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Our home is near a busy Union Pacific line. I thought it would be an issue but ultimately it's not. After awhile you get used to the sound and despite the train whistles, you will still get to hear plenty of nature's sounds - cicadas, toads, crickets. All of the trees also seem to buffer the sound. Fact is the train was here long before the subdivision and many residents lived in the subdivision for at least 15 years, so it must not be that bad..
I, too, have lived in HOA neighborhoods for 20 years. This is not by choice. It is extremely difficult to find properties in my area without an HOA.
People buy into my neighborhood because my HOA looks amazing on paper. We pay $135/QUARTERLY (lowest rate in my area, by far) and have access to 2 pools, a basketball court, a tennis court, playground, and two bike paths. Should you read the CCRs they look perfectly reasonable.
Here's an example: rule says grass has to be cut. We had a board member who thought, in the interest of fairness, he should measure the height of the grass in every single yard with his handy dandy yardstick in order to assess fines. I imagine some people here on city-data will think this is a great idea. Thank goodness b/c they will by my pool of buyers when I sell in a few years.
Don't even get me started on financials. Legally (at least where I live), financial information is only available to current HOA members. That means if you're buying my house you won't know that those 2 pools need some serious repairs. Our HOA dues cannot be increased by more than 5% a year. This isn't nearly enough to cover the upcoming costs. So the Board decided to sell pool memberships to people outside of our neighborhood to make up the difference. This means that our pools are incredibly crowded.
I'm glad your experience has been positive. You've been lucky.
Yep, been lucky for over 20 years. I've never paid more than $100 a year for HOA dues either, so I guess I'm lucky there as well.
We barely even have a board for that matter - just bare bones. We get a financial report twice a year. It seems reasonable. I live right across from one of the common areas that needs to be mowed fairly often and the HOA stays on top of it. That's basically what my $100 a year goes toward.
Location
Quiet street with no thru traffic
Large lot
Mature trees
Two stories
Three or four car garage
Open floor plan
Four bedrooms
Non-cookie cutter neighborhood
Neighbors with well kept homes and yards
It's just that in my experience neighborhoods where people park on streets are more densely populated > more noise > more trash on the street > more issues between neighbors.
I personally have never lived in a subdivision or suburb in my life - I'm a rural person now, and otherwise have lived in both large and small cities or small towns.
That is not the case in my neighborhood. I would say half the neighbors park on the street. it is clean and super quiet.
I had to look up "snout house" - I'd never heard that before!
I learned that It's a house with the garage dominating the front view of the house, and I agree - I don't like what that says about the people inside (car dependent).
I had to look up "snout house" - I'd never heard that before!
I learned that It's a house with the garage dominating the front view of the house, and I agree - I don't like what that says about the people inside (car dependent).
Or maybe it says "the lot narrow so that's why the garage faces the front. And in spite of that, we love the rest of the house so the positives outweigh this negative."
Or something like that.
And no, I don't have a forward facing garage. I just understand why some homes are built that way and it isn't an indication of character or the lack thereof of the owners.
Snout houses are for the developers benefit, but they do tend to result in a closed lifestyle. However I just hate houses that are basically garage with attached house. There are other options for tiny lots, however developers found snout houses convenient and profitable, so they told us we collectively love snout houses and the masses obeyed and started thinking they are acceptable.
Developers are even better at directing the thinking of the masses than they are at building homes.
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