For anyone who has ever lived or knows someone who has lived in an HOA, I'm sure the consensus is clear: HOAs can be annoying at times.
Some people have found out the hard way through personal experiences and today they share their stories of terrible HOA deeds. It ranges from simple mistakes to pure malice.
Read on and find out just how bad some people have it.
1. The Backyard Battle
My old house's backyard bordered an HOA community.
Our house was built 30 years before the community was built so we weren't part of it. We used to get notices about violations and fines if we didn't correct them. We never did correct them.
They finally sent legal papers to repossess our house. We went to court with a tax map that showed our property was NOT part of the HOA community. The judge dismissed their suit against us and found them guilty of harassment.
We didn't get awarded much, but I made sure to break every rule of theirs I could until we moved.
Uncle_Lazlo
2. Heartlessness and Stalking
I usually like living in HOAs and the ones I’ve lived in have been decent but my parents' HOA is insane. When my dad was diagnosed with cancer and began his chemo, he became too weak to walk. My parents installed a ramp at the front door so he could get his wheelchair into the house.
Their neighbor, the HOA president, went crazy. She demanded doctor's notes, appointment slips, and that my dad would prove to the neighborhood that he could walk and was lying.
My dad was too weak to do anything and my mom was too passive so I had to step in. I threatened to lawyer up and sue her personally. She eventually backed down.
My dad passed away in April and a week after, she came banging at our door saying she saw the funeral home come and pick my dad up and that we need to take the ramp down now “that he’s finally dead.” (Her exact words.)
At that point, I called the police right in front of her to report her for stalking and harassment. I moved in with my mom and now every time this woman sees me, she runs back into her house.
On another note, she follows neighborhood kids home from school asking their names and where they live because she wants to know if “they really live there” and my neighbors and I have caught her many times looking into our backyards.
Mshistories
3. Cul-de-Sac Rebellion
When I was a kid my parents had a house in a nice cul-de-sac, but it was a working-class neighborhood. The transmission in my truck took a doo doo so I replaced it in our driveway.
A few days later we got a letter citing a clause stating all improvements done on property must be done by a licensed contractor.
It was a far reach but they stood by it as there was nothing in the CC&Rs against working on personal vehicles.
My dad made me pay him back for the fine but for a while afterward, I’d go put some oil or coolant under the HOA president's cars and hope he wasting money chasing a nonexistent problem.
cantuseasingleone
4. Paperwork Distress
HOA “lost” paperwork for a change of ownership when we bought our house. They sent us letters saying there would be a lien placed on our home if we didn’t pay the overdue amounts plus over $200 of late fees. I had to call them 3 times to even get someone on the phone who knew how to help me.
Then I contacted escrow who said they had already not only sent all the paperwork, but turns out we had already paid the fees. Called HOA again and they were insistent that we hadn’t paid or sent over paperwork.
Called escrow again and requested they contact the HOA themselves to sort this out and the HOA still insisted we owed a late fee. I started losing my temper until escrow said they would pay the late fee.
A month later we got a letter in the mail saying we were being fined for leaving our trash bins out longer than necessary.
sneakypandas
5. The Mailbox Chaos
Moved to Florida where every neighborhood is a HOA. Upon moving in I felt like I had joined a sorority or fraternity and I had to endure the hazing from the HOA. The final straw was when they sent me a letter that my white mailbox was dirty.
So I decided to walk down one street and took pics of mailboxes with no doors and mailboxes that were covered in mildew and I emailed them all to the HOA.
I told them to not send me any more notices until these mailboxes were up to code.
I haven’t received another notice in a year. I guess I passed my initiation…
littleblue0111
6. Siding Surprise
I was putting on new siding... very obviously too, had ladders up and everything. But there was just plywood up one morning on part of my house, facing the street.
I got a knock on the door at 7:30 AM, a code enforcement officer (in uniform, looking vaguely like a cop) was visibly upset and acting like I'd taken a dump on the front sidewalk or something.
He told me if I didn't have the siding up by the end of the day I'd start getting fined every day.
SanchoMandoval
7. Purple Door Standoff
We had a cookie-cutter house built. One of the color palettes we could choose from included an accent color for the door/shutters that was a dark purple. The hubs and I are a little kooky so we selected it.
