limits and the lobbyists. If you look at institutions that affect policy, lobbyists for major interests are important. They become more important because of term limits. Now you have this institutional history in lobbyists as opposed to the legislators.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Why do you think the lobbyists have become more important? because of term limits?
Marvin Nodiff:Because it's easier for them to control through contributions and controlling the information. Who do you think drafts a lot of the bills that the legislature looks at?
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You're absolutely correct. I used to be a registered lobbyist in Florida for when my only client was a group called CALL, which is our Community Association Leadership Lobby, and it was not in paying, but it was comprised of all the different associations throughout Florida. So we go up there and try to educate our legislators about what it meant. how do these associations even operate? What do they need? What are the challenges? And the first thing I would ask is how many of you have actually lived when I would testify in front of a committee? How many of you live in a condo or HOA? Maybe one or two hands would go up.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:in a committee of a dozen, how many of you served on the board? No hands. So there was a complete disconnect. in many cases And this was years ago I could never lobby. now, marvin, when I see what's going on, i could never lobby. but you're right. It is much, as legislators often don't know what's in their own bills to any great extent, they're relying upon the lobbyists to give them some context. They're not subject matter experts on most of any of the bills they're sponsoring.
Marvin Nodiff:Right. Right, they really lack an independent source of information and evaluation of legislation. And that that tension, i think, raises a critical issue for community association leaders And to the extent that that we as I don't say an industry, but you know homeowner interests can be represented fairly and and effectively in state legislatures. And then on one hand you've got large lobbyists who make contributions to candidates and it creates, you know, i've seen this come up in different legislative action committees across the country. Do you want to form a PAC and raise money so that we can kind of even the scale here of influencing or having access to legislators? And you know, in one of my books I put this quote on election day would you rather have a million dollars or a million votes?
Donna DiMaggio Berger:What's the?
Marvin Nodiff:answer. I look at this and say we'll never out raise the kind of money that special interests have. We need to impress people with the number of people we have, the number of voters that we have. That's where I am on that whole issue.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Well, let's jump into the issue of preemption, because in your book there is a bill pending that would preempt regulation, i believe, of drones and short-term rentals like Airbnb, and we're again living that down here in Florida. Our governor right now is set to sign a bill which would preempt even landlord tenant rights. So I'm sitting speaking to you in Fort Lauderdale, florida. There's a Broward County ordinance which says that if you condo or HOA board, you turn down a potential tenant, you have to give a reason as to why you would. If this bill signs, potentially that means you can't have an ordinance that says that There seems to be a grab in terms of this preemption trend that everything that the state knows best.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:And I just had Vice Mayor Ray Martin on from the city of Lauderdale and we talked about it And he said if this continues and it's taken to its illogical extreme, why do you even need local government anymore? The state will just control everything. Is this a problem in Missouri as well, and have you seen it elsewhere? I mean, i know you do your research for your books.
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, missouri is the preemption leader, i'm sure. in the country We, you know, state preempts everything.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:What's the motive for that? Why Their control freaks?
Marvin Nodiff:A motive? Well, the motive is is that certain interests want to have their interests protected And it's easier to influence the state legislature, for reasons we discussed a few minutes ago, than a whole bunch of local governments, because you have one target and they're down in the same room, versus hundreds of thousands of municipal and county local governments, so it's easier. I mean, you know, on the drone thing, they they tried that in Missouri a couple of years ago to preempt local governments and they want to change in zoning In the state zoning law that would declare short term rentals as residential period. They would be defined as residential. Well, really, i mean, there's a commercial operation and it's a zoning thing, and zoning forever has been a thing of local control. So that one definition would would basically preempt local governments. It didn't, it didn't pass, but that's just. That's an example of preempts.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:What is out there and, speaking from my experience, once the idea is out there, they tend to revisit it. How many counties do you have? Marvin in Missouri?
Marvin Nodiff:113 plus St Louis City.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You have 113 counties. In Florida we have 67 counties. I mean, go around the country. Do we really think that a state in in these large small states, that they know what's best in all of these counties and then even drill down even further in all of their cities?
