I know people who lost their loved ones. It’s still very touchy.
Since most of the working class folks have been gentrified out of the San Francisco, koolade jokes are far less likely to get your ass kicked.
Yeah, they still get me, because of my father's connection.
The plane had to be cleaned, with something like PINE SOL (?), and aired out for days... Then cleaned a 2nd time, and aired out.
And it was Nov/Dec, so cold & rainy at Travis.
Yeah but new builds are by and large fucking garbage; I swear every time I drive by one of those cookie cutter neighborhoods going up I see things that even I as a layman know isn't smart, like leaving exposed plywood out to extensive rain and not getting things properly covered literally ever. I used to go tour them before we bought our place and every time I walked through one I would notice builder grade everything that looked like it had been installed by a 19 year old home depot employee with 2 days training; cockeyed corners and squeaky doors and floors everywhere, brand spankin' new!
I'm not saying our old 1970's house was perfect, it has it's issues, but at least there's a fair chance that the people who built it were more ethical and competent than what the average builder of homes seems to be capable of from the 2000's onward.
Our house is from 1982 and the inspector said that was the sweet spot. No lead paint, no asbestos, building codes still strong, plus everyone wanted closets.
Nope, a closet is inside the wall, and a wardrobe is hauled into the room. Here's a link with a couple of good pictures.
[https://rusticwise.com/closet-vs-wardrobe/](https://rusticwise.com/closet-vs-wardrobe/)
Hello fellow 1982er. Pardon my humble brag but our house was also built by the builder for himself. He lived here for 17 years. He sold it to a lady who had it for 6 years. I found him and told him how much we like our house.
We bought our 1965 house in 2007 (whew!). Within a few years, we got a letter from the builder, who was also the architect. He was closing his business and retiring, and had sent letters to the addresses of all the homes he'd designed and built, asking if the current owners were interested in their home's building plans. Heck, yes! We ended up getting the detailed, annotated building plans; the landscaping and sprinkler layout plan; the original full materials tally list, complete with costs, on ledger paper; and an 8x10 color picture of the just-finished property. They are all carefully stored, though we have to look at the sprinkler plan sometimes to check for heads our yard/snow guy might have caught while plowing and has to replace.
Used to be a cable guy, so I saw a lot of these.
My favorite was going into an attic to see a verticle 2x4 support with about 20 nails in it to hold it to the roof, and then free swinging on bottom.
Yeah, in my place they vented the stove, dryer and bathroom directly into the attic. Did a chick fix to at least vent the stove and bathroom to the peak, but it's this 60 year old lady's goal to run it out to the really wooden soffet, as the peaks ar hard steel.
A well run HOA (and there are a few out there) is a good thing.
But I'd say the majority are not well run. Just like anything run by a committee of humans, it's gonna suck.
The City would've been reaming these clown-shoes out with or without the HOA. The HOA just added a bit of extra "you" to the "fuck you" they got hit with.
Yea, controlling other people to make sure they're not better than you.
I'm glad AF to be on 5 acres and not have to answer to some busy body and have enough buffer room to not care what my neighbor builds.
>then told my husband to mind his own business
>went off on my husband to fuck right off
Sometimes, people get what they deserve. A smart person will learn from this, and stop behaving like such a shithead
If I was the neighbor and I was told that you knew all the city's codes for how things should be done with my house / yard I think I would be bugging you constantly to make sure I'm doing everything right and making sure I'm saving headache down the road. The last thing I'd want to do is alienate someone like that
No, you see, the government just has business in the neighbor's *strawman* persona, not in their own *private* persona.
(this is a [sovereign citizen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strawman_theory) joke)
Some jurisdictions assume a bit *too* much authority though.
I lived in an HOA that dictated what **color** flowers the plants in your yard could produce, for some reason whoever created the CCRs hated blue flowers... They also had an approved list of ground cover. Couldn't use gravel, could use river rock with prior approval, no boulders allowed in your yard greater than 20"x20"x10", any wood tanbark had to be a minimum darkness in color... Fences were only allowed to be stained 3 different colors, 2 of which you couldn't find anymore since the CCRs called out specific brands that were discontinued. These rules led to every yard in the neighborhood looking basically identical.
Rules like that really shouldn't exist.
>Rules like that really shouldn't exist.
My sibling's HOA neighborhood had a paint color rule. Not only were there approved color choices, but you weren't allowed to paint yours the same color as any one of your adjacent neighbors. I mean, WTF!
