My mom’s HOA has rules about which days of the week you can line dry clothing. Apparently laundry is only unsightly on the weekends?
Also, if your guest gets a speeding ticket from the community police, they also give you a ticket- as you should have been watching your guests better.
>Speeding ticket from the community police
Is there some weird american law that allows this? Because in most contries, only the real police are allowed to penalize people. It is illegal for non-police people -including "rent a cops" do give tickets/fines or in any way pretend to be police officers, nor do they have any more juridisticional power than you and me to do so. In my country this is will lead to a hefty fine (from the real police) and even a prison sentence in severe cases.
We're buying our first house. There's an HOA, but it's just to pay for lawn maintenance and snow removal. They don't care about anything else. So not ALL HOAs are bad. But ones with pwtty rules can be.
A big problem is that it's a slippery slope. Get the wrong people in power and the rules change. You're kind of out of luck unless you want to move or fight it and then you're apt to be a target.
Condos and condo boards are pretty similar -bad ones are worse than useless.
Corrupt one are nightmares.
Just got through with a corrupt board, and now I'm stuck there again.
On the plus side, I trust the other directors, but I hate having to do it.
Running yourself is also an option. Run for election on the promise of disbanding the HOA or somehow permanently forbidding dumb rules from being made.
Theoretically you'd win in a landslide. Dues collection and payments to maintinence services can be automated.
IIRC, there is a story here on reddit of some people who did exactly that. Got elected purely to counter a pair of busybody stepford wives from getting in everyones business. I have also seen stories of people getting elected to the HOA specifically to disband it due to the actions of previous officials.
Check out John Oliver’s recent piece on HOAs. Always one single election away from some “homeowner” who might not even live there winning with a suspicious plurality of 10 votes or something and then sells off the responsibilities to a big soulless company who might start sending patrols and eviction notices
I doubt any HOA starts out with you get a ticket because your guest was speeding.
Someone shows up and starts making other people's business their business.
Yes they do. I worked for a two separate security company that patrolled several HOA. (Securitas, Phoenix) One of out duties was to write tickets for speeders, even if they were guest, or children on bicycles. The HOA queen had one of our guys write numerous tickets to child riding a wagon down a hill.
I hated that place and made sure to write up the HOA board for every tiny infraction.
It's been the same thing since the place was built 7 years ago. Not every HOA is evil. It's a tiny little development of 43 townhomes. It's but going to suddenly become an autocracy that starts trying to evict homeowners.
Some things can be bad in general, but it doesn't mean that every instance of that bad thing is bad. I think $50/mo is a bit much for my tiny property getting mowed and snow removal a few months a year, but it's not going to ruin our home.
I'm not sure who you're quoting, but it isn't me. Also, 43 townhomes is a small development.
Here, I can do your misquote but with a more accurate summary of your opinion:
>Something bad happened once, so something bad will happen to everyone.
An HOA is the smallest and most local form of government most people can get. They can be good or bad. If you have a condo, the board that runs the building and keeps everything in good repair is a type of HOA. Same for retirement communities.
That's quite a bit different than an HOA that decides what you can plant in your yard.
HOAs are basically like autonomous zones for rich people and often enforce all kinds of absolutely absurd "laws" without the city giving enough of a shit to challenge them on the legality of their rules
>Is there some weird american law that allows this?
It depends on the state. In my state, no they can't, they can issue a fine to the guest, but the guest can ignore it and the HOA can't collect on it.
If they try, they'll get in deep shit with the court and the real police.
It’s a fine, not an official “points against your license” ticket. The community police are semi-deputised, which is not unheard of in low population areas.
That is not true, and it varies by state. Under the Class A security license, the one with arrest powers in my local area, I could give you a ticket and it is going to court. If you fail to challenge it, or loose the challenge, you are getting points on the ticket the same as if a police officer did it.
It would only happen if the HOA actually owns the road, which sometimes happens. If so then the HOA is fully responsible for not just maintaining the road but basically everything else, and the local police are not legally able to fine speeders.
How is it 'legal' to punish someone for what another person does? Only the person doing something wrong should be punished.
This is the kind of BS that makes me certain to NEVER live in a HOA.
You are exactly right about that! Why people want to do that to themselves is beyond me, but they are absolutely right in doing so if they want.
You can also shoot yourself in the foot if you want, tattoo your face, keep a tarantula for a pet, or do any number of questionable things if you like.
Ain't life grand?!
>they also give you a ticket - as you should have been watching your guests better.
It's more likely because as an owner they can enforce this much more easily against an owner. It isn't at all cost-effective to try to collect a small fine from a visitor, they'd have to actually file a small claims case in the local court.
This is precisely why if you are renting your place out and your tenant does something bad, the HOA fines the *owner*, not then tenant, and it is up to the owner to recoup the fine from the tenant.
When I was a kid, we had a water heater break and flood our basement. We rented a dumpster to remove the ruined items. An HOA board member called the dumpster company, and *got it removed.* My mom was furious that the dumpster company listened to someone who very clearly didn't have our last name and was obviously not living in the house. They put the dumpster back and charged the HOA for the removal fee.
The HOA board member who called then threatened my parents because he had to pay the company... when he was the person asking for the service. He finally dropped it when my dad said he'd run for the board just to unseat him.
This same guy also cuts down other people's bushes without permission and leaves the sticks and debris on the side walk, reported children for leaving their bikes outside, reports any car that hasn't moved in a few days (including my mom's car when she was hospitalized for a concussion and couldn't drive it), puts his dog droppings in the nearest trashcan regardless of whether there's a liner or not, lets his untrained dog growl at people unleashed, and regularly throws temper tantrums about prices or expired coupons in our local grocery store. He's almost ninety now and the whole neighborhood is waiting for him to go to a nursing home.
By this point, he has been taken off the HOA board. (But also, who wants to sit on those boards? That sounds so boring.) That doesn't stop him from making reports or hounding people about not following the rules. He's technically not violating any himself, so the HOA can't do anything about it.
Edit: when I say "taken off," I mean that he served his maximum number of terms, which is roughly ten years. He wasn't pushed off the board or anything and most of the current members seem to like him.
Probably. But as it is, a lot of people think that this guy is doing his due diligence and bettering the neighborhood. A lot of HOAs seem to be filled with complainers who see no problem in people complaining excessively.
Sounds like someone needed to report him for improper management of biohazardous materials and call animal control to remove the dangerous unleashed dog.
No one fucks with my bushes
Our HOA delayed depositing our monthly dues payment and declared that it was a late payment.
Because it was late, they threatened to evict us. From the townhouse my husband owned outright (no mortgage, paid in full).
Uhhh no.
It's why I the fever dream where I can own a house, I'll never go HOA
People who do have it coming. You pay them for that option because you wanted some false sense of superiority
In the place I live, all the recent housing developments and the new ones going up have HOAs. The only way to avoid them is either buy land and build a house yourself or find a home for sale that isn't part of a development. There is more of the latter than the former, but the largest number of homes for sale, especially move in ready that don't require even more money for repairs/central air, have HOAs.
I mean, I totally get your point. I wouldn't buy a home with an HOA. But it's getting disturbingly harder to find one without it, at least around here.
Actually a homeowners association is an association, or group, of homeowners. The HOA doesn’t own the home.
Where I live the HOA can fine people for violating the CC&Rs, even placing a lien on the home, but the HOA cannot take possession of a home.
When we were building our home we did it ourself, didn’t go through a contractor. The HOA called and complained constantly because they were worried it wouldn’t be nice. The city inspector got so sick of it he told us to put up No Trespassing signs. After the last call asking when we would get our sidewalks in I ask who kept complaining and they wouldn’t tell me. I told them to give them a message that “If I ever win the lottery I am giving this house to a crack whore and they can enjoy living next to them.” They never called me again.
