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If my neighbor wants to paint his or her home purple, I don't like it but it's not my home so not my problem. A local charity was offering up a newly built home in a very restrictive HOA community. As a joke, I said i'd buy my alcoholic cajun country uncle the tickets so if he won, he'd sit outside the home in his faded overalls, playing his old Cajun music loudly, drinking a beer, and watching as his dog (named "6 pack") jumps in and out the "parts" car parked next to his repair car.
If my neighbor wants to paint his or her home purple, I don't like it but it's not my home so not my problem. A local charity was offering up a newly built home in a very restrictive HOA community. As a joke, I said i'd buy my alcoholic cajun country uncle the tickets so if he won, he'd sit outside the home in his faded overalls, playing his old Cajun music loudly, drinking a beer, and wabatterrd tching as his dog (named "6 pack") jumps in and out the "parts" car parked next to his repair car.
It does become your problem if you try to sell your home and your property value goes down.
I used to think the same way, "not my problem" until I put my home up for sale and my neighbors behind me pulled in an ugly, battered 1950's mobile home and parked it in their backyard. Everyone who looked at my home loved it except for the trailer that spoiled the view from my deck.
My real estate agent researched and found there was nothing to do, no ordinance against parking an ugly mobile home next to your neighbor's property.
It does become your problem if you try to sell your home and your property value goes down.
There is no evidence that your property value "went down" and it is doubtful that any tax assessor would reduced the appraised value.
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I used to think the same way, "not my problem" until I put my home up for sale and my neighbors behind me pulled in an ugly, battered 1950's mobile home and parked it in their backyard. Everyone who looked at my home loved it except for the trailer that spoiled the view from my deck.
You don't have an inherent right for all the property around you to be subject to your view of how the world should look. The law does not cater to men's tastes or consult their convenience merely, but only guards and upholds their material rights, and shields them from unwarrantable invasion.
Notions of beauty or unsightliness are necessarily subjective in nature. Giving someone an aesthetic veto over a neighbor's use of his land is a recipe for legal chaos. That's why HOA-burdened property is nothing but a liability in every sense of the word. The alleged pursuit of the elimination of ugliness is nothing but a pretext for growing a despotic regime. Lawsuit after lawsuits funded by perpetual liens on your property that can never be paid off. What's deemed ugly doesn't stop with an opinion about a motor home but is extended to color, paint, construction material, type of vehicles, model of vehicle, pet size, flowers, etc., and.... whether a child is "permitted" to draw with sidewalk chalk.
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My real estate agent researched and found there was nothing to do, no ordinance against parking an ugly mobile home next to your neighbor's property.
The neighbor no doubt chose the home to live in and raise a family in, not to be staged for your viewing pleasure. See above.
I don;t live in a HOA, never have and see no reason to live in one because I like wide open land and most don;t need HOAs. I also probably would not opwrk well with an HOA cause I;m always changing things on the house, putting up stuff for people to see, and generally living as I want to live my way....
BUT, If I did move into a place with an HOA, unless that was held a secret from me I had no idea that an HOA existed, what the frack am I complaining about? Anyone who moves into a HOA has agreed to follow the rules so if you don;t want to follow them, move somewhere else, its that plain and simple. I bet the majority of folks who bought a house in HOA moved there because it was exactly as they pictured because of that HOA. Now that they have to abide by what they found so wionderul, they are all pissy off like a child and want to complain that everyone is playing baseball and they want to play football. BOO-Hoo-Hoo. get over it already. Did you know you were buying in a HOA, if yes, shut up and sit down cause you made the decission now live with it!
I don;t live in a HOA, never have and see no reason to live in one because I like wide open land and most don;t need HOAs. I also probably would not opwrk well with an HOA cause I;m always changing things on the house, putting up stuff for people to see, and generally living as I want to live my way....
BUT, If I did move into a place with an HOA, unless that was held a secret from me I had no idea that an HOA existed, what the frack am I complaining about? Anyone who moves into a HOA has agreed to follow the rules so if you don;t want to follow them, move somewhere else, its that plain and simple. I bet the majority of folks who bought a house in HOA moved there because it was exactly as they pictured because of that HOA. Now that they have to abide by what they found so wionderul, they are all pissy off like a child and want to complain that everyone is playing baseball and they want to play football. BOO-Hoo-Hoo. get over it already. Did you know you were buying in a HOA, if yes, shut up and sit down cause you made the decission now live with it!