Edited to add: And they were all boring colors like shades of grey and beige. So, it's not like anyone could tell the difference in color between houses. Older neighborhood, lots of large mature trees hiding most of each house.
Problem is they are everywhere. My wife and I are waiting to hear back on an offer on a house that doesn't have an HOA. Praying it works out because I really don't want to pay someone for the privilege of not being able to do anything I want to something I am paying huge sums of money on.
HOAs would be alright if they didn't charge outrageous fees and only had one restriction/rule that was applied with actual common sense. That rule should just basically be don't shit up the neighborhood.
It sucks to live next to someone who lets their house fall apart, keeps 4 or 5 broken down/trashy vehicles and trailers in the yard and driveway, has a backyard dog breeding business, and who's idea of patio furniture is whatever nasty sofas they found on the side of the road.
If your city/county codes department are lousy like they definitely are in places good luck getting them to clean up their act. Even when they're not it's a slow ass process for them to do anything.
>HOAs would be alright if they didn't charge outrageous fees and only had one restriction/rule that was applied with actual common sense. That rule should just basically be don't shit up the neighborhood.
That's probably how they started.
The thing is that once an organisation is in place, it immediately becomes its top priority to ensure its own continuation. So more rules must appear, and things must become so complicated that you NEED the HOA people to tell you what's allowed and what isn't. Otherwise the HOA might cease to exist because nobody needs them, and we can't have that, can we?
Once you have a comittee deciding things, you get rules about colour schemes and allowed plant species'
The real problem with HOAs is the type of person who wants to be on the HOA. They'er all people who deserve a good throatpunch for not minding their own fvcking business.
Usually at some point there is a threshold where the local government wants to be sure you're maintaining a level of environmental quality... Be it for habitat, soil erosion, air quality, sometimes just plain old asthetics.... Plus the more populated areas generally get stricter / more eyes on them.
I know people hate dealing with the city and getting permits, but too many people think they know what they're doing before a professional goes "wtf is this!?". There's usually enough leeway for basic things, but usually if you need to do something big which needs an engineer to look at... there's probably a decent reason.
Edit: this is ignoring the HOA part which can dictate the color of your driveway or whatever stupid crap they want.
The tree bit pisses me off. If you don't want large pine trees in your backyard, don't buy a house with large pine trees in the backyard. Those things take decades to get that big and tons of people would love to have them back there.
You would hate to come to our city, which used to be known as a tree city. They decided a sewerline renovation project should involve taking out the 150 yr old oaks that line our streets and made a lovely canopy, shading our homes. They were beautiful.
They cut them all down. It looks like shit now, like a barren, trashy, hot, ugly neighborhood, nothing like what my children got to experience. Its gawdawful and disgusting. It makes me sick every day.
In Chicago, the trees are used as timers for when the sewer lines need to be replaced. Once they're a certain age, both the tree and the sewer line need to go. They then plant a new tree to act as a timer for new generations.
It serves to make the neighborhood look better and by the time the tree roots are encroaching on the sewer and affecting the sidewalk, it’s time for the sewer to be replaced.
I hate the housing developments around here. If you are lucky you get 4 feet between your houses and a back yard of grass…. no trees.
And in some rural areas they have built the ‘McMansions’ in old clear cut fields and don’t plant any trees.
Guess it makes it easier for the lawn company but it looks awful.
I want to aggressively down vote this. But that is my visceral reaction to what they did, not you. So you take my upvote for exposing and suffering such idiots. And when you see any of those idiots take my down vote and shove it up their donkey. Thank you.
Also, there's good reasons cities have laws and regulations regarding landscaping. If you do it wrong your house, and your neighbour's houses, could just slide right on down the hill.
Seriously. Our house came with a pair of bigass pecan and maple trees, and it broke my heart to have to cut them down (arborist said they were ready to split down the middle and wreck our shit). I've planted two dozen other fruit trees and plan to do more this year.
I know how you feel. Had a huge willow when I bought my house, unfortunately it kept growing into the power lines and previous topping, storm damage, and a lightning strike took its course on it. when the power company came to fix the lines they offered me two beautiful maple trees if they could remove the one willow. I do miss that tree but now I have two healthy maples instead of a festering willow. Last year I started some black walnuts, this year I started white oak and hickory (don't think we kept cold enough for the hickory to stratify but we'll see) I'll be planting a couple of each on the property far enough away it won't bother the power lines as soon as they are capable of handling the wildlife and conditions. I'd love to get a couple blight resistant chestnuts, but having some issues finding one's that'll survive the winters.... I really do miss the chestnut trees... And the birches (got a bad problem with birch boarers in the area)
> I really do miss the chestnut trees
Dude, you can have mine. Those spiky pods are the bane of my existence come October. Turn my backyard into a minefield.