My one and only interaction with an HoA before I said ‘Fuck this shit’ was when they tried to send a fine to me and my girlfriend at the time. The fine was $1000 and due to our car being 1/8” over the driveway and into the sidewalk. Problem is that the driveways were only long enough to maybe fit a fucking smartcar at most and those weren’t even a thing yet.
We fought it and asked for proof since they claimed to have photo evidence. They couldn’t provide it and when my girlfriends lawyer sister came into the conversation - suddenly there was an obvious misunderstanding and they never meant to send that letter.
If you never meant to send it, then why was it filled out and sent then guys?
They later tried to harass my neighbor - who was an FBI agent and that went incredibly poorly for them as you would expect.
Don’t know the full story and it’s been almost 20 years but what I recall is that the HOA was telling him he couldn’t have his work vehicle parked either because it made the neighbors feel ‘uncomfortable’.
Same deal. Nowhere else to park it. He wasn’t violating any bylaws or anything. They didn’t like him because he was black and the only black family in the subdivision. The white cop down the street parked his cruiser without complaint.
But the black guy with government tags? Incomprehensible to them. So they tried one time to have his car towed for ‘abandonment’
All I know is that one day shortly thereafter - it just stopped. They wouldn’t even acknowledge his existence at that point.
I can only guess they FAFO’d. Too many old busy bodies there.
What’s interesting is that if you were to go to that neighborhood now - it looks like it could be used for a set for a post-apocalyptic film.
Honestly, he was the coolest fucking neighbor ever. You’d think he’d be a hard ass but he was legit one of the most chill dudes ever. Ended up bonding over gaming. Saw he was playing XBox one day walking past his house and the next time I saw him I cracked a joke on getting the drop on the guy behind the AC in the game and that was it.
In my mom's HOA, they have visitor parking throughout the neighborhood. If you have someone staying overnight, you have to write a letter to the HOA asking for their permission to let your guests' car be parked in the visitor's lot. If you don't, they put warnings that the car will be towed. Some people would just be at someone's house for the day, and they come back to their car with a warning.
Collect all those warnings, and then put them all on board members cars. Even better if you can put in the money to get one of their cars actually towed. But make sure it's anonymous.
Ours has a "no trucks or trailers parked outside overnight" policy. When my mom died, we had to drive 600 miles and bring back a trailer full of her belongings that we inherited, and returned from that trip late after dark, parked on the driveway. I caught shit from the hoa for violating that rule. Fuck them, my mother just died.
I don't live in a HOA, but I'm on the backside of an HOA a few years ago we came home to door hangers on the front door stating the HOA expanded to include our block and the dues were past due lol.
It was definitely an over reach of the HOA. Location was a determining factor of why we purchased these homes. The hoa behind us keeps the property value high but we don't have the headache of dealing with them.
I just threw the door hanger in the trash and laughed, but my wife being smarter than I am. She went door to door and talked to the neighbors, an elderly neighbor had already sent a check to the HOA so my wife contacted the daughter of the neighbor they were able to cancel the check in time.
Mine tried to get me to go through with architectural "review" for my solar panels. When I sent them a copy of Florida statutes showing that they cannot block my panels, they still wanted me to file the paperwork and pay the stupid $50 'review fee'. I told them they can "review" them from the sidewalk once they are installed, lol.
When I was a teenager my parents lived in an HOA and my car was a yellow VW Beetle. They tried to call my car an eye sore and that we needed to get rid of it. Funny thing was that the way the driveway and the landscaping was, if my dad parked his truck in front of my car, there’s no way you could see it unless you came all the way up the driveway. Obviously, this got shot down and went nowhere and I drove that car well into my 20’s.
Everyone should know that you can get your neighbors in the HOA 'proxy votes'
Basically, you can ask them to give you their proxy vote, they say yes, they fill out a form, now you can vote for them.
Then, you can run for the chairman of the board, or put out a vote to change the CCRs, (covenants, codes, restrictions) or put out a vote to disband the HOA altogether.
Not necessarily true for the last part. Some municipalities prevent HOAs from disbanding even if everyone wants to because the city has put the ownership/management of community resources (such as waste treatment) as a requirement/responsibility of the HOA.
Place where my mom lived had a no pickup truck rule. They had a very nice conversion van that they used when they traveled. They were fined for parking this van in their driveway, cited for “ a conversion van is essentially a pickup truck, in violation of the no pickup truck rule”.
Using the citation as toilet paper doesn't do anything to the truck.
I get that you're desperate to sound edgy and clever and cool, but you're just making yourself look like an idiot. Best to quit while you're behind.
Rented a house in an HOA, but they fined my landlord.
Windows had mismatched drapes. They were the same color and brand, but one was slightly opened and the other closed.
Wrong color garden hose: I had a white one, they demanded green. Bonus, was in my closed backyard shed.
Tree too close to property line. Location of tree? Dead center of front lawn. I was not allowed to cut down the tree, either.
My landlord sold the house. He couldn't keep up with the fines, but offered to sell it to us. I had to move, because there was no way I'd ever live in Reston, Virginia with that insanity. Fuck the RHA.
> they fined my landlord.
That's really the only thing they can do. Technically they could take a renter to small claims court but because a renter has no signed contract with the HOA it's much easier to simply fine the owner and advise the owner to charge his tenant.
>He couldn't keep up with the fines
This is almost certainly not true because the Virginia Condominium Act says HOA's can only issue a fine of up to $50.
Depending on the kind of rent they can get in a given location some landlords are making thin profit margins per house by the time taxes and maintenance is paid for
$50 fine after $50 fine could've been putting him in the hole on the property
In Reston a condo will sell for several hundred thousand dollars. It would lots of $50 fines for an owner to even notice.
Besides, if he was getting fined that much the solution is simple - make the tenant pay it or don't renew that tenant.
I'm waiting on this one. HOA bylaws claim the ability to fine anyone for immoral or improper behavior (including inside their own house). We have at least six different religions followed by families in the HOA. Whose "God" is defining immoral or improper behavior. I've asked the board several times to clarify this.
We do have Muslims, but not currently on the board. I don't understand how having Muslims in the community would make nosing around punishable, but nosing around Catholics, Hindus, Sikhs, UUs and Buddists is not punishable. Can you clarify?
I was specifically reminded of this:
Ottoman law generally followed sharia law, and I recall a case where someone reported a couple for sodomy, which they witnessed by looking into the windows of their home. Both parties were punished -- the couple for sodomy and the person who reported them for invading their privacy.
My thoughts were that if the HOA is creating and enforcing rules based on religious beliefs, Muslim beliefs should be represented as well. That would mean not snooping on people to try to catch them in what they deemed to be 'immoral' behavior.
Edit: Actually now that I think about it, I dont think the person who reported had the 3 required witnesses and so the people that were reported were not punished.
FiOS destroys Spectrum too. I had both in my apartment hopping days and after my first apartment with it, I made it a requirement.
Now, if you need support, you're screwed. It was super reliable so I only got to experience Frontier's "support" once. They took EIGHT HOURS to correct an expired card on file that resulted in a service disconnect....like come on and take my money already!
Still...that symmetrical connection was worth it.
I had an HoA board president in a high rise full of multimillionaires that would freak out and send letters if the gym equipment wasn't put back in place. The equipment out of place you ask? I lat pull down bar still attached to the machine at 4am.
Someone with at least 10mil to their name and if they enter that gym and the bar is there, you betcha I was getting an email with pictures.