Marvin Nodiff:No, no, there's just two different. There are two TOO too many differences. You know, i think in Florida, and probably Missouri as well, there are really some sharp, sharp differences between urban areas and rural areas And one size does not fit all, and zoning is a particular issue where that's proven to be true. One size does not fit all, it's it's. You know, zoning is important to, to have a say in in the quality of life for people, where you separate different uses into different areas. And that's a local matter because you're going to protect communities and let them thrive by having effective zoning.
Marvin Nodiff:And as for short-term rentals, come in and so many other things. So it's really harmful And to look at condo and HOA problems in from the perspective of Jeff City and say, well, one size fits all. If they're, you know, if the legislature is dominated and they are dominated by representatives from smaller counties, rural counties that don't have the kinds of of high-rise condos that the urban areas have, then you really need to to allow the urban areas to deal with those problems, you know, and surfside comes to mind. To what extent do we have inspections, should we driven by local government or state law, and reserves and funding and disclosure of all that. Those are important issues because we have older building stock in the urban areas.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Well, it's funny you mentioned that because in the immediate aftermath of Champlain Towers the legislature concluded its regular session and didn't pass a single safety reform. Of course there was a huge outcry saying are you kidding me? We just had this catastrophe and you guys ended session without anything. They went back in special session. They did pass a bill that called for massive reforms. You know we only had two counties Marvin in Florida that required building certifications when buildings reached their 40 and 50 year anniversaries. Those were the only Miami Dade and Broward in the aftermath of surfside, and that legislation passed in the special session. Now it was a requirement for all 67 counties and they also passed a requirement mandating funding of reserves because, as you know, so many, so many older buildings for decades just decided to kick the ball further down the field and not fund reserves. But this last session, the glitch bill that was passed, sb 154, that bill kind of goes back and says to counties the local authority can set deadlines, they can give you more time, they can give you less time. So to your point, you know we hear about it all the time. In a state as diverse as Florida, culturally, demographically, you know, sometimes when the state comes down and really wants to throw the book at boards. You've got a board in Jacksonville or Fort Walton Beach saying that's a Miami condo board or HOA problem That has no relevance whatsoever And, as a matter of fact, you're putting handcuffs on us, and you're not only are you solving a problem that doesn't exist for us, you're creating a new problem. So to your point, i agree Again.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I talked about the names. I talked about Joshua's nemesis in the book is Chippy Kimbrough IV, and he works at BFD. What's the largest? and I get the feeling that it's kind of a David versus Goliath battle you're setting up here, and I'm a partner here at Becker. We are probably considered the 800 pound gorilla in the Florida market, and we're in other states as well. So I have to tell you I've got to ask you what's the largest law firm you've ever worked for? How many attorneys?
Marvin Nodiff:Well, i think I mentioned that I went to law school like 10 years after I graduated college, so at the ripe age of 33 or 35 or so, when I got out of law school, i knew that I wasn't going to be attractive to a large firm, regardless of grades, just my age. And second, i really didn't want to. I've been, i've been, i had been a grunt in many of my life experiences prior to that. So the reason I went to law school is I realized that state government was fun, but it was not a profession, it was not a career, and so I wanted that kind of stability and certainty, besides getting to know how important the law was during those 10 years. So I started my own firm. So, in answer your question, one.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I knew you were going to say that, but I've listened. I started out and I worked at a little boutique firm. It was a family owned firm. I was the only attorney who was not a family member, but they treated me very well. So I've been at a six lawyer firm And now I think we're at we're not a huge firm, but I think we're at about 150 attorneys, so they'd probably be considered large. To me it boils down to the relationship with your particular attorney. So I don't know, it's that. It's the size of the firm, and I think that's what you were getting at in your book with BFD. I think it was not the size of the firm, it was the culture of the firm which seems fairly cutthroat.
