You’d need a contract with this guy saying who is to pay attorney fees in order to collect any. Of course nobody in your hoa has such a thing.

Sounds like nobody is claiming damages so it’s not like a court will up and declare the winner gets say 50k and it washes the legal costs out.

The real reason to fight this is because your neighborhood may not be pleased with what is built on it once he gets title and sells it off.

You have to watch for this kind of stuff. In many states, 7 years of open and hostile use opens the door to adverse possession.

Probably have to vote out the hoa board or see if by laws allow you to force some sort of vote among the owners to take or not take a given action.

38k seems really high for a lawsuit like this. There really shouldn’t be much discovery to dig through and likely a survey that wasn’t very much. I’d be questioning the billable hours and maybe see if the hoa would replace the attorney. Do they have a senior partner involved where a real estate specialist would be better suited?