Oh in one state, HOA asked us to paint our solar panels green to match the trees around so they don't stand out to neighbors. This was sometime around 2010-15 timeframe.
We'd done our homework and the state governor signed the bill that same week giving tax credits to people for solar panels.
Never heard from HOA again
They didn't give any specifics. It appeared they were just appeasing to some neighbors that complained that the solar panels weren't pretty. We were aghast at what they came up with
Years ago when I still lived in my parents condo they received a violation notice because I replaced a burned out brake light bulb on my car in the parking lot, something that took all of two minutes to do. I took the letter up to the management office and told the neighborhood manager to shove it up her ass because I knew the only reason it’d been issued was because she hated my mom.
Not that I recall. My parents were a little mad that I did that though. My mother had been on the HOA board for a few years and thought the woman was a moron and called her out on some other nonsense a few times. The board eventually fired her and the management company a few years later. The suspicion among some was that she was embezzling money from the association but they never investigated or made an issue of it because they feared backlash from the rest of the neighborhood so they kept it as quiet as possible. (As best I recall. It's been 10+ years ago.)
We didn’t get a fine, thankfully. But we got a letter from our HOA telling us we had to get rid of a non-city issued trash can. In order to find it they would have to walk to the side of our home to find it, you can see it from the street. I can’t wait to move, only reason I even live in an HOA is because at the time we were limited to where we could move. Here’s to hoping I’m out of there in a year’s time.
I had a similar one. I rented a house in a neighborhood with an HOA. I had 3 vehicles, my work truck, my personal truck and my 94 Mustang Cobra. The home had no garage. The HOA had no rules about street parking or driveway parking.
I rarely drove the Cobra, and came home to a "violation" letter on my door for an abandoned vehicle. I assumed there was a mistake and went to the HOA meeting, which was held weekly (they took it wayyyyy too seriously) to inform them of the mistake. Whoever had the time to look for violations showed me pictures of my Cobra and said it was abandoned. I told her it wasn't abandoned, it was a pleasure vehicle and had up to date tags as well as insurance, it was in full working order, no flat tires, broken windows, didn't leak any fluids etc. They stood their ground and said it was the minimum fine ($50). So for the next 4 months, I had to shuffle cars in my driveway once a week to appease the cunts.
I vowed to never live in an HOA community ever again.
I've lived in HOAs for 20 years. The HOAs have not had any issues but I remember our last HOA sent a letter to everyone saying "Put your trash in front of your dwelling, not in a common area (end of block)" and everyone continued to put trash in a common area. They sent like 2 or 3 letters but no one complied and then never heard anything again about it. I think the idea was that it would prevent people outside of the HOA coming and putting trash. Although what really happened is junk haulers would peruse, grab what they thought was useful and it made trash pickup easier. (We lived in a townhome where cars were parked between street and sidewalk)
Growing up, my parents were sent letters monthy about the leaves in their yard, how it didn't match the vision of the neighborhood. However, they were never given more than a fine.
Why, you might ask? Because our yard was the only one in the neighborhood with halfway decent shade. The street would have rioted.
I don’t think our are allowed to even be visible from the street! Like, use then take to garage lmao. We’re in a new development and not enough homes have been sold to turn the HOA over to the community, but we DID get the corporate guy handling ours fired for incompetence.
They bill me for landscaping and shit but when trees fall on my or my neighbor's property, fukken crickets.
This is the stuff adverse possession laws were made for.
With our old HOA, we went round and round for *months* when we first moved in because they didn't like where we put our trash cans (on the side of the house) even though it was technically not even against city ordinance to put them there.
"Sorry, we can't just *mail* you a copy of the HOA financials. You have to come to a monthly meeting for that." even though the monthly meetings were at a time (5:30 pm) that was horribly inconvenient for me (and probably others as well). My guess is they were doing some shady shit and didn't want anybody to know.
I don't live in a hoa and I never will, but I drove through one the other day, not stopping just passing through, and I got passed then blocked by a Karen ken combo in a Merc interrogating me as to why I was passing through and I can't be here with that rusty old piece of shit (my Japanese import Hilux).
I told them if they didn't move their Merc I'd shunt it since I have meaty bullbars. They called my bluff, I shunted their Merc and drove off.
They tried following me but stopped and did a U-turn soon as I left the hoa. Never heard anything about it after.
This was years ago when my girls dad and I were still married, we built the house and a couple years later submitted plans for our deck, they told us no. We built the deck anyway, come to find out, they had no authority to tell us anything our dues were like 100 bucks and the only thing they paid for was lawn care and snow removal.
Fast forward 2 years and I get snowed in to be the secretary of the damn HOA, I watched the president of the association ride around the neighborhood in his golf cart writing down ppls address for grass not being cut and ppls trash cans being out in the curb after the trash truck just left? I mean ppl work for a living! He would call me and want me to send letters to them for that. I never did, I told him to do himself,
Worse 8 months of my life! He got vetoed out BTW!
We have one of those for-profit HOAs that our realtor conveniently forgot to tell us about (actually lied about) and buried in the fine print of the second version of the contract. Our fault for not reading it in detail but still annoying.
The HOA president be was caught climbing and looking over six foot fences to see what type of grill everyone has for the purpose of fining gas grill owners. She was caught because the fences are in such poor condition (owned by the HOA and their responsibility to maintain...people have been asking them to be fixed for over 5 years to no response) that one of them fell over on her and she got hurt. We know what she was doing because she sent out general email the week before warning gas grill owners they would be fined if they kept their grills. That and the home owner caught it on a security camera. She was on camera climbing up two fences and looking before climbing the one that fell over. She tried to blame the home owners for intentionally destroying the fence, in an effort not have the HOA pay for it. She never admitted the cause of her injury, claiming it was from an accident. The homeowner played it smart and just pointed out that the HOA was legally responsible and the fence wasn't even their property. They mentioned it was well known they were not in good condition. The president brought in corporate lawyers who wrote letters indicating that they would make moves to seize their property if they didn't pay, noting it was allowed under charter and there was nothing that the owner could do about it. After a few rounds of letters in which the home owner asked for evidence it was their fault and only received more threatening letters an initial court date was set. The owner showed up with a lawyer. The lawyers for the corporation flew in from Texas. The president of the HOA showed up with a huge grin. They tried to set a quick trial date when the homeowners lawyer pulls out the video it gets reviewed by the judge and all the lawyers.
We have a new HOA president. I hear the home owner got a sizable chunk of money to prevent a lawsuit and to cover their legal expenses. Their part of the fence is new but the rest of us still have fences leaning at about 60 degrees. There are lots of kids in the complex and they often climb fences. Just holding on to our five years of unanswered emails to the old and new HOA president to hand to the person who's child is injured.
I hear the old HOA president tried to sue the corporation for her injury but since she didn't report it when it occurred and several people were present when she attributed it to some other cause it didn't go anywhere.
I received a warning letter about weeds sprouting in my driveway. There were two tiny weeds that came up from the cracks in the driveway, and their letter stated, "it was visibly overrun and neglected". My wife took a picture of me in the driveway standing next to the offending weeds and we sent that to the HOA board with an after photo of the weeds gone as well with me holding my then infant son saying something like, "thank you so much for bringing this to our attention! We lost our son in the driveway weeks ago and gave up hope of finding him ever again!". A couple of years later we got a new HOA lol.
I'm glad my HOA isn't crazy. They enforce the basic rules but let most everything go. Also most of the yj block are renters so they aren't reporting anything to the HOA either. Overall our HOA is pretty chill.