Marvin Nodiff:Yeah, i enjoy it. I enjoy the conflict for a David and Goliath scenario because I think it's something that readers will grasp. It's something that's of interest to me And I've been up against the large firms on construction defects on all kinds of cases, not the little ones but big cases. I had a case down in Branson, missouri, where there was the biggest firm in St Louis was on the other side. So I've been around that track And they'll load you up with all kinds of paperwork and discovery And, like I said, they can try to overwhelm you. So I think it's not just attempting but it's a real dilemma because you want to even scale in terms of representation for our condo associations in HOAs.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Well, let me talk to you about even in the scale when you were actively representing associations. Did you ever come up against people representing themselves pro se? For instance, sometimes when we go to covenant enforcement actions, when you're enforcing against a violation, the violator will represent himself or herself without benefit of counsel. Did that ever occur?
Marvin Nodiff:Oh sure, even in collection cases we've had it.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So in those cases, Marvin, you were the BFD.
Marvin Nodiff:Oh yeah, yeah, You were the Goliath in those cases. It's easy Just looking at the association as a party in lawsuit against an individual is easy attempting to portray the association as the big bad organization, the corporation that's oppressing us, overwhelming us, and yet sometimes they're the victim And it is the perception is out there, but sometimes it's actually the big bad association that's in the more vulnerable position.
Marvin Nodiff:Right, yeah, and that's circling back to our discussion about journalism and reporters. That's a point that will take some work, i think, with journalists to get that perspective that associations are not the big bad, oppressive partner of players in this.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So in a couple of your books, particularly in Pimball, lawyer, marvin, you tackle the issue of judicial corruption right In the book. The judge by the way, the judge's name, i recognize that name not as a judge but as a member of the, a very esteemed member of CCAL. Just a coincidence, i'm sure. But he refuses to recuse himself, despite having a relationship with the large law firm BFD. Has that been an experience in your when you practiced that you had concerns about judicial corruption?
Marvin Nodiff:That's an extreme example And sometimes in fiction you have to use extreme examples to make a point In the day-to-day practice. Now in Missouri the system of appointing judges has been around since the 1940s when Missouri was really a pioneer in devising a system where the governor appoints judges, but from a panel of possible nominees who are named through the bar system. So they're all qualified candidates. However, that applies to the urban areas City of St Louis, for example. Outstate is a whole different thing where judges are elected same in Illinois. Judges are elected. So I have to wonder when I have opposing counsel next to me and I'm in front of a judge in another county, did my opposing, did my opponent, give a campaign contribution to this guy? Are they going to have lunch after this hearing? So that definitely took the scale for us And we almost have to look at hiring local counsel. We have a big case outstate.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I mean, this is such a broader topic in terms of judicial integrity We're seeing it play out on the national stage. So I look forward to reading future books and seeing how you continue to tackle that issue. I want to talk about artificial intelligence Because I've been really following chat GPT. I've been following Elon Musk saying in the other Silicon Valley moguls saying that this is going to be the destruction of humanity And yet they still developed all the technology for it.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Bfd has in your novel, a computer named Clifford, which Joshua first believes is just some genius researcher locked away in a dungeon somewhere that's turning out all these great briefs for them. Turns out Clifford is in fact artificial intelligence And he kind of feeds it a little virus along the lines of the Independence Day plot with Jeff Goldblum. So I recently asked chat GPT Marvin, how do we get good people to serve on a homeowners association board? And within 60 seconds actually spat out probably eight paragraphs bullet points. Really good, send it to. My marketing department said can you believe this? Can you believe this? Like this could actually form the basis for something. It's such a great tie in with what you wrote that book back in 2019. We're in 2023. And now we're talking about chat, gbt. I can just imagine the wheels turning in your head about where this is going. My question to you is, first of all, what are your thoughts overall about artificial intelligence? Is it going to improve association operations or could it go off the rails?