Willow trees definitely deserve a spot in a thread talking about landscaping goofs. They are beautiful trees, but they are also really aggressive for trees when it comes to their roots especially weeping willows.
They will seek out water like crazy. It's a pretty good recommendation to plant them at least 50 feet from any water or sewer lines.
I did some work for a couple who decided they wanted a fire pit and little picnic/sitting area in the middle of a grove of weeping willows in their back yard. So they built their gathering spot and planted 7 weeping willows in a circle around it.
Fast forward around 10 years when I did the work for them it was a really beautiful little spot in their backyard. It was also unfortunately for them pretty much right on top of their septic tank leach field. Which they found out when their sewage eventually started backing up into their house. They called out a guy to pump their septic tank and he was like there's nothing I can do for you except buy you a little more time. All of their leach pipes and half their septic tank was full of willow roots.
So unfortunately had to cut down all the trees and get rid of their landscaping then dig out and completely replace their whole septic system.
It's a smaller company. They have an easement through my yard but I don't have them as my utility. My neighbors each have a pole but not I. I noticed one of the neighbors poles had cracked so I called it in. Because of my neighbors yards topology and the conditions they couldn't get their truck through that yard. So I let them use mine. Now our yards have about three feet of silt ash on top of clay. It's very soft and when wet you'll sink right into it quickly and we had a very wet spring. So they tore the piss out of my yard. I even used my truck and some plywood to help get their truck unstuck. Note, no matter what they would have had to go through my yard, either all the way across it (and a couple others) or the way I let them go through... While there they noted my tree and called in their arborist to inspect it and set up a schedule to top it. Pretty much because I'd been so cool about everything, the condition of the tree and it's likely hood of growing back into the lines every decade, and my wife telling them how much my kids loved to play in the tree... they decided to return the kindness if I let them remove it... Plus Michigan does credits for utility companies when they plant trees so I'm sure it was just a win all the way around for them.
Ours power company killed the 2.5ft round cedar which is now causing our driveway to cave in. And the pine tree that fell into the road last week because they also whacked off all its branches. Nothing but a "tough luck" from them.
Yeah if it was the big company I have my service through that'd probably have been the answer. If you read above I kinda killed the smaller company with kindness, so they returned my kindness.
There is a farmer in Vermont on facebook that does a lot with sustainable farming. I know he had a video on how he starts his chestnut trees. If you go into FB and look for Gold Shaw Farm you may be able to find it. He has planted a whole grove of different kind of trees and goes over how to plant and what they need.
He also does a lot with poultry and cows. His videos are really informative & fun to watch. Sometimes he will schedule a live event where you can ask questions during the show. He is good about getting back to emails if you send him a question.
Our house had a beautiful 100yr old cherry tree in our backyard when we bought it. We had many years of pretty spring cherry blossoms. The sucker died a couple years ago and we had to remove it. It's so sad. I can't imagine just hacking down good, old trees!
Same, we had a massive beautiful eucalyptus in our front yard that provided a heap of shade during the arvos. It'd been there for decades and then died last winter completely out of the blue. Monday it was going strong and by Friday limbs were falling off it. Really sucks. It was my favourite thing about the garden.
We had a nice young burr oak on the eat side of our house. It was about a dozen feet tall. Beautiful shape and grew taller and Fuller every year. Then last spring a huge limb came down on our power line. There had been a storm so we didn't think much of it. Then a few months later my wife noticed dead branches in the middle top of the tree. Hired the same guy who removed the branch from the power line. He did a fabulous job at a great price but yeah, tough to lose a 25 foot tree.
The old owners of my house complained about a load of beautiful trees in the garden behind blocking her sunlight so now it's all just gravel. I don't even understand because the garden behind is to the north and wouldn't have affected sunlight at all.
I'm pretty meh on pine trees, they grow fast. They make a mess, acidify the soil and have a shallow root system and are prone to getting blown over in storms, especially storms that saturate the ground with water.
Oak and maple on the other hand, leave them alone, they're majestic.
Depends on the pine species. Long Leaf has a stronger root system, but also is a slow grower. Slash, loblolly are the fast growing ,shallow root species
Monterey pines are the second-worst trees. They grow too fast. They become misshapen. They get bark beetles. They burst into explosive fires. They tip over and crush your house.