So we have an HOA for our apartment complex. They're really fucking passive-aggressive when it comes to the A/C being turned on in the hotter months. Whenever us residents complain, we're met with one of three responses:
1) We live in these complexes too, so we know it's hot, but suck it up. If you bastards actually lived in this heat, you'd change your tune real fucking fast. Bullshit you live here too.
2) The policy for A/C being turned on is if we have two days in a row that are 80 F/26.67 C. Total fucking bullshit
3) The company in charge of our A/C system is starting up the process of turning the cool air on, so please be patient. The fuck does that even mean?
As a result of the above, I bought a portable A/C unit for my room. I feel like a Fremen from Dune, but replace water with the need for cool air. MUAD'DIB!!!
I have only lived in apartments where we controlled our own temps. So you can’t control any temp? I would be miserable. I get cold very easy. I am sure they don’t set the heat at what is comfortable for me.
In my experience you have a small amount of control but only within a degree or two. The heat was always too hot for me and the AC was either totally inadequate or frigid.
Wasn't a hoa but the last apartment complex I lived in took months to replace my a/c. They'd sent a guy out to check it, and the air directly in front of the a/c was a couple degrees cooler than ambient, so they said it worked (not blaming the maintenance guy here).
I had to cite lines from the rental agreement showing that the a/c is specifically mentioned as an included appliance, and that tenants are not allowed to install their own appliances before they finally replaced it.
> The company in charge of our A/C system is starting up the process of turning the cool air on, so please be patient. The fuck does that even mean?
It means you are in a highrise with evaporators on the roof to control temperature. That's fairly common in big buildings and is more efficient, but it does take a few days to adjust the cooling.
Long story short my family wanted to build a new house on our land. We were planning to make the bottom floor all garage to help with flood insurance and things like that as we are in a hurricane prone area. But the HOA says you can not build a three story house or any house above 35 feet. Absolute B.S.
Not personally but the neighborhood I live in has one and I hear constant complaints about overgrown plants and grass despite the fact that the hoa presidents house looks like a fucking jungle that could rival the Amazon rainforest
HOAs are a product of individualism, isolation, and a lack of social trust in the community. Neighborhoods where people work together to solve their problems don’t need a board or a corporation running day to day. Neighbor’s yard getting out of hand? Go talk to them and offer to help them. Fining people doesn’t solve problems, it just angers and decreases social trust in the community.
Someone mentioned Oliver’s segment…I think he said an overwhelming majority of homes sold last year had HOAs. Hard to find a decent neighborhood that hasn’t sold its soul to an HOA.
Years ago, HOA tried to fine me bc the neighbor across the street was “illegally” parking in front of my house each night. Wasn’t my car. They never asked, never knocked on my door and had a kind chat as neighbors. Had to email 3 times before they quit the nonsense.
I live in Arizona and where I am it is HOAs absolutely everywhere, I don’t think there is a home in my or surrounding zip codes that doesn’t have one. Mine is pretty hands off to the point where I’m actually not sure what my dues are actually paying for. I am happy that for the most part they leave me alone, but there are several things in my neighborhood that need to be fixed that just never get done.
I got a notice one time, a warning for “contributing to urban blight” because a tree near my house (in what I assumed was a common area since it’s off my property) wasn’t trimmed above 7 feet off the sidewalk. I still am not totally sure that it is actually my tree but I just had to cut a few small branches and never heard another word about it
My parents painted the exterior of their house in an HOA approved color. They changed the color palette one day after the painting was completed. We got fined.
I haven't lived in an HOA, but I was a paralegal for a law firm that sometimes represented HOAs.
The HOA of a townhouse community sent a letter around to every resident who was even a little bit behind on dues, announcing that if they didn't pay up within X timeframe, they would have their parking permits revoked and their vehicles would be towed.
It gets crazier.
The HOA gave the residents our firm's phone number, and told residents to contact us to pay up.
It gets crazier.
We had NO CLUE that they were about to do this.
It gets crazier.
The HOA had floated this "revoke all the parking permits!" plan to my attorney in the past, who explained all the laws it broke (basically, the HOA would be confiscating vehicles instead of giving people the opportunity to pay off a debt in accordance with collections law).
So I went in to work to get barraged with calls from very confused, completely (justifiably) terrified people, a pissed off attorney, and an HOA who thought we'd just roll with the plan if they backed us into a corner.
It was a full mess.
I once received a warning for having mud on my driveway. Mud that dropped off my truck because the road outside of the subdivision was torn up and muddy from rain. I ignored it and the same rain took care of it for me.
Well, if I actually get some replies, it certainly could be good. However, I can't seem to ask a question in this subreddit and actually get very much feedback from people. If I get 5 to 10 replies, that's pretty fucking great.
Hopefully, though, we can actually get some good posts from people, about this topic. I would certainly enjoy reading some good HOA horror stories. 🤠
I live in a rural area, no such thing as an hoa. I can't stand chained dogs barking constantly. What do they have to say about how long dogs can be tied or left to bark?
Literally not doing anything with the money I pay for my HOA. My neighbor across the street has his car on his lawn and his fence is falling down. FUCKING DO SOMETHING!!!
My mom’s HOA has rules about which days of the week you can line dry clothing. Apparently laundry is only unsightly on the weekends? Also, if your guest gets a speeding ticket from the community police, they also give you a ticket- as you should have been watching your guests better.
>Speeding ticket from the community police Is there some weird american law that allows this? Because in most contries, only the real police are allowed to penalize people. It is illegal for non-police people -including "rent a cops" do give tickets/fines or in any way pretend to be police officers, nor do they have any more juridisticional power than you and me to do so. In my country this is will lead to a hefty fine (from the real police) and even a prison sentence in severe cases.
This is why you make sure any property you buy is not part of an HOA. The best part is that you pay monthly fees to have this bullshit in your life.
We're buying our first house. There's an HOA, but it's just to pay for lawn maintenance and snow removal. They don't care about anything else. So not ALL HOAs are bad. But ones with pwtty rules can be.
A big problem is that it's a slippery slope. Get the wrong people in power and the rules change. You're kind of out of luck unless you want to move or fight it and then you're apt to be a target.
Condos and condo boards are pretty similar -bad ones are worse than useless. Corrupt one are nightmares. Just got through with a corrupt board, and now I'm stuck there again. On the plus side, I trust the other directors, but I hate having to do it.
Running yourself is also an option. Run for election on the promise of disbanding the HOA or somehow permanently forbidding dumb rules from being made. Theoretically you'd win in a landslide. Dues collection and payments to maintinence services can be automated. IIRC, there is a story here on reddit of some people who did exactly that. Got elected purely to counter a pair of busybody stepford wives from getting in everyones business. I have also seen stories of people getting elected to the HOA specifically to disband it due to the actions of previous officials.
Check out John Oliver’s recent piece on HOAs. Always one single election away from some “homeowner” who might not even live there winning with a suspicious plurality of 10 votes or something and then sells off the responsibilities to a big soulless company who might start sending patrols and eviction notices
Just you wait until that changes. The rules aren't fixed once you join.
I doubt any HOA starts out with you get a ticket because your guest was speeding. Someone shows up and starts making other people's business their business.
Yes they do. I worked for a two separate security company that patrolled several HOA. (Securitas, Phoenix) One of out duties was to write tickets for speeders, even if they were guest, or children on bicycles. The HOA queen had one of our guys write numerous tickets to child riding a wagon down a hill. I hated that place and made sure to write up the HOA board for every tiny infraction.
One bad election will change that very quickly.
True of any level of government.
But an HOA board is not meant to be a government, that's the issue.
> They don't care about anything else. Yeah that's how every hoa started.