At our final walkthrough, our door and shutters are brown. I told the general that it was wrong and showed him my contract. We were the only homeowners in the subdivision that selected that color, so the HOA decided to not offer it anymore.
We said fine, that puts you in breach of contract and we want to be released.
A few phone calls later, my door and shutters are purple and I’m happy. We purchased the house.
At least once a year we got a nasty letter from the HOA about our “unapproved door color.” Every time I sent them a copy of my contract and their bylaws stating that the colors from the builder are allowed.
Not my problem that you guys discontinued it after I picked it.
BlondieeAggiee
8. Heated Arguments Over Trash
My grandparents lived in an old folks community with a zealous HOA. My grandmother had to go to the hospital, because of her many health problems. My grandfather would go with her. This happened once when I was visiting.
There was a knock on the door at about 10 am. Two elderly women with clipboards immediately jump into a speech about how the trash cans hadn't been brought in.
I explained the situation.
One of them said she had been in the hospital the previous week but still managed to bring in her trash can and handed me what looked like a ticket for $50.
CaptainPeachfuzz
9. Emergency Resilience
I work in emergency services. I’ve had HOA board members try telling me we couldn’t idle our fire engine or park our ambulance “there” as if I’d know the rules.
I’m usually professional but the second time they tried to complain about the fire engine idling I responded along the lines of “Go screw yourself. I don’t care what your bylaws say.
Article 300 of the Michigan traffic code says I can park wherever the hell I want.”
We were there for a family with carbon monoxide poisoning and I truly didn’t give a damn about anything else at that moment. We had crews up and down the road to treat and transport the entire family.
pokemon-gangbang
10. Power-Hungry Boomers
I live in a neighborhood that has a $1 / month HOA because we have a shared drive with an area drain. That money goes to emptying the area drain every couple of years. The CC&Rs are very laid back / there are no rules so I [wrongfully] assumed that would be the experience living here.
The HOA president (the guy who schedules the area drains being emptied) is a boomer on a power trip. He is in my business about everything. I got a new furnace and he threatened to sue me because the utility company had to use the driveway.
I scheduled a specialty garbage pickup with my garbage company and he called me screaming that I put garbage out in front of my house that morning. I have a retaining wall in front of my house and he came by and yelled at me for cleaning it.
The list goes on and on. Total nightmare experience and I will never live somewhere with an HOA of any kind ever again.
Inconspicuousness
11. Fighting for a Pool
This didn't happen to me but several years ago a co-worker told me about how she and her husband put in a small in-ground pool in their backyard. They got all of the required permits and everything and nobody said boo during the weeks of construction.
After the pool was installed and they were getting ready to open it, the HOA sent them a letter informing them that it was in violation of the HOA rules and it had to be removed.
(I guess their community had a public pool at the clubhouse or something.)
They ended up going to court and spending thousands of dollars to fight it. In the end, they agreed to erect a high privacy fence around it so that it wouldn't be visible. How ridiculous!
Linux4ever_Leo
12. Defying the HOA
I love reading contracts and agreements so when a friend of mine told me about his HOA troubles and not letting him keep his boat behind his house I jumped on the opportunity.
After reading, sourcing, and finding a few rulings I learned that they have very little power to enforce what they can’t see from the road (which affects property value). He took my documentation to the HOA and requested that they remove his fines.
They refused saying “The agreement says nag nag nag” and after a few months he finally paid a real estate lawyer $2000 to go talk circles around the HOA and they finally backed down removed his fines and allowed him to keep his boat.
Then out of pure spite and with my design we built a 40’ tall “temporary” structure, conforming to both the HOA agreement and building code to fly a flag on a further 25’ pole.
We took it down and put it back up every 3 months for a year. You could see it from almost anywhere in the neighborhood... It was a real triumph and IT WAS HIDEOUS!!
taylorm92
13. Shady Deals
My HOA had a coup where half the board resigned on the spot, the same day, and the three board members that were left, handed management of our neighborhood over to some mega HOA corporation based out of LA.
Before the handoff was complete, the chairman of the board fired everyone who worked for the HOA, including our incredibly talented accountant who due to his experience kept our finances so tip-top that we had a surplus of money and have never had our monthly dues raised in almost 15 years.