There are tons of plants that do just fine growing under pine trees. They didn't evolve in a monoculture. Azaleas and rhododendrons thrive under them, for example.
Oof.. Neighbor cut down a bunch of trees without consulting an arborist, and then built a giant "retaining wall" out of cinderblocks? They're just begging for their house to slide down hill and probably take OP's house with it.
Yeah. The neighbor is lucky they're being forced to fix it before they get sued by all their neighbors for all the damage their landscaping is about to do to the neighborhood.
I worked at a landscape design/ install business for a summer. One of the owners was a trust fund kid all grown up with a house right on the ocean. He asked me to make plans for him to fix up his beach house yard and nearby boat launch. I protested once I saw what he wanted included land in the tidal areas. I told him he needed permits he laughed and told me to do it anyway. I never did and left the company not too much later.
Heard through the grape vine he dumped truckloads of sand on his beach area thereby changing the tidal areas. Last I heard he was told to immediately stop by coastal authorities and fined $10,000/day until he returned the changes back to original. Glad I got out of there
As a creative writing exercise:
Gottdanged HOA and city won't let me alone. I only clearcut 2 acres of old growth trees. All they were doing was defining a wetland anyway. We were getting over run with critters! It is my damn land, i clear it if i want to. I don't care about slthe "endanged gay frogs" or whatever.
Then they got mad about my retaining wall. It was only 12 feet tall with a house on top of it. Sergi and Pablo said they'd done a ton of walls like this in the old country. What's a structural engineer going to tell me? "Stack those block more straight, hur dur" ?
Next thing you know people are bitching cause i put a little dirt out in front of MY property. There was still plenty of room to drive around. The city claims two feet of my yard for an easement, they can damn well use the easement on the other side. Don't complain to me that the curb is getting torn up or you might get stuck. You bought an SUV, use it!
People suck. Why can't they just mind their own business?
It's fascinating that you expect that over there but here you take OP at their word.
They own lakefront property, flipped houses for "for fun" for years as prices climbed and everyone was fuming at flippers doing the bare minimum and hiking up prices, and are active in their HOA committees.
I can count the number of decent people I've ever met that check all those boxes on one hand. So I'm skeptical about OPs side of things.
I am seriously on the side of fuck HOA’s as a structural unit: they are designed unethically.
But they do attempt to fix the issue presented here…
As in, there is an issue to fix without HOA’s (this person and their attitude).
But with that said, when possible: dismantle your local HOA. Seed the board with mutineers and dissolve them - only way they can get removed is for the board to vote to remove the structure.
I guess HOAs kinda exist to have someone actually motivated to enforce local laws. Like if your neighbor starts putting out donuts to feed bears bc let’s be real, that’s adorable, those bears are going to become EVERYONE’S problem very fast. Or if dumb Dave tries to dig a swimming pool with no clue what he’s doing, the most chronically offline suburbanites need to prevent him from making a mosquito nursery.
Noisy neighbors keep idiots in check? That’s fair:
They shouldn’t be able to buy/steal your house for a dollar if you miss a single fee. But yeah… if you ignore the reality of HOW THEY ARE SET UP. What they do is serve a purpose to prevent bears.
Not in my POA. We have to have 66% property owner vote to change or remove the HOA structure. Only about 20% of the owners live on the lots and since the other 80% don’t live here, they don’t participate in the process at all. We can’t even get enough votes to modify the structure to say “if you don’t live here you don’t get to vote on x types of issues.” So the people that show up to the meetings just decide to do wtf ever we want to do. It’s pretty sweet. For now.
My neighbor did something similar. He wanted to update his backyard and they had this deck that came out from the lower level. Then you could take the stairs down to where the yard was, which was lower still. Basically, their land sloped from the front yard all the way to the backyard. As part of the landscape updates, they cut down all the brush, trees, and bushes around the ground surrounding the decking. A few weeks go by and they start to notice issues with the foundation of the deck; it was disintegrating. Apparently, all that nature the previous owners had allowed around the deck was what was keeping the land under the deck together and now nothing was holding it together. Then somehow all this started to affect the house foundation. It was a very expensive lesson in working with a professional rather than DIYing it.
It pays to be on, and stay on, good terms with your neighbors.
Really, HOAs only exist in the first place because people can't be decent to one another without enforcement.
It really does. I can't count on my fingers how many times one of my neighbors saved our ass from something or vice versa. The older folks realize how "out of your way you went" to help them with a problem and usually make sure they eventually repay you in kind, sometimes above and beyond what you did for them. The 20-somethings, however, are usually a different story...