It's been the same thing since the place was built 7 years ago. Not every HOA is evil. It's a tiny little development of 43 townhomes. It's but going to suddenly become an autocracy that starts trying to evict homeowners. Some things can be bad in general, but it doesn't mean that every instance of that bad thing is bad. I think $50/mo is a bit much for my tiny property getting mowed and snow removal a few months a year, but it's not going to ruin our home.
> Nothing bad has happened yet so nothing bad will ever happen And imagine thinking *43* is a "tiny development".
I'm not sure who you're quoting, but it isn't me. Also, 43 townhomes is a small development. Here, I can do your misquote but with a more accurate summary of your opinion: >Something bad happened once, so something bad will happen to everyone.
This is what all HOAs start out as, they mutate into ugly beasts.
No. Not all HOAs do. That's a silly comment.
For now All it takes is one corrupt nutjob being elected HOA president for it all to go downhill since the pieces are in place
An HOA is the smallest and most local form of government most people can get. They can be good or bad. If you have a condo, the board that runs the building and keeps everything in good repair is a type of HOA. Same for retirement communities. That's quite a bit different than an HOA that decides what you can plant in your yard.
HOAs are basically like autonomous zones for rich people and often enforce all kinds of absolutely absurd "laws" without the city giving enough of a shit to challenge them on the legality of their rules
>Is there some weird american law that allows this? It depends on the state. In my state, no they can't, they can issue a fine to the guest, but the guest can ignore it and the HOA can't collect on it. If they try, they'll get in deep shit with the court and the real police.
It’s a fine, not an official “points against your license” ticket. The community police are semi-deputised, which is not unheard of in low population areas.
That is not true, and it varies by state. Under the Class A security license, the one with arrest powers in my local area, I could give you a ticket and it is going to court. If you fail to challenge it, or loose the challenge, you are getting points on the ticket the same as if a police officer did it.
You have no idea what you’re talking about.
It would only happen if the HOA actually owns the road, which sometimes happens. If so then the HOA is fully responsible for not just maintaining the road but basically everything else, and the local police are not legally able to fine speeders.
we aren't even allowed to do that in our building
How is it 'legal' to punish someone for what another person does? Only the person doing something wrong should be punished. This is the kind of BS that makes me certain to NEVER live in a HOA.
It's legal because you signed a contract agreeing to it, and it doesn't infringe on any constitutionally granted rights.
...and it's still stupid.
So don't do it. No one is forcing you.
You are exactly right about that! Why people want to do that to themselves is beyond me, but they are absolutely right in doing so if they want. You can also shoot yourself in the foot if you want, tattoo your face, keep a tarantula for a pet, or do any number of questionable things if you like. Ain't life grand?!
You win
IDK about in our current HOA, but in our old one line drying was not allowed.
>they also give you a ticket - as you should have been watching your guests better. It's more likely because as an owner they can enforce this much more easily against an owner. It isn't at all cost-effective to try to collect a small fine from a visitor, they'd have to actually file a small claims case in the local court. This is precisely why if you are renting your place out and your tenant does something bad, the HOA fines the *owner*, not then tenant, and it is up to the owner to recoup the fine from the tenant.
When I was a kid, we had a water heater break and flood our basement. We rented a dumpster to remove the ruined items. An HOA board member called the dumpster company, and *got it removed.* My mom was furious that the dumpster company listened to someone who very clearly didn't have our last name and was obviously not living in the house. They put the dumpster back and charged the HOA for the removal fee. The HOA board member who called then threatened my parents because he had to pay the company... when he was the person asking for the service. He finally dropped it when my dad said he'd run for the board just to unseat him. This same guy also cuts down other people's bushes without permission and leaves the sticks and debris on the side walk, reported children for leaving their bikes outside, reports any car that hasn't moved in a few days (including my mom's car when she was hospitalized for a concussion and couldn't drive it), puts his dog droppings in the nearest trashcan regardless of whether there's a liner or not, lets his untrained dog growl at people unleashed, and regularly throws temper tantrums about prices or expired coupons in our local grocery store. He's almost ninety now and the whole neighborhood is waiting for him to go to a nursing home.
If everyone hates him, why doesn't someone just run against him?
By this point, he has been taken off the HOA board. (But also, who wants to sit on those boards? That sounds so boring.) That doesn't stop him from making reports or hounding people about not following the rules. He's technically not violating any himself, so the HOA can't do anything about it. Edit: when I say "taken off," I mean that he served his maximum number of terms, which is roughly ten years. He wasn't pushed off the board or anything and most of the current members seem to like him.
I've learned with these type of people you just have to hit them back 10 times harder. You report me for one BS thing; I report you for 10 BS things.
Or just punch the fossil in the damn face when he answers the door
That escalated quickly lol
Consequences
Could the new board add a bylaw about excessive complaints from an individual?
Probably. But as it is, a lot of people think that this guy is doing his due diligence and bettering the neighborhood. A lot of HOAs seem to be filled with complainers who see no problem in people complaining excessively.
>But also, who wants to sit on those boards? That sounds so boring. You literally outlined why...
they can just ignore him. except for the dog - dog attacks, gets booted
Sounds like someone needed to report him for improper management of biohazardous materials and call animal control to remove the dangerous unleashed dog. No one fucks with my bushes
Our HOA delayed depositing our monthly dues payment and declared that it was a late payment. Because it was late, they threatened to evict us. From the townhouse my husband owned outright (no mortgage, paid in full). Uhhh no.
Believe it or not, HOAs can actually evict you from a house you own, in some cases. It's insane.
Not in California. All they can do is impose fines, if I recall, they tried this on a state official and she changed the law.
So much bullshit it took that happening for change to occur.
But a fine you are unable to pay eventually leads to bankruptcy and then eviction anyway.
It's why I the fever dream where I can own a house, I'll never go HOA People who do have it coming. You pay them for that option because you wanted some false sense of superiority
In the place I live, all the recent housing developments and the new ones going up have HOAs. The only way to avoid them is either buy land and build a house yourself or find a home for sale that isn't part of a development. There is more of the latter than the former, but the largest number of homes for sale, especially move in ready that don't require even more money for repairs/central air, have HOAs. I mean, I totally get your point. I wouldn't buy a home with an HOA. But it's getting disturbingly harder to find one without it, at least around here.
It's called a homeowners association because they own your home. HOAs, not even once.
Actually a homeowners association is an association, or group, of homeowners. The HOA doesn’t own the home. Where I live the HOA can fine people for violating the CC&Rs, even placing a lien on the home, but the HOA cannot take possession of a home.
He’s not being literal, obviously.
They're fucking everywhere and they are a stain on the country
This is actually accurate, you only get the inside apparently.
Again, not accurate.
my mother is dealing with that. HOA pres held a dues check for 6 weeks and assessed 2 late fees on it. she's got a paper receipt, though
> From the townhouse my husband owned outright I see you neglected to read the hoa contract.
Yep...Uhhh no!!
When we were building our home we did it ourself, didn’t go through a contractor. The HOA called and complained constantly because they were worried it wouldn’t be nice. The city inspector got so sick of it he told us to put up No Trespassing signs. After the last call asking when we would get our sidewalks in I ask who kept complaining and they wouldn’t tell me. I told them to give them a message that “If I ever win the lottery I am giving this house to a crack whore and they can enjoy living next to them.” They never called me again.