When we, the residents, demanded an explanation, the chairman refused by quoting an article from our HOA charter which gives the board the explicit right to manage the community however they see fit and without needed approval from the residents.
He basically told us "I don't owe any of you an explanation, so leave me alone".
Now we are trying to overturn his decision to essentially give our neighborhood over to some bad HOA management group that treats its residents horribly like a bad landlord would a tenant.
Oh, and the management group that we were given to is run by a man whose only formal education is a degree in Opera. And the accountant who has been assigned to manage my neighborhood's finances does not have a degree in finance or business. She has a degree in ballet.
It is my opinion that our board was bribed into selling us to that management firm. Our community hired a lawyer and we are in the process of reversing what our board has done.
If successful, we are going to rehire everyone they terminated and change the bylaws to prevent anyone from ever being able to do this again.
mrperson296
14. A Muddy Situation
My wife’s aunt and uncle live in an HOA neighborhood. Their current problem is that the ground is higher than their 1st level and it's slopped towards a group of condos.
Every time it rains badly, their condos flood. They don't have basements. HOA won't do anything and it seems a few of their residents are lawyering up. This has happened since they put in a storm drain and for some reason, it backs up into their common area which is behind the group of condos.
bwalz87
15. Plants and Gym Meetings
We rented a condo from the people who owned it and it was associated with a HOA. We like to grow things but there was no balcony so we just had two large pots, one on either side of our door.
We got a notice one day that we had to get rid of our only plants because they didn’t fit the aesthetic of the building or something. Basically, they were too ugly.
They also didn’t have a room to discuss whatever it was they discussed at meetings, so they would do it in the gym for some reason. They’d move all of the equipment to the side and set up their tables and chairs and then never move anything back.
One time I accidentally barged in on them in my workout gear and I actually had the nerve to ask them if there was a boardroom I could work out in. I said it on my way out, so I don’t know what their response was.
But yeah, we didn’t renew our lease there.
Cirrus-Ramparts
16. Fenced War
I bought a house in a development that had died. My house was built in the 70s. But a new developer came in and as houses started being built everywhere, they enacted the HOA clause and populated it with rich retired folks who just make up annoying rules.
They wrote a rule that you had to put up a fence around your backyard. So I did. They didn't like my fence so they changed the specifications for the fence.
I got irritated and had a friend give me a dead feral hog to hang on a post in my front yard.
The dogs in the hood loved me. It didn't solve anything but since I had a dog door I would sometimes wake up with 15 dogs around my bed who came in during a storm. I was the crazy redneck, but the dogs loved me and I like them more than humans.
diegojones4
17. Micromanagement and Speed Bumps
My HOA president walks around the neighborhood every day and takes pictures of any violations he finds. There is a management company that does monthly checks for violations, but that's not enough for this old, bored, retired man.
About a month after having a baby I got a knock on the door from the HOA president, which I answered in my post-surgical breastfeeding outfit because a palm frond hadn't been trimmed after being down for 3 days. Then I got a written notice the next day, then I got another notice 2 days later.
The HOA maintains the roads and there's a 15 mph speed limit. People drive pretty slowly. These idiots put in three-speed bumps on a 200-foot stretch of road! I've never seen anyone blast through and I regularly go on walks.
They also put up a security camera, raising our monthly dues, because one neighbor left their garage door open all day and someone took a few things. We clearly live in a dangerous area full of criminals.
I can't sell yet, but when I do, never living in an HOA again!
dreameRevolution
18. Military Housing Rules
This sort of fits. I lived with my wife in officer housing on a military installation. Of course, we had to follow certain rules so everything looked ship-shaped. That wasn’t hard to do.
What did get under my skin was the colonel driving around, taking notes, and then having her underlings issue tickets to residents for minor infractions. The one that stuck in my mind was the “suckers,” as they were called (I had never heard the term before).
Although I kept my grass mowed per regulation, the little maple tree seeds would sprout up overnight and be an inch taller than the grass. I got a ticket for suckers in my lawn, even though the grass was freshly mowed.
Okay, sure. I’ll just mow the lawn every goddamned day. Sheesh. I never lived under an HOA, but that experience was enough for me to realize that HOAs weren’t my thing.
shugerbooger
19. The Power of HOA Freedom
My former HOA threatened to take me to court over the color of a light bulb inside my condo. They claimed that the color of a bulb inside my unit altered the exterior appearance of the building. I'd had Philips Hue lights for probably over a year without issue.