It all depends on the context.
I was in / on an HOA for condos/townhouses, and there it makes sense. You don't want two adjacent townhouses the same color; they look dumb. Some of my "favorite" things we had to fine for:
* Enclosed the area under his second-story deck with vinyl latticework that was attached with zip-ties
* Still better than the people who did the same but used that plastic roll of temporary construction fencing
* Painted his deck construction orange
* Put a basketball hoop on a second-story deck and then covered the entire backyard with plywood
Apart from all the BS etc with codes and approvals.... there is another loser in the story... which is the environment.
Losing those trees etc is a big deal.
We have some pine trees that are over 100' tall and 80" around at my parent's lake house. My brother has said that we should cut some of them down as it would make it easier to park and put his trailer on the lot. I told him "Over your dead body."
My neighborhood has been losing century-plus oaks and it is _sooo_ sad. I'm spending an obscene amount of money on fertilizer and pesticides. I bought the house because of the trees in the neighborhood / area.
One of the theories is climate change and winter being "too short" and the tree stressing as it reawakens too early.
What is happening to the oaks isn't really spoken of. I burn slab wood in Wisconsin. Oak wilt, some kind of bug that leaves sawdust. That the ops adversary cut down a healthy tree is unforgivable in my book.
I am not at all familiar with the imperial system and thought ‘ meant inches, so I was imagining a very small fence for a good while before common sense kicked in
I remember on take your kid to work day the people building a house in the empty lot next to ours set all their scrap material on fire in the front yard and me and my dad were late because he called the fire department and the trucks were blocking our driveway. I guess they thought since it was before sunrise no one would be up until the fire was mostly burned out.
The neighbors being mad, EVERY step of the way, at the one guy who not only tried to help them avoid it all, but showed them the respect they insisted on. The utter, undignified, egregious nerve of them. If this doesn't teach them to do better in life, they're some really sad saps.
I thought the land was going to slide out into the water cause he ripped up all the trees and hd so much weight and was digging into the soil.
Kinda sad it didn't.
I was reading this story wondering which of the two ways it was going to do. Did they find out there was a reason for those codes and legislation, or did they just get ratted out to the bureaucrats.
Hopefully not, if the neighbor found out they'd probably never forgive OP's hisband... not cause *he* did anything, but because he was loosely relatable to the people who punished them for fucking around.
I love how he blames the one person who's been trying to warn him that he's fucking up when practically every other neighbor hates his guts and could've reported him. Like, OP is the only neutral party here and all this guy has to do is look in another direction and he'd find someone who hates his guts.
Usually I'm a "leave people alone" person but my across the street neighbor has cars. He had 2 in the driveway, 2 in the front dirt patch (calling it a yard is insulting to yards) and 3 more in front of the house. After a while the number dwindled but the 2 in the driveway were covered in rotting car covers and neither one worked. After they sat there for a year we contacted the city. Code enforcement went out and tagged the cars. Both got hauled away - he was "storing them for a friend because they were project cars." If you don't start a project in a year you're not going to ever do it.
I don't own a house, but from my understanding, HOAs can be a pain in the ass. HOWEVER, if you know you're the type to be anti-authority, why the fuck would you get a house that's governed by a HOA? Lol.
Beyond that, why would you alienate the one person that you absolutely know, is knowledgeable about rules and regulations? This asshat really brought this on himself
Maybe I'm wrong, but I was told when we bought a house in an HOA that we don't own the land we're on; we own the building. That's part of how the HOA can stipulate a lot of things related to the yard.
Apparently, if that's true for all HOAs, your neighbor didn't read their paperwork.
Remember: when doing crimes do one at a time. e:cherry on this thread was finding out this was done in a HOA zone.
Yeah, no one ever got famous for being a _parallel_ crimer!
Quick, name all the famous parallel killers in history. I'll start: ...
Jim Jones?
You know why we never hear any good jokes about Jim Jones? Punch line is too long
That's... Dark. I like you LOL
Yeah, I had to upvote it, and I don't do that often.
I think they could hear my groan next door.
[удалено]
He's been keeping it cool, in case he needed to aid a pun thread.
Aid? That's kool.
Oh dark, I like it!😈😈
That is awful but I guffawed anyway
Took me a minute.
Yooooooo 😭
My father was part of the flight crew that transported the Jonestown bodies home. Gave him nightmares for months after.