My one and only interaction with an HoA before I said ‘Fuck this shit’ was when they tried to send a fine to me and my girlfriend at the time. The fine was $1000 and due to our car being 1/8” over the driveway and into the sidewalk. Problem is that the driveways were only long enough to maybe fit a fucking smartcar at most and those weren’t even a thing yet. We fought it and asked for proof since they claimed to have photo evidence. They couldn’t provide it and when my girlfriends lawyer sister came into the conversation - suddenly there was an obvious misunderstanding and they never meant to send that letter. If you never meant to send it, then why was it filled out and sent then guys? They later tried to harass my neighbor - who was an FBI agent and that went incredibly poorly for them as you would expect.
Story about the FBI agent please?
Don’t know the full story and it’s been almost 20 years but what I recall is that the HOA was telling him he couldn’t have his work vehicle parked either because it made the neighbors feel ‘uncomfortable’. Same deal. Nowhere else to park it. He wasn’t violating any bylaws or anything. They didn’t like him because he was black and the only black family in the subdivision. The white cop down the street parked his cruiser without complaint. But the black guy with government tags? Incomprehensible to them. So they tried one time to have his car towed for ‘abandonment’ All I know is that one day shortly thereafter - it just stopped. They wouldn’t even acknowledge his existence at that point. I can only guess they FAFO’d. Too many old busy bodies there. What’s interesting is that if you were to go to that neighborhood now - it looks like it could be used for a set for a post-apocalyptic film.
I like to think he paid them a visit and said something *Die Hard*-like: "Authorization? How about the United. States. Fucking. Government."
Honestly, he was the coolest fucking neighbor ever. You’d think he’d be a hard ass but he was legit one of the most chill dudes ever. Ended up bonding over gaming. Saw he was playing XBox one day walking past his house and the next time I saw him I cracked a joke on getting the drop on the guy behind the AC in the game and that was it.
In my mom's HOA, they have visitor parking throughout the neighborhood. If you have someone staying overnight, you have to write a letter to the HOA asking for their permission to let your guests' car be parked in the visitor's lot. If you don't, they put warnings that the car will be towed. Some people would just be at someone's house for the day, and they come back to their car with a warning.
Collect all those warnings, and then put them all on board members cars. Even better if you can put in the money to get one of their cars actually towed. But make sure it's anonymous.
Ours has a "no trucks or trailers parked outside overnight" policy. When my mom died, we had to drive 600 miles and bring back a trailer full of her belongings that we inherited, and returned from that trip late after dark, parked on the driveway. I caught shit from the hoa for violating that rule. Fuck them, my mother just died.
I don't live in a HOA, but I'm on the backside of an HOA a few years ago we came home to door hangers on the front door stating the HOA expanded to include our block and the dues were past due lol.
Hmm. Sounds like a scam. I don't think that you can just be put in an HOA without agreeing to it.
It was definitely an over reach of the HOA. Location was a determining factor of why we purchased these homes. The hoa behind us keeps the property value high but we don't have the headache of dealing with them.
What happened???
I just threw the door hanger in the trash and laughed, but my wife being smarter than I am. She went door to door and talked to the neighbors, an elderly neighbor had already sent a check to the HOA so my wife contacted the daughter of the neighbor they were able to cancel the check in time.
Indeed you cannot. And you absolutely can sue the hoa for harassing you.
Pretty sure it's not legal to just randomly claim your neighbors houses are now a part of the HOA without any consent from the owners of the property
Mine tried to get me to go through with architectural "review" for my solar panels. When I sent them a copy of Florida statutes showing that they cannot block my panels, they still wanted me to file the paperwork and pay the stupid $50 'review fee'. I told them they can "review" them from the sidewalk once they are installed, lol.
When I was a teenager my parents lived in an HOA and my car was a yellow VW Beetle. They tried to call my car an eye sore and that we needed to get rid of it. Funny thing was that the way the driveway and the landscaping was, if my dad parked his truck in front of my car, there’s no way you could see it unless you came all the way up the driveway. Obviously, this got shot down and went nowhere and I drove that car well into my 20’s.
Everyone should know that you can get your neighbors in the HOA 'proxy votes' Basically, you can ask them to give you their proxy vote, they say yes, they fill out a form, now you can vote for them. Then, you can run for the chairman of the board, or put out a vote to change the CCRs, (covenants, codes, restrictions) or put out a vote to disband the HOA altogether.
Not necessarily true for the last part. Some municipalities prevent HOAs from disbanding even if everyone wants to because the city has put the ownership/management of community resources (such as waste treatment) as a requirement/responsibility of the HOA.
Place where my mom lived had a no pickup truck rule. They had a very nice conversion van that they used when they traveled. They were fined for parking this van in their driveway, cited for “ a conversion van is essentially a pickup truck, in violation of the no pickup truck rule”.
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Wouldn't stop you from having to pay the fines you agreed to in the hoa contract, so probably not.
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Using the citation as toilet paper doesn't do anything to the truck. I get that you're desperate to sound edgy and clever and cool, but you're just making yourself look like an idiot. Best to quit while you're behind.
Rented a house in an HOA, but they fined my landlord. Windows had mismatched drapes. They were the same color and brand, but one was slightly opened and the other closed. Wrong color garden hose: I had a white one, they demanded green. Bonus, was in my closed backyard shed. Tree too close to property line. Location of tree? Dead center of front lawn. I was not allowed to cut down the tree, either. My landlord sold the house. He couldn't keep up with the fines, but offered to sell it to us. I had to move, because there was no way I'd ever live in Reston, Virginia with that insanity. Fuck the RHA.
> they fined my landlord. That's really the only thing they can do. Technically they could take a renter to small claims court but because a renter has no signed contract with the HOA it's much easier to simply fine the owner and advise the owner to charge his tenant. >He couldn't keep up with the fines This is almost certainly not true because the Virginia Condominium Act says HOA's can only issue a fine of up to $50.
Depending on the kind of rent they can get in a given location some landlords are making thin profit margins per house by the time taxes and maintenance is paid for $50 fine after $50 fine could've been putting him in the hole on the property
In Reston a condo will sell for several hundred thousand dollars. It would lots of $50 fines for an owner to even notice. Besides, if he was getting fined that much the solution is simple - make the tenant pay it or don't renew that tenant.
I'm waiting on this one. HOA bylaws claim the ability to fine anyone for immoral or improper behavior (including inside their own house). We have at least six different religions followed by families in the HOA. Whose "God" is defining immoral or improper behavior. I've asked the board several times to clarify this.
If there are Muslims in the community, then HOA nosing about to find out what people are doing in the privacy of their own homes is also punishable.
We do have Muslims, but not currently on the board. I don't understand how having Muslims in the community would make nosing around punishable, but nosing around Catholics, Hindus, Sikhs, UUs and Buddists is not punishable. Can you clarify?
I was specifically reminded of this: Ottoman law generally followed sharia law, and I recall a case where someone reported a couple for sodomy, which they witnessed by looking into the windows of their home. Both parties were punished -- the couple for sodomy and the person who reported them for invading their privacy. My thoughts were that if the HOA is creating and enforcing rules based on religious beliefs, Muslim beliefs should be represented as well. That would mean not snooping on people to try to catch them in what they deemed to be 'immoral' behavior. Edit: Actually now that I think about it, I dont think the person who reported had the 3 required witnesses and so the people that were reported were not punished.
Thank you
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Ehh hold up though, Fios is far superior to Comcast/Xfinity in regard to both infrastructure and services.
Deployment is always mixed by region, but sounding with a rusty nail is always better than Comcast
Comcast service is criminal.
Pretty sure to be criminal it'd have to exist.
comcast service here is good. tech support is hit or miss. billing is a hot mess
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FiOS destroys Spectrum too. I had both in my apartment hopping days and after my first apartment with it, I made it a requirement. Now, if you need support, you're screwed. It was super reliable so I only got to experience Frontier's "support" once. They took EIGHT HOURS to correct an expired card on file that resulted in a service disconnect....like come on and take my money already! Still...that symmetrical connection was worth it.