Then my neighbor left up their Christmas lights well past New Year and received a complaint about it. Next thing I knew someone complained about my Hue lights. I switched them to white.
I could have won in court, but it wasn't worth angering a bunch of petty people who have nothing better to do than to sit on an HOA board. Anyway, the association wanted to add a new amendment that allowed them to sue anyone over anything they deemed a "nuisance."
They brought in their lawyer for a question-and-answer session.
I asked if the color of my neighbor's lights could be considered a nuisance, and he clarified that it had to be a bigger concern.
I followed up asking if we could claim that my neighbor had altered the exterior appearance of the building, he laughed and said no dismissively.
So by that point, their lawyer had already admitted their case was unwinnable, and he'd said earlier in the meeting a big part of his job was to keep the association from taking an unwinnable case to court. So the lights were whatever color I wanted them to be from then on.
I now live in a neighborhood without an HOA. Sometimes a neighbor's grass is a bit high and another neighbor just built a patio in the front yard and sometimes people put trash out a couple of days before the city says they can and nobody says anything; it's wonderful.
tacojohn48
20. The Elevator Dilemma
Forcing older and /or somewhat handicapped dog owners to produce a doctor's note stating they are unable to use the stairs because of a rule of no dogs in the condo's elevator.
Not because of potentially vicious dogs in an elevator cab. It was because they felt that people's dogs were leaving a mess and they weren't cleaning it up (which I never experienced).
The dogs, by that rationale, could still leave a mess not cleaned up in a stairwell or hall.
I sent the board an x-ray of my knee with screws in it to avoid a $500 fine. That got hit down with a threat of an ADA lawsuit. Now anyone can use it.
bearcub42
21. Heartless HOA
My family was fined for "putting up a fence" when we put a 12-inch tall wire border around our flowerbed. My friend was fined in a different HOA because her garage (which was painted by the same company at the same time and with the same paint) was a "different" color than her house.
It wasn't. The HOA president delivered the violation notice to her on the day of her husband's funeral. Yes, he knew that she (46 years old) had just lost her (48-year-old) husband 4 days before.
christikayann
22. Intrusive Inspections
It's 6:30 AM, and my cats are going nuts, and I realize someone is in my backyard. At the time I worked as a bouncer and very frequently got the "I'm going to come to your house" type threats.
I live in the same HOA (albeit a huge one) as a bunch of the mean customers. My sliding door starts jiggling. I grab a gun and throw open the blinds. Outside, on my porch is a damn old man.
I start screaming, make him get on his knees, and call the cops. Lo and behold, he's an "inspector" from my HOA, there because a neighbor reported me cutting down a half-dead tree that was about to fall on my house. "Town" cops show up.
They are actual police but only work in the HOA, they are not happy with me, but because I said the right words on the 911 call, the county sheriffs also show up.
They basically have an argument with the local cops about the fact that being a HOA inspector doesn't allow you to come onto someone's enclosed deck and that since I didn't physically attack the inspector, I didn't commit a crime.
We spent all morning going back and forth, and finally, we basically agreed to an "everyone go home" agreement. HOA sends me a strongly worded letter.
MaverickDago
23. Struggling for Roofs
I got a letter saying I needed to clean my roof, as mildew built up on it; it’s Florida, it happens. It was bad, and I was about to pay a company to do it anyway but I got the letter first. Went ahead and paid $250 for a company to clean it and got a 2-year warranty.
Then of course I drove around and noticed that 90% of the homes in my community needed their roof cleaned, most were worse than mine was. Waited 2 months to see if they were going to take care of it, but nothing happened.
Had a neighborhood kid fly his drone up and take pictures of all the roofs, proceeded to email the company the pics, and asked why me only. Haven’t gotten a response yet. Can’t wait to move out of here.
I called and talked to the manager, he said they have sent out over a hundred violations and people are just not doing it, but since the pandemic, they have not been fining them, just sending out reminders.
He doesn’t know when they will get tough and start fining yet.
surfdad67
24. A Fine and a Sticker
My husband and I have a home with an HOA. Our most recent letter was a picture of our trash can out on the street and basically, they told us that we put our trash out too early for pick up.
