Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Illinois

Private Property? No way to tell without a review of both the governing documents, your deed, and a survey. While you may legally own the driveway, you may also only have an exclusive right to use it, and either way it sounds like the Association is saying that it is subjected to the governing documents that give the Association control over it including the right to direct how it is maintained. From a practical matter, however, as an owner the question I would want to ask is whether last year's seal-coating work had a warranty -- if it was only for a year, or the season, then really the issue is whether the Association can get a contractor to give a longer warranty and save the owners some money. If it was for two years, then why should the owners pay again this year instead of calling the original contractor back to perform warranty work if the original seal-coating work failed. Most seal-coating work I've seen is not annually, and may be an unreasonable expense, but the Association may have the last word even if the owners meet and grouse about the expense, which they may have the right to do, which only raises some political issues because then the board would say they're being questioned on everything. So in the end sometimes the only way to "combat" these kinds of expenses is to run for the board!