Not that simple. There are plenty of people who've never heard of HOA nor the horror stories associated with them. Also, some buy into an HOA knowing the rules and obey the rules. However, they decide to do something that isn't against the rules but not to the liking of a nosy neighbor and so new rules were made making them violating the rules.
I don;t live in a HOA, never have and see no reason to live in one because I like wide open land and most don;t need HOAs. I also probably would not opwrk well with an HOA cause I;m always changing things on the house, putting up stuff for people to see, and generally living as I want to live my way....
BUT, If I did move into a place with an HOA, unless that was held a secret from me I had no idea that an HOA existed, what the frack am I complaining about? Anyone who moves into a HOA has agreed to follow the rules so if you don;t want to follow them, move somewhere else, its that plain and simple. I bet the majority of folks who bought a house in HOA moved there because it was exactly as they pictured because of that HOA. Now that they have to abide by what they found so wionderul, they are all pissy off like a child and want to complain that everyone is playing baseball and they want to play football. BOO-Hoo-Hoo. get over it already. Did you know you were buying in a HOA, if yes, shut up and sit down cause you made the decission now live with it!
HOAs are numerous and difficult to avoid in many parts of the country. They are numerous because local governments mandate them to avoid their responsibilities while still taxing residents to the hilt. Developers like them as a control and liability shifting device. In addition, many developers have turned the HOA into the perpetual income stream by using the HOA to force homeowners to have to consume various goods and services and to purchase those goods and services exclusively from developer affiliates.
Your statements illustrate that you bought into the false propaganda from the industry hacks that HOAs are somehow "chosen" and negotiated by homeowners. The reality is that homeowners are often left with the choice of which HOA to be stuck with. There is no negotiation. The ground is contaminated with them much like it would be with environmental waste. You buy the property "as-is" and the existence of the HOA is actually often concealed from the prospective purchaser. Even if there is knowledge of the HOA, there is little way to know how badly the HOA board and vendors treat the residents and you certainly cannot count on real estate agents or sellers to provide accurate information in that regard. Consider that in most states the homeowners have no right to vote or to run for office. Now you get the picture of what kind of regime these places quickly devolve into. You won't find that in any of the literature provided by the seller or the real estate agent. But hey the more churn you have in HOA properties, the better it is for the real estate professionals, right?
If you look at the available housing built in the last 20 years, the vast majority of it is HOA-burdened for the benefit of local government and developers. A large percentage of homeowners out there have little choice but to be stuck with undesirable HOA housing.
Last edited by IC_deLight; 06-20-2012 at 06:43 AM..
I am on my 5th HOA. I learned as I went along. I like the principal of having the necessary authority to control the standard of the neighborhood so it does not deterioate. I am talkng about those trashy folks (no one out here of course....LOL) that could move in.
There are HOAs and then there are HOAs. Having lived in one of the latter, I wouldn't do so again. 250 page CC&Rs (good luck reading that and memorizing all the rules before you move in) and strangers peering in the windows of your cars to check the odometer to make sure you've driven your minimum number of miles for the month are not my idea of home ownership.
I am on my 5th HOA. I learned as I went along. I like the principal of having the necessary authority to control the standard of the neighborhood so it does not deterioate. I am talkng about those trashy folks (no one out here of course....LOL) that could move in.
If each homeowner took pride in his property and respected others, HOAs would be unnecessary. But some people see nothing wrong with parking cars on blocks in their front yard, leaving their lawns ummowed, building fences out of pallets, leaving their trash cans on the sidewalk all week, etc.
I have lived in several non-HOA neighborhoods, and I prefer an HOA. In the area where I live, the HOA neighborhood homes retain their value better than the non-HOA neighborhoods.
I know of several neighborhoods that those who proclaim that the only way to preserve a neighborhood's property values is with an HOA would insist are HOA neighborhoods, and nice ones, at that - only they're not. They are non-HOA neighborhoods with excellent schools, with community pools (city pools, actually, but primarily used by the neighborhood residents), nicely kept houses, etc.
I also am aware of a new niche in the real estate world - specifically non-HOA neighborhoods, because there are enough people that do NOT want to live in an HOA neighborhood but want to live in a nice neighborhood to support such a niche. Probably because of those HOA's who go so far beyond the basics as to want to ban sidewalk chalk lest someone be offended, among other such things.
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