The photo was taken on Friday at 3 pm and trash pick up was on Saturday at 6 am, so they sent us a letter that it wasn’t acceptable. Also one of the lights in our garage had gone out and we received a letter with a picture about that as well, that we had to fix it immediately or we’d be fined.
We’re also not allowed to park on the street without a pass from the HOA hung in the car.
We didn’t know this and we were moving in at the time.
We parked one car in the driveway and one on the street, grabbed some boxes, went inside with them, and by the time we came about out there was a huge neon sticker on the window telling us the rules and that we would be towed.
That sticker was so hard to remove.. and we were literally parked there for maybe 10 minutes at that point.... so annoying.
joneselliot
25. Welcome to the neighborhood
Had a member of the board drive up and yell at me while I was moving in because the moving van was in the street. Parked it in the driveway but it stuck out into the street about 2 feet.
Woke up the next morning and there was a warning posted on the moving van for sticking out into the street. Welcome to the neighborhood. Ended up living next door to the meanest person in the neighborhood too.
These were zero-lot-line properties and he put an above-ground pool in the side yard between our 2 houses. There's supposed to be 3' space along the side of the house for access but his pool went from his wall to my wall so you couldn't even walk between the properties.
Then every time they went swimming the pool walls would flex and bang into my house. I wrote multiple letters to the HOA but they didn't do anything. Moved out shortly after the pool incident.
I'll never live in another HOA.
[deleted]
26. Bucket Violation
We got an okay to have potted plants. I'm a college student so I can't afford fancy architectural pots like my neighbors. I used Home Depot buckets for my bigger plants (tomato and peppers) and got a violation for having out construction supplies.
With 4-foot plants growing out of them and a prior okay. They would not budge on it and we eventually just spray painted them black, but after doing that I was nervous to eat anything from the plants because some paint got on them. So I never got to enjoy the fruits of my labor.
coffeebarry
27. The Mysterious Bucket
I was doing some work in the yard and had a 5-gallon Home Depot bucket on my driveway. After about an hour I took the bucket back in the garage and went inside.
A week later my HOA sent me a three-page letter with a picture of a said bucket on my driveway saying it detracted from the value of my neighbors' homes.
It was on my driveway for an hour, while I was working.
[deleted]
28. Here We Go Again
Our neighbor was flooding our backyard and the HOA property from her drain by overwatering. The HOA sent us an extremely rude and unprofessional note telling us we can’t drain our pool onto their property. We don’t have a pool. We replied to their letter with FOAD.
A couple of weeks later I got out of the shower to see the HOA president and his wife with a ladder propped against our shared fence peering into our backyard to look at our “not a pool”.
I walked out buck naked and asked if I could help him with something. He died a few years later (thankfully!) and his wife (who isn’t even officially on the HOA board, just a busybody) recently stopped by our garage to ask if we were watering and damaging their fence.
She tried to introduce herself and I simply said “We’ve met before” while looking her straight in the eyes...
triit
29. Annoying Habits
My mom used to live in a HOA neighborhood and the habits she picked up are annoying me.
She would keep overflowing trash INSIDE the house unless it was the night before pick up and then freak out when I took the trash out on a "not-allowed" day.
Me asking my neighbors for help has her going "Why would you do that? Now they're all up in our business!"
jtrisn1
30. Pondside Drama
I was showing my six-year-old stepdaughter how to skip rocks in the pond. An HOA board member screeched to a halt in his truck and yelled at her to stop doing that.
I yelled back at him, saying I'll buy more rocks for the community if it's such a big deal, but his reasoning was that I was unsettling the structure of the pond. Apparently, small, thin rocks mixed in with the large boulders were preventing erosion in this guy's mind.
He then backpedaled a bit and said teenagers from other communities were messing with the pond and he didn't realize the situation.
Just leave the big rocks alone.
It upset my stepdaughter, who didn't want to skip rocks after the brief encounter. The random upshot was that I told a guy at work this story, who just happened to also be on a HOA board with the same man at a sister community across town.
The two got into a shouting match at a meeting over rock skipping. There were many other things. I've moved. Never again.
StBeals
31. Trash Can Troubles
Lived in a condo for 4 years, sold and bought a house this past July. The first year we lived there, HOA fined us for having “no lid on the trash cans”. I went outside, took a picture of my trash cans with the lids on, and sent it to the HOA, and they said “Sorry, our mistake”. A couple of months later, the same thing.