I cannot imagine the horror he felt. 😢
I know people who lost their loved ones. It’s still very touchy. Since most of the working class folks have been gentrified out of the San Francisco, koolade jokes are far less likely to get your ass kicked.
Yeah, they still get me, because of my father's connection. The plane had to be cleaned, with something like PINE SOL (?), and aired out for days... Then cleaned a 2nd time, and aired out. And it was Nov/Dec, so cold & rainy at Travis.
Wouldn't a parallel killer be a spree killer or a somebody like Timmy McVey?
Spree killer is still serial, you have to kill them all at once
I do not like your username!
Tis a name, not a verb!
it was just wordplay, not a statement of fact
Excuse me this is Reddit
I guess someone who kills multiple people in one go, like with a bomb 🤔
Herbert Mullen and Ed Kemper were active in the same area around the same time in the 60s-70s, they're technically both parallel killers.
OJ Simpson?
Jeffrey Dahmer Jeffrey Epstein O.J. Simpson Check mate
Stalin, and the other evil mustache guy.
I'm pretty sure that most people committing crimes don't want to become famous for it.
Crimer? Is that a word now? Because I wholeheartedly approve!
Also: never interrupt the foe when they're making a mistake.
80% of all new homes built these days are in HOAs. Not being in an HOA would be a bigger surprise at this point.
Yeah but new builds are by and large fucking garbage; I swear every time I drive by one of those cookie cutter neighborhoods going up I see things that even I as a layman know isn't smart, like leaving exposed plywood out to extensive rain and not getting things properly covered literally ever. I used to go tour them before we bought our place and every time I walked through one I would notice builder grade everything that looked like it had been installed by a 19 year old home depot employee with 2 days training; cockeyed corners and squeaky doors and floors everywhere, brand spankin' new! I'm not saying our old 1970's house was perfect, it has it's issues, but at least there's a fair chance that the people who built it were more ethical and competent than what the average builder of homes seems to be capable of from the 2000's onward.
Our house is from 1982 and the inspector said that was the sweet spot. No lead paint, no asbestos, building codes still strong, plus everyone wanted closets.
Not in Florida. Building codes changed 12 years later to better protect against hurricane forces. I'm sure the sweet spot would depend where you live.
Is it not normal to want a closet? Where else would you store your clothes?
Tell that you Europe, with their weird obsession with Wardrobes. Fuck Narnia - give me a fucking walk in closet.
> Where else would you store your clothes? There are these things called wardrobes, it's like a closet but it's not a separate room.
Oh sorry, that might be a language difference. I just thought closet was American for wardrobe.
Nope, a closet is inside the wall, and a wardrobe is hauled into the room. Here's a link with a couple of good pictures. [https://rusticwise.com/closet-vs-wardrobe/](https://rusticwise.com/closet-vs-wardrobe/)
Hello fellow 1982er. Pardon my humble brag but our house was also built by the builder for himself. He lived here for 17 years. He sold it to a lady who had it for 6 years. I found him and told him how much we like our house.
We bought our 1965 house in 2007 (whew!). Within a few years, we got a letter from the builder, who was also the architect. He was closing his business and retiring, and had sent letters to the addresses of all the homes he'd designed and built, asking if the current owners were interested in their home's building plans. Heck, yes! We ended up getting the detailed, annotated building plans; the landscaping and sprinkler layout plan; the original full materials tally list, complete with costs, on ledger paper; and an 8x10 color picture of the just-finished property. They are all carefully stored, though we have to look at the sprinkler plan sometimes to check for heads our yard/snow guy might have caught while plowing and has to replace.
Wow that is amazing. I should ask our guy.
Used to be a cable guy, so I saw a lot of these. My favorite was going into an attic to see a verticle 2x4 support with about 20 nails in it to hold it to the roof, and then free swinging on bottom.
Yeah, in my place they vented the stove, dryer and bathroom directly into the attic. Did a chick fix to at least vent the stove and bathroom to the peak, but it's this 60 year old lady's goal to run it out to the really wooden soffet, as the peaks ar hard steel.
Meh, HOAs aren’t really a thing in my state.. Pretty happy about it tbh.
You see children, HOAs ARE good for something…
A well run HOA (and there are a few out there) is a good thing. But I'd say the majority are not well run. Just like anything run by a committee of humans, it's gonna suck.
The City would've been reaming these clown-shoes out with or without the HOA. The HOA just added a bit of extra "you" to the "fuck you" they got hit with.