Marvin Nodiff:Believe it or not. In my most recent book, i do have an episode with AI in a different setting from pinball, and actually read a book to try and get more understanding. I do try to do research when I want to do things that I'm not familiar with And at the end of the book I saw okay, ai can be extremely helpful for associations and managers in sorting massive amounts of data, and I use the example of going through all your delinquent accounts for the past five years or something to get an idea of why people are delinquent and to break that down into different you know is it an age thing? Is it a family thing? Are people living alone or older people in fixed incomes? What's the best way to tackle our delinquency issue? And we use AI to sort through massive data for a large community And, however, it's not so useful for things like landscape violations, where it calls for judgment, because AI doesn't have human judgment. They can give you a result, but they have no idea. Ai has no idea if the result is good or bad.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Not yet, marvin, we'll see.
Marvin Nodiff:Well, that takes a good touch And that's, you know, that's really the dilemma, I think, for the future of AI is bringing in a human touch into the final decision making. So I do have an episode in my new book on AI.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:So everyone's talking about which professions is AI going to render obsolete? And I actually thought about you know, could you have an online manager who can? but you just mentioned the judgment calls that have to be made. Could you have a Clifford? that really, i mean as association attorneys or as attorneys. I don't know that we need to fear being rendered obsolete by AI, but what are your thoughts?
Marvin Nodiff:I envision. I envision a new division down at the city civil courts building called Division 99. Okay, so you're a homeowner and you're maybe a serial filer, so you go down with your petition and you can file it in Division 99 and then your opponent has 30 days to file an answer and AI makes the decision, because he can tap all these court cases and render a decision and you'll never have to talk to a judge.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:How far out? how far out do you think we are from this possibility?
Marvin Nodiff:Not far.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:All right, we'll see. We'll see. I wanted to read a quote from pinball lawyer that I that I really liked at one point. the office manager snapper. And for people you read the book, you'll understand why she's called snapper. She says to Joshua you're like the silver ball in a pinball machine. Rick is sheying off flippers and bumpers. Is it a game of skill or chance? How can you practice law when you're pinballing from one crisis to the next? Do you feel that all practice, all legal practice areas, fit that description? or our practice area of community association law in particular, fits that?
Marvin Nodiff:No, i love the quote because it's it's so real. It is real. It also may be surreal, and I think it reflects practice in our field. Community association lawyers have to know a lot about a lot of different fields of practice, everything from easements to fair housing and all of that, and and on top of that labor law contracts, even sometimes criminal law, you name it.
Marvin Nodiff:There's more than a dozen fields that we have that we have to be extremely familiar with, and because we're going from one issue to the next as we move from one file or one case to another. And on top of that is the complexity of the client. We talked about this a few minutes ago. That clients are are it's group decision making, and a lot of you know half of my time was spent being a social worker trying to deal with people and people problems, not legal. You have to understand the people problems before you can deal with the legal problems, so that makes it even more complex. And, yeah, sometimes you feel like a pinball And I love that quote because it just, you know it reflects as why I named the book the pinball of your, because I love it And it and it read and it definitely resonated with me.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:But how would you find time to write when you were a practicing touring? I love to write. I've written a fiction book, nothing to do with associations, more historical fiction. Never had time to actually wrap it up, but how did you find time to write?
Marvin Nodiff:The, the it kind of based the question of why I started to write And then I found the time to do it. Some, you know, some major decisions just come because opportunity or challenges plunked at your doorstep that you weren't expecting. I hadn't thought about writing fiction. There's one particular manager who I'd known for years and she'd call up and tell me about this problem And and I'd see if I need to intervene and get involved. So one day she called, it was late in the afternoon and she was telling me about this. You know, this disgruntled owner and and all kinds of complaints, and this is really complicated and the board is upset and and and. At the end of this lament she said you know, i mean, this stuff is really crazy. So much to write a book. And I thought about that And I thought that's a dare, i'm being dared, and so I paused that And I, you know, in a week after that I looked into that and wondered well, you know, i was a fiction that's out there.