Then a few months later, we got fined when our trash barrels blew away, after they were emptied, the wind took them, and I brought them into the garage when I got home from work.
They sent a fine to everyone in the complex, so we all appealed. They then fined me again, when a neighbor put out a cardboard box that blew onto our driveway. I refused to pay that fine and they sent it to collections.
The last one was after we moved, I got a letter from the HOA delivered to my new home, stating that the new owners didn’t pay the August HOA, and I was responsible... What?
bignose703
32. Banning Chickens
I live in an HOA. We are outside of city limits, so the HOA takes care of the roads, snowplowing, our 2 parks, and our water treatment. So, can't complain there. And our HOA dues are cheap.
They also try to keep up with making sure no one keeps junky cars on blocks in the driveways, and that lawns are maintained.
So, that's all good. But...
There are some nitpicky things, too. Sheds must be the same color as your house. And many of us would love to raise chickens (1/2 acre lots) and they're not allowed. We've tried to get that changed but so far, nope.
MoonieNine
33. Control Freak HOA
I built some very nice planters for my wife's garden. Three years later the HOA told me the planters violated some HOA rule. I told them by not bringing it up three years ago they had by default approved of them. They let it drop.
Other things our HOA did were that they wouldn't let us grill on the front porch, wouldn't let us park in the street for more than three days a month, wouldn't let us mow our own lawn, wouldn't put in the city-mandated fire break behind our house on property they owned.
They made us pressure wash a fence that no one could see without coming into our backyard, and check my gutters to make sure I was cleaning them.
That is just a small sampling of our HOA experience.
The most interesting thing is that they wouldn't fix street lamps that broke or road damage unless they were in front of an HOA member's house.
Oh yeah, for the privilege of them hiring a company to do a horrible landscaping job and to pave the road every other year, we paid over $2000 a year.
Seriously these people are the worst sort of people. All their self-worth seems to be wrapped up in other people's lives.
dragonkin08
34. Puppy Politics
Lived in a HOA where many people owned dogs. I went and got one myself. We had a large shared backyard (no fence), so I'd put him on a long leash for him to enjoy it.
I could sit out with him or easily watch through the window. My dad had a spat with the neighbors so they decided to complain that they didn't feel comfortable using the yard with the dog there.
For one, he's the sweetest boy in the world. Loves everyone. Secondly, they've never used the yard before anyway. They put a tiny little fence around their pad.
Anyway, despite everyone else doing it, it is against the rules to have a dog on a long leash. So I had to take him out with a hand leash. So I'd walk him right over in front of their pad, and just stare as he did his business.
They stopped coming outside because they were very cowardly when it came to any confrontation. We also complained that their dogs were off-leash and scaring people. Since their fenced-in pad was deemed shared space, they had to stop letting their barky rats out.
dndpoppa
35. Becoming the Hero
We just moved into a brand new house in a newly developed neighborhood. HOA was established AFTER our house and fence were built. HOA sent us a letter saying our fence violated the HOA regulations that were set after its construction and had to be removed.
One note from our lawyer, threatening to sue and they backed off real quick. Guess who is now the vice president of the HOA and has the power to keep the HOA from doing bad things? Yep- me.
Poisonktty
36. HOA Issues
These are modern-day fiefdoms that have no use in a decent society. For the convenience of having an admin hire undocumented people to clean the pool and cut the lawn I traded hundreds of $$$ per month.
And having the final say in things like what flowers could be in the yard, what windows could be installed, who I could sell my condo to, etc.
Oh, and if there is a nightmare neighbor partying ALL night and leaving beer cans and cigarette butts on your deck and threatening you that’s your problem to work out with them and feel free to call the police when your safety is in danger.
NEVER again!
[deleted]
37. No More Chickens
As a kid, me and my Parents lived in an HOA neighborhood and had a lovely big backyard at the base of a big mountain. It had a creek right behind it that ran past multiple houses next to us. So, something important is how my Mum has always wanted chickens.
A neighbor two houses from us had chickens, geese, and a turtle. She decided she should get some, and my mum sent a request to the HOA.