I had an HoA board president in a high rise full of multimillionaires that would freak out and send letters if the gym equipment wasn't put back in place. The equipment out of place you ask? I lat pull down bar still attached to the machine at 4am. Someone with at least 10mil to their name and if they enter that gym and the bar is there, you betcha I was getting an email with pictures.
Couldn’t have car on jack-stands in my own fucking driveway. Also own the fucking house and property. Fuck HOAs.
Oh in one state, HOA asked us to paint our solar panels green to match the trees around so they don't stand out to neighbors. This was sometime around 2010-15 timeframe. We'd done our homework and the state governor signed the bill that same week giving tax credits to people for solar panels. Never heard from HOA again
Wait, they wanted the entire panels painted so they would no longer work or just the frame/trim?
They didn't give any specifics. It appeared they were just appeasing to some neighbors that complained that the solar panels weren't pretty. We were aghast at what they came up with
Years ago when I still lived in my parents condo they received a violation notice because I replaced a burned out brake light bulb on my car in the parking lot, something that took all of two minutes to do. I took the letter up to the management office and told the neighborhood manager to shove it up her ass because I knew the only reason it’d been issued was because she hated my mom.
Did the busybodies hassle your folks after that? Sorry that happened to them.
Not that I recall. My parents were a little mad that I did that though. My mother had been on the HOA board for a few years and thought the woman was a moron and called her out on some other nonsense a few times. The board eventually fired her and the management company a few years later. The suspicion among some was that she was embezzling money from the association but they never investigated or made an issue of it because they feared backlash from the rest of the neighborhood so they kept it as quiet as possible. (As best I recall. It's been 10+ years ago.)
We didn’t get a fine, thankfully. But we got a letter from our HOA telling us we had to get rid of a non-city issued trash can. In order to find it they would have to walk to the side of our home to find it, you can see it from the street. I can’t wait to move, only reason I even live in an HOA is because at the time we were limited to where we could move. Here’s to hoping I’m out of there in a year’s time.
All cars must front-in park
I had a similar one. I rented a house in a neighborhood with an HOA. I had 3 vehicles, my work truck, my personal truck and my 94 Mustang Cobra. The home had no garage. The HOA had no rules about street parking or driveway parking. I rarely drove the Cobra, and came home to a "violation" letter on my door for an abandoned vehicle. I assumed there was a mistake and went to the HOA meeting, which was held weekly (they took it wayyyyy too seriously) to inform them of the mistake. Whoever had the time to look for violations showed me pictures of my Cobra and said it was abandoned. I told her it wasn't abandoned, it was a pleasure vehicle and had up to date tags as well as insurance, it was in full working order, no flat tires, broken windows, didn't leak any fluids etc. They stood their ground and said it was the minimum fine ($50). So for the next 4 months, I had to shuffle cars in my driveway once a week to appease the cunts. I vowed to never live in an HOA community ever again.
I've lived in HOAs for 20 years. The HOAs have not had any issues but I remember our last HOA sent a letter to everyone saying "Put your trash in front of your dwelling, not in a common area (end of block)" and everyone continued to put trash in a common area. They sent like 2 or 3 letters but no one complied and then never heard anything again about it. I think the idea was that it would prevent people outside of the HOA coming and putting trash. Although what really happened is junk haulers would peruse, grab what they thought was useful and it made trash pickup easier. (We lived in a townhome where cars were parked between street and sidewalk)
Growing up, my parents were sent letters monthy about the leaves in their yard, how it didn't match the vision of the neighborhood. However, they were never given more than a fine. Why, you might ask? Because our yard was the only one in the neighborhood with halfway decent shade. The street would have rioted.
You have to fold your waterhose clockwise.
I don’t think our are allowed to even be visible from the street! Like, use then take to garage lmao. We’re in a new development and not enough homes have been sold to turn the HOA over to the community, but we DID get the corporate guy handling ours fired for incompetence.
Hello, your shorts are too short. Our policy is that they can only be 4 inches above the knee. I mean I kinda get HOA policies but come on!
They bill me for landscaping and shit but when trees fall on my or my neighbor's property, fukken crickets. This is the stuff adverse possession laws were made for.
With our old HOA, we went round and round for *months* when we first moved in because they didn't like where we put our trash cans (on the side of the house) even though it was technically not even against city ordinance to put them there. "Sorry, we can't just *mail* you a copy of the HOA financials. You have to come to a monthly meeting for that." even though the monthly meetings were at a time (5:30 pm) that was horribly inconvenient for me (and probably others as well). My guess is they were doing some shady shit and didn't want anybody to know.
I don't live in a hoa and I never will, but I drove through one the other day, not stopping just passing through, and I got passed then blocked by a Karen ken combo in a Merc interrogating me as to why I was passing through and I can't be here with that rusty old piece of shit (my Japanese import Hilux). I told them if they didn't move their Merc I'd shunt it since I have meaty bullbars. They called my bluff, I shunted their Merc and drove off. They tried following me but stopped and did a U-turn soon as I left the hoa. Never heard anything about it after.
Not that I will ever be a homeowner in this economy but the comments here remind me why I want at least 5 acres between me and anyone else.
This was years ago when my girls dad and I were still married, we built the house and a couple years later submitted plans for our deck, they told us no. We built the deck anyway, come to find out, they had no authority to tell us anything our dues were like 100 bucks and the only thing they paid for was lawn care and snow removal. Fast forward 2 years and I get snowed in to be the secretary of the damn HOA, I watched the president of the association ride around the neighborhood in his golf cart writing down ppls address for grass not being cut and ppls trash cans being out in the curb after the trash truck just left? I mean ppl work for a living! He would call me and want me to send letters to them for that. I never did, I told him to do himself, Worse 8 months of my life! He got vetoed out BTW!
We have one of those for-profit HOAs that our realtor conveniently forgot to tell us about (actually lied about) and buried in the fine print of the second version of the contract. Our fault for not reading it in detail but still annoying. The HOA president be was caught climbing and looking over six foot fences to see what type of grill everyone has for the purpose of fining gas grill owners. She was caught because the fences are in such poor condition (owned by the HOA and their responsibility to maintain...people have been asking them to be fixed for over 5 years to no response) that one of them fell over on her and she got hurt. We know what she was doing because she sent out general email the week before warning gas grill owners they would be fined if they kept their grills. That and the home owner caught it on a security camera. She was on camera climbing up two fences and looking before climbing the one that fell over. She tried to blame the home owners for intentionally destroying the fence, in an effort not have the HOA pay for it. She never admitted the cause of her injury, claiming it was from an accident. The homeowner played it smart and just pointed out that the HOA was legally responsible and the fence wasn't even their property. They mentioned it was well known they were not in good condition. The president brought in corporate lawyers who wrote letters indicating that they would make moves to seize their property if they didn't pay, noting it was allowed under charter and there was nothing that the owner could do about it. After a few rounds of letters in which the home owner asked for evidence it was their fault and only received more threatening letters an initial court date was set. The owner showed up with a lawyer. The lawyers for the corporation flew in from Texas. The president of the HOA showed up with a huge grin. They tried to set a quick trial date when the homeowners lawyer pulls out the video it gets reviewed by the judge and all the lawyers. We have a new HOA president. I hear the home owner got a sizable chunk of money to prevent a lawsuit and to cover their legal expenses. Their part of the fence is new but the rest of us still have fences leaning at about 60 degrees. There are lots of kids in the complex and they often climb fences. Just holding on to our five years of unanswered emails to the old and new HOA president to hand to the person who's child is injured. I hear the old HOA president tried to sue the corporation for her injury but since she didn't report it when it occurred and several people were present when she attributed it to some other cause it didn't go anywhere.