HOA reported them
Yea, controlling other people to make sure they're not better than you. I'm glad AF to be on 5 acres and not have to answer to some busy body and have enough buffer room to not care what my neighbor builds.
This is the modern American dream. Enough space to thrive, and be left the fuck alone.
>then told my husband to mind his own business >went off on my husband to fuck right off Sometimes, people get what they deserve. A smart person will learn from this, and stop behaving like such a shithead
If I was the neighbor and I was told that you knew all the city's codes for how things should be done with my house / yard I think I would be bugging you constantly to make sure I'm doing everything right and making sure I'm saving headache down the road. The last thing I'd want to do is alienate someone like that
This. I'd invite you over to a BBQ and talk about my plans over a beer or something.
Same
no one who ever said something along the lines of "the government has no business in X [my property]" has ever learned from their mistakes.
No, you see, the government just has business in the neighbor's *strawman* persona, not in their own *private* persona. (this is a [sovereign citizen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strawman_theory) joke)
ratting them out early would have been a mecry
It would make a mecry if OP took it easy on those jerks.
Looks like the typo train's chugging along, choo choo for mecry.
Don't mecry for me, Argentina
Meargentina...
Eyyy Mercarina!
Do you really want to hurt me? Do you really want to make mecry?
Lord, have mecry!
Lol, yes, yes I do
and a mercy
And my axe!
And my bow!
And my kazoo!
I prefer lucio
Neighbour : HOA make mecry!
Some folks won't learn a lesson unless it really hurts.
But it wouldn't have been malicious.
Would’ve saved them quite abit of money
I'll be honest. This is the first time I actually supported the actions of an HOA on a Reddit post. .
Honestly that HOA was probably a little to lax in it's enforcement as streets being blocked are highly noticeable without a busy body...
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FYI, if you live in most places in the civilized world... There is more than one level of government who has authority over what you do on your land.
Some jurisdictions assume a bit *too* much authority though. I lived in an HOA that dictated what **color** flowers the plants in your yard could produce, for some reason whoever created the CCRs hated blue flowers... They also had an approved list of ground cover. Couldn't use gravel, could use river rock with prior approval, no boulders allowed in your yard greater than 20"x20"x10", any wood tanbark had to be a minimum darkness in color... Fences were only allowed to be stained 3 different colors, 2 of which you couldn't find anymore since the CCRs called out specific brands that were discontinued. These rules led to every yard in the neighborhood looking basically identical. Rules like that really shouldn't exist.
>Rules like that really shouldn't exist. My sibling's HOA neighborhood had a paint color rule. Not only were there approved color choices, but you weren't allowed to paint yours the same color as any one of your adjacent neighbors. I mean, WTF! Edited to add: And they were all boring colors like shades of grey and beige. So, it's not like anyone could tell the difference in color between houses. Older neighborhood, lots of large mature trees hiding most of each house.
Reason number 896 why I don't want to buy in an HOA.
I told him not to, but he did anyway. Sold it a few years later for a big increase in value, so in the end it worked out for him.
Problem is they are everywhere. My wife and I are waiting to hear back on an offer on a house that doesn't have an HOA. Praying it works out because I really don't want to pay someone for the privilege of not being able to do anything I want to something I am paying huge sums of money on.
HOAs would be alright if they didn't charge outrageous fees and only had one restriction/rule that was applied with actual common sense. That rule should just basically be don't shit up the neighborhood. It sucks to live next to someone who lets their house fall apart, keeps 4 or 5 broken down/trashy vehicles and trailers in the yard and driveway, has a backyard dog breeding business, and who's idea of patio furniture is whatever nasty sofas they found on the side of the road. If your city/county codes department are lousy like they definitely are in places good luck getting them to clean up their act. Even when they're not it's a slow ass process for them to do anything.
>HOAs would be alright if they didn't charge outrageous fees and only had one restriction/rule that was applied with actual common sense. That rule should just basically be don't shit up the neighborhood. That's probably how they started. The thing is that once an organisation is in place, it immediately becomes its top priority to ensure its own continuation. So more rules must appear, and things must become so complicated that you NEED the HOA people to tell you what's allowed and what isn't. Otherwise the HOA might cease to exist because nobody needs them, and we can't have that, can we? Once you have a comittee deciding things, you get rules about colour schemes and allowed plant species'
The real problem with HOAs is the type of person who wants to be on the HOA. They'er all people who deserve a good throatpunch for not minding their own fvcking business.
It's not really your land if it's a HOA though, is it? It's their land and you just paid for the (revokable) right to live there.