Marvin Nodiff:Nobody's really setting stories and community associations. I have a vast array of material to work with. I have all kinds of fun issues that are that are interesting If I can figure out a plot that's both entertaining and has mystery and has some romance in it, then that's a big challenge. So that's what I set out to do And while I was practicing the only time I had I had to compartmentalize. You know, you put your files in your head, you put them in a box and put them away. At 1030, 11 o'clock at night I'd start and I worked for a couple of hours. That's where I found the time.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You feel like writing is your life's purpose.
Marvin Nodiff:It's hard to say. It's satisfying in the sense that I think there's something of value. You know I mentioned earlier one of the things I want to do is inform the broad general public about the kinds of issues and the community and the lifestyle that's involved in community association. Living in form. It's another way of educating. To me That's really high priority. I want to do it in an entertaining way, with wit and plot twists and that sort of thing.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You make a really good point, because people learn in all different modalities. Some people it's visual to show me, you know, a video or a webinar. I'm good. Others want to, you know, delve into more scholarly articles, but I think there is a huge benefit to reading about this in an entertaining fiction novel, which is why I was so excited to have you on the podcast, because we're in our second season. We've had a lot of people have not found anybody who does what you do, and I think it's really cool. So, now that you're no longer practicing actively, though, where are you drawing your inspiration for plots and characters?
Marvin Nodiff:Oh, because I keep up with my colleagues across the country And you know it's not like I'm just kind of inspiring these crazy things. Read the headlines and ask the question what if? what if this happens? I like to put kind of typical boards and I have colorful characters, memorable characters, but put them into unusual circumstances We have to deal with with emerging technology. My first book talked about cybercrime and it want to be years ahead of computer hacking that has occurred And I've talked about the issues of drones and the potential for that or the downside of that and all kinds of things that I look at new issues that boards will wind up dealing with.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:You're curious, That's that. That's it. You're curious. And from that curiosity these, these plots and characters come. As anybody ever reached out to you and said Marvin, I know that's me You wrote about in that book.
Marvin Nodiff:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Are they flattered or horrified?
Marvin Nodiff:Mistaken mostly. Oh, it's not them. A lot of times that they've seen themselves in the character It's not a particular person, but there's certainly the model of that type of person, the personality, for example.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Is Joshua based on you? Fesa, fesa, yeah, you know he. And, by the way, i have to say I said it in the intro all these very attractive women seem to be wanting to want his attention really into him. He's a commitment phobe. Is this based on you at some point?
Marvin Nodiff:Joshua is tall, he's handsome, he's got charm, he speaks fluently, he's got charm. That I mentioned, that You did, yeah, and so you know. And he's attractive to women. So it's definitely not me, all right.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:I'm going to let you off the hook on that one And I've taken up so much of your time. I did want to say when we were talking prior to this episode, we both have daughters in the entertainment industry. So my daughter Lauren is out in LA. She's working for a large talent agency. Your daughter Monica is in New York City. She's doing marketing and training for people in the theater business. Is there any chance one of your books is going to make it to a screen or stage anytime soon?
Marvin Nodiff:Yes, some great authors were not discovered until much later in their careers. So I'm patient.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Well, maybe this podcast episode will help. So tell people where they can find all these wonderful books.
Marvin Nodiff:They can find them in the CAI bookstore online, and some of them are with Amazon, but any member of CAI, of course, will get the membership level in terms of the pricing. So that's the first place to go.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:And what about your website? Don't you have a website that talks about all of your books?
Marvin Nodiff:It's my name MarvinNotiffcom.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:And Notif is N-O-D-I-F-F MarvinNotiffcom. Marvin. Thank you so much. I am going to read What's the latest one out.
Marvin Nodiff:The New Book. The newest book came out in April and it's entitled The Great Condo Heist.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Okay, all right, maybe we can get you back on to talk about once. I read a few of the other ones.
Marvin Nodiff:Love to. It's been fun, Donna. Thanks so much.
Donna DiMaggio Berger:Thank you so much. Thank you for joining us today. Don't forget to follow and rate us on your favorite podcast platform or visit tickettotheboardcom for more ways to connect.