Apparently, we were “out of range” of the chicken allowance area. Because of how close to the mountains we were, cougars came near us often. They said, “They didn’t want any attacks” ...
Do you think a Cougar will see the house with the chickens and go “WOW! Some delicious food! Whoopsie, it’s in the HOA chicken ok zone, looks like I can’t eat them”
Mewmew5525
38. Natural Disasters
While living with my mother and siblings in Nevada, a huge storm hit the area and did a ton of damage. During the night, we heard something close to the sound of a garage door slamming down or a huge crack of lightning.
The following morning we got up to let the dog out to find that the huge tree in the raised portion of the backyard had uprooted and fallen.
It took out our fence along the sidewalk, a small playset in the yard, and the back porch, and nearly wrecked the foremost right side of the house itself.
(We had a leaky ceiling over there for a while.) HOA told us we needed to get the tree out, away and the damage fixed immediately due to it being an "eye sore." Like we weren't trying already.
Kiivez
39. A Lucky Plot-Twist
I'm lucky, my HOA isn't nitpicky like some of the stuff I've read here. One of my neighbors works construction, started replacing his siding, and didn't have time to get the job done for months (two small kids and another on the way).
Instead of fining him, the HOA persuaded him to bring a small end loader home to help re-mulch the playground. Everybody won.
3mta3jvq
40. Unexpected Betrayal
Not me but I had a boss of mine that lived in an HOA neighborhood. They had a community playground for the kids that needed to be mowed, they spent three months trying to find the proper person to mow the yard, and finally, my boss went and mowed it with his personal lawn mower.
The following week he got a citation from them saying that he was not an authorized landscaper and not allowed to mow and weed-eat the playground. The funniest thing about it is his wife was part of the HOA.
jtgreen76
41. Fees for Weeds
Our HOA charges pretty high fees per month, but all of the trees in our shared spaces are dead from not being watered and there are weeds in those areas taller than a fence.
Supposedly our biggest cost every year is landscaping and watering. The HOA management company is a joke.
cactusflower4
42. Stupid Christmas Deadline
In Salt Lake City we got fined every winter for having our Christmas lights up past January 14th. Anyone who lives in ice and snow knows you can’t actually remove the lights from your roof because you will slip and die and/or the lights see iced into the gutters.
We were really tight on cash a few years ago and had to literally cut through the ice and cables around the whole house so we wouldn’t get fined for ruining all the lights.
Screw HOAs, most of the time they’re just witches in power suits.
NorthMcCormick
43. The Military Vs HOA
They're rampant in Florida. Live in an area near a lot of Military installations so there are a lot of troops that see deployment. HOAs are just evil. They sneak around unannounced and unwelcome documenting the most asinine of conditions.
I had a very minor dent in the bottom aluminum panel of my lanai screen door. Citation. In the next subdivision, there were people literally having to spray paint their lawns green during a drought and consequent watering restrictions so they didn't have brown/yellow stains on their lawns.
In some cases, these citations pile up and they can actually put a lien against your house. There have been more than a few cases here where a deployed solider will return stateside to find their property either in a state of default or under such a fine levy that they have no way to pay.
Restrictions for flags, outdoor BBQs, holiday ornaments, you name it. Some are worse than others... but sometimes it just depends on what council of angry of angry Karens you get..
axi0n
44. Fixer-Upper Struggles
I bought a fixer-upper that has been abandoned. Very run down and not livable so we started on the inside to get in quickly while staying with my parents.
Received a letter a week after closing, fining us for the paint chipping on the outside.
They gave us 7 days to fix it even though it had been abandoned for years.
It was a great welcome to the neighborhood. We had to delay everything to paint the outside of a house while leaving the urine-stained carpets in. Priorities.
Timetogrowup444
45. HOA Hell
We were renting a townhome when the community went 0% rentals. That caused many renters to get kicked out, and about 15% of the homes in the neighborhood went up for sale as soon as they were out.
Prices plummeted as everyone who had been renting for years undercut everyone else to sell quickly, as they couldn’t afford both mortgages anymore.
Meanwhile, we had to come up with new rental money within 2 months.
We ended up renting a room with friends and moving back in with our parents, respectively, for six months so we could save up properly and get the place we’re in now.
We are looking at buying a home now and the number one stipulation was NO HOA.
GibMirMeinAlltagstod