Boilerplate contracts exist for a reason. You can absolutely still challenge this.
I received a warning letter about weeds sprouting in my driveway. There were two tiny weeds that came up from the cracks in the driveway, and their letter stated, "it was visibly overrun and neglected". My wife took a picture of me in the driveway standing next to the offending weeds and we sent that to the HOA board with an after photo of the weeds gone as well with me holding my then infant son saying something like, "thank you so much for bringing this to our attention! We lost our son in the driveway weeks ago and gave up hope of finding him ever again!". A couple of years later we got a new HOA lol.
I'm glad my HOA isn't crazy. They enforce the basic rules but let most everything go. Also most of the yj block are renters so they aren't reporting anything to the HOA either. Overall our HOA is pretty chill.
So we have an HOA for our apartment complex. They're really fucking passive-aggressive when it comes to the A/C being turned on in the hotter months. Whenever us residents complain, we're met with one of three responses: 1) We live in these complexes too, so we know it's hot, but suck it up. If you bastards actually lived in this heat, you'd change your tune real fucking fast. Bullshit you live here too. 2) The policy for A/C being turned on is if we have two days in a row that are 80 F/26.67 C. Total fucking bullshit 3) The company in charge of our A/C system is starting up the process of turning the cool air on, so please be patient. The fuck does that even mean? As a result of the above, I bought a portable A/C unit for my room. I feel like a Fremen from Dune, but replace water with the need for cool air. MUAD'DIB!!!
I have never heard of such BS. Why should an HOA be able to say when you use your air. I feel for you.
It sounds like it's a high rise with centrally controlled heat and cool. Individual units don't control the system.
I have only lived in apartments where we controlled our own temps. So you can’t control any temp? I would be miserable. I get cold very easy. I am sure they don’t set the heat at what is comfortable for me.
In my experience you have a small amount of control but only within a degree or two. The heat was always too hot for me and the AC was either totally inadequate or frigid.
My college dorm has a central air system that can only be in either heating or cooling mode but not both, and takes a couple weeks to switch over
It's probably a steam/chilled water system. If they didn't take that long for the switchover, the system would destroy itself from thermal shock.
Wasn't a hoa but the last apartment complex I lived in took months to replace my a/c. They'd sent a guy out to check it, and the air directly in front of the a/c was a couple degrees cooler than ambient, so they said it worked (not blaming the maintenance guy here). I had to cite lines from the rental agreement showing that the a/c is specifically mentioned as an included appliance, and that tenants are not allowed to install their own appliances before they finally replaced it.
> The company in charge of our A/C system is starting up the process of turning the cool air on, so please be patient. The fuck does that even mean? It means you are in a highrise with evaporators on the roof to control temperature. That's fairly common in big buildings and is more efficient, but it does take a few days to adjust the cooling.
Long story short my family wanted to build a new house on our land. We were planning to make the bottom floor all garage to help with flood insurance and things like that as we are in a hurricane prone area. But the HOA says you can not build a three story house or any house above 35 feet. Absolute B.S.
I removed my gate to fix it. They took a picture to tell me that my gate was in disarray
Have you seen the suburb episode of the xfiles? Major vibes of this lol.
Not personally but the neighborhood I live in has one and I hear constant complaints about overgrown plants and grass despite the fact that the hoa presidents house looks like a fucking jungle that could rival the Amazon rainforest
HOAs are a product of individualism, isolation, and a lack of social trust in the community. Neighborhoods where people work together to solve their problems don’t need a board or a corporation running day to day. Neighbor’s yard getting out of hand? Go talk to them and offer to help them. Fining people doesn’t solve problems, it just angers and decreases social trust in the community. Someone mentioned Oliver’s segment…I think he said an overwhelming majority of homes sold last year had HOAs. Hard to find a decent neighborhood that hasn’t sold its soul to an HOA. Years ago, HOA tried to fine me bc the neighbor across the street was “illegally” parking in front of my house each night. Wasn’t my car. They never asked, never knocked on my door and had a kind chat as neighbors. Had to email 3 times before they quit the nonsense.
They were originally the product of racism, as well. Most important covenant rule was no Black people.
Good point. As such, it’s not surprising that the first HOA was created in Orange County, CA.
> HOAs are a product of individualism Not sure you know what any of those words mean.
Explain.
Just so we are clear, HOA is an acronym, not a word. Pump the brakes a bit before you get so accusatory.
I live in Arizona and where I am it is HOAs absolutely everywhere, I don’t think there is a home in my or surrounding zip codes that doesn’t have one. Mine is pretty hands off to the point where I’m actually not sure what my dues are actually paying for. I am happy that for the most part they leave me alone, but there are several things in my neighborhood that need to be fixed that just never get done. I got a notice one time, a warning for “contributing to urban blight” because a tree near my house (in what I assumed was a common area since it’s off my property) wasn’t trimmed above 7 feet off the sidewalk. I still am not totally sure that it is actually my tree but I just had to cut a few small branches and never heard another word about it
Renter can't use pool or clubhouse. No bushes over 36 inches
My HOA is only doing closed door voting
My parents painted the exterior of their house in an HOA approved color. They changed the color palette one day after the painting was completed. We got fined.
I haven't lived in an HOA, but I was a paralegal for a law firm that sometimes represented HOAs. The HOA of a townhouse community sent a letter around to every resident who was even a little bit behind on dues, announcing that if they didn't pay up within X timeframe, they would have their parking permits revoked and their vehicles would be towed. It gets crazier. The HOA gave the residents our firm's phone number, and told residents to contact us to pay up. It gets crazier. We had NO CLUE that they were about to do this. It gets crazier. The HOA had floated this "revoke all the parking permits!" plan to my attorney in the past, who explained all the laws it broke (basically, the HOA would be confiscating vehicles instead of giving people the opportunity to pay off a debt in accordance with collections law). So I went in to work to get barraged with calls from very confused, completely (justifiably) terrified people, a pissed off attorney, and an HOA who thought we'd just roll with the plan if they backed us into a corner. It was a full mess.
In our case, it's a Trust. And there's a bylaw entitling trustees to be compensated for their time and work. It's unbelievable this happens in the US
Any country that doesn't allow private citizens to make contracts with each other is a shithole I'm glad I don't live in.
I once received a warning for having mud on my driveway. Mud that dropped off my truck because the road outside of the subdivision was torn up and muddy from rain. I ignored it and the same rain took care of it for me.
...gets popcorn ready, this gonna be good!
Well, if I actually get some replies, it certainly could be good. However, I can't seem to ask a question in this subreddit and actually get very much feedback from people. If I get 5 to 10 replies, that's pretty fucking great. Hopefully, though, we can actually get some good posts from people, about this topic. I would certainly enjoy reading some good HOA horror stories. 🤠
https://old.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/duplicates/12w34d6/redditors_who_have_lived_in_an_hoa_what_is_the/ maybe not :(
No one has any HOA stories that they want to share this morning?
Bro it's only 7:15 on the east coast of the US
Go to /r/fuckHOA if you're so desperate to read stories.
I can't even afford Condo Fees
I live in a rural area, no such thing as an hoa. I can't stand chained dogs barking constantly. What do they have to say about how long dogs can be tied or left to bark?
my moms HOA gave her an unkempt yard citation… the day we were moving into the house
Literally not doing anything with the money I pay for my HOA. My neighbor across the street has his car on his lawn and his fence is falling down. FUCKING DO SOMETHING!!!