I am mystified why anyone would want to have an HOA. What purpose do they serve other than to control how you live in your own home?
you obviously have never had a neighbor that parked their old abandoned cars in the front lawn, or thought of the front lawn as extra storage for all their crap!
lol
In some places, HOAs are responsible for maintaining common property - communal playgrounds, sometimes the streets, swimming pools, etc. Others were formed just for insurance purposes - not sure how that worked. The one I was in had zero community property. Fees went for collecting fees and for insurance for the BOD.
They do the things I can no longer physically do myself, such as shovel the snow, cut the grass, trim the trees and bushes, keep the streets paved, maintain the outside of the building and the roof.
Is it perfect? NO. As my health has been failing, I could no longer take care of the 3,000+ SF home, landscaping, and all the upkeep and maintenance.
Aside from moving into an apartment or condo (NO F'ing WAY!) a townhome community suited my needs. Takes a lot of stress off of me, which is what I need due to the condition I have.
Can HOA's be a pain in the ass? Sure. Spend the time, get to know the people who "serve" on them and help out instead of just complaining. It works *for me* and my situation. No, it's not for everyone.
Well, they also control how your neighbors live in their homes. Would you want to live in a neighborhood with $700k homes and have a next-door neighbor with cars in his driveway on cinder blocks? HOA's help to preserve property values.
1. It established harmless rules and regulations about the use of the properties. Basically, you can't keep junk cars on your front lawn, you can't park commercial vehicles in the street, and you can only park RVs on the street for 48 hours at a time.
2. The subdivision backs onto a creek and has a large landscaped area in the rear for stormwater detention. The HOA is responsible for maintaining this area and paying the property taxes on it.
There was a movement among several owners last year to disband the HOA. That would be an enormous mistake, and I have no idea why they wanted to do it. It only costs each homeowner $75/year in HOA fees.
The next subdivision does NOT have an HOA, and whenever a home comes up for sale there the listing includes a prominent boast that they have no HOA. I looked at a home over there before I bought this one. The neighborhood is awful, and looks like a rural slum with all kinds of trailers parked in the street and cars and junk all over the lawns. A home over there typically sells for about 40% less than a comparable home in this subdivision.
The need is driven by population density. The order of increasing freedom-sucking tyranny is: federal, state, county, city, HOA, wife.
I live in a large gated community with HOA fees. You’ve got to have some sort of a mechanism to pay for the security at the gates and to maintain the roads and drainage. Worth it to keep the riff-raff out. Also pays for some pools, playgrounds, tennis courts, etc. It’s basically another layer of local government.
There are some rules I don’t much like, but the practical reality here is that many are observed primarily in the breach. For example, technically I was supposed to get a bunch of approvals to put in a low voltage light kit I got at Costco. I just put it in, no one cares, neighbors like it.
Something like this, with a couple of uplights as well:
https://www.costco.com/volt-6-piece-area-light-landscape-lighting-kit.product.100505043.html
Just don’t paint your house pink and you’ll be OK.
Can there be idiot HOAs? Sure. But there can be disadvantages without one as well. Life is all about tradeoffs.
I’m in an HOA as part of a 2800 single home community. It’s a must with that volume of homes. No stiped colored homes. No lawn with two feet of grass. No cars on blocks. Only manicure lawns and basic color homes. It’s paradise! The HOA fee is only 115 a month and that covers all mowing in main areas along with maintaining three pools and three clubhouses. We have two golf courses and a restaurant. It is better then the other non HOA areas I pass buy with Terribly kept up property. Our home values are high compared to other areas as well.
It really depends on the specific HOA. I’ve lived in a neighborhood with an HOA for 35 years and I’m very pleased with it. Our neighborhood has beautiful parks and other amenities that I appreciate and that we wouldn’t have without it. Not too long ago we were going to be annexed by the city of Austin. Building on relationships forged through years of participating in the HOA were able to get legislation passed at the state level that prohibited the annexation. Besides the thousands of dollars that saved me on property taxes I know the HOA will never cause me the problems and frustrations that the city of Austin would have burdened me with.