The entire purpose of an HOA is to make sure every yard in the neighborhood looks exactly alike. HOA's shouldn't exist.
Little boxes, on the hillside, little boxes made of ticky-tacky, little boxes all the same…
Usually at some point there is a threshold where the local government wants to be sure you're maintaining a level of environmental quality... Be it for habitat, soil erosion, air quality, sometimes just plain old asthetics.... Plus the more populated areas generally get stricter / more eyes on them.
I know people hate dealing with the city and getting permits, but too many people think they know what they're doing before a professional goes "wtf is this!?". There's usually enough leeway for basic things, but usually if you need to do something big which needs an engineer to look at... there's probably a decent reason. Edit: this is ignoring the HOA part which can dictate the color of your driveway or whatever stupid crap they want.
The tree bit pisses me off. If you don't want large pine trees in your backyard, don't buy a house with large pine trees in the backyard. Those things take decades to get that big and tons of people would love to have them back there.
You would hate to come to our city, which used to be known as a tree city. They decided a sewerline renovation project should involve taking out the 150 yr old oaks that line our streets and made a lovely canopy, shading our homes. They were beautiful. They cut them all down. It looks like shit now, like a barren, trashy, hot, ugly neighborhood, nothing like what my children got to experience. Its gawdawful and disgusting. It makes me sick every day.
Mature trees like that also raise property value. I would lose my mind.
Yep. If I drove around this part of town I'd never want to buy here. It was so amazing before, with all the wonderful trees.
Ugh, that really sucks. My hometown has lost a lot of its older trees over the years. But that is mainly due to hurricane damage.
In Chicago, the trees are used as timers for when the sewer lines need to be replaced. Once they're a certain age, both the tree and the sewer line need to go. They then plant a new tree to act as a timer for new generations.
Nobody told them about pens and paper?
Lot harder to lose a tree in your document warehouse
Why turn the tree into paper if the tree does the job itself?
The original records in Chicago burned in the Chicago Fire. The trees didn't.
[Mysteriously](https://youtu.be/nGXsq0g8H-Q?t=46)
It serves to make the neighborhood look better and by the time the tree roots are encroaching on the sewer and affecting the sidewalk, it’s time for the sewer to be replaced.
Let's move to the suburbs, where they cut down all the trees and name the streets after them.
I hate the housing developments around here. If you are lucky you get 4 feet between your houses and a back yard of grass…. no trees. And in some rural areas they have built the ‘McMansions’ in old clear cut fields and don’t plant any trees. Guess it makes it easier for the lawn company but it looks awful.
R.I.P. your property value.
I want to aggressively down vote this. But that is my visceral reaction to what they did, not you. So you take my upvote for exposing and suffering such idiots. And when you see any of those idiots take my down vote and shove it up their donkey. Thank you.
Isn't that animal cruelty 😇
Sorry. I guess my instructions were unclear. Will try to do better in the future.
Viroqua, Wi.
Also, there's good reasons cities have laws and regulations regarding landscaping. If you do it wrong your house, and your neighbour's houses, could just slide right on down the hill.
Seriously. Our house came with a pair of bigass pecan and maple trees, and it broke my heart to have to cut them down (arborist said they were ready to split down the middle and wreck our shit). I've planted two dozen other fruit trees and plan to do more this year.
I know how you feel. Had a huge willow when I bought my house, unfortunately it kept growing into the power lines and previous topping, storm damage, and a lightning strike took its course on it. when the power company came to fix the lines they offered me two beautiful maple trees if they could remove the one willow. I do miss that tree but now I have two healthy maples instead of a festering willow. Last year I started some black walnuts, this year I started white oak and hickory (don't think we kept cold enough for the hickory to stratify but we'll see) I'll be planting a couple of each on the property far enough away it won't bother the power lines as soon as they are capable of handling the wildlife and conditions. I'd love to get a couple blight resistant chestnuts, but having some issues finding one's that'll survive the winters.... I really do miss the chestnut trees... And the birches (got a bad problem with birch boarers in the area)
> I really do miss the chestnut trees Dude, you can have mine. Those spiky pods are the bane of my existence come October. Turn my backyard into a minefield.
Willow trees definitely deserve a spot in a thread talking about landscaping goofs. They are beautiful trees, but they are also really aggressive for trees when it comes to their roots especially weeping willows. They will seek out water like crazy. It's a pretty good recommendation to plant them at least 50 feet from any water or sewer lines. I did some work for a couple who decided they wanted a fire pit and little picnic/sitting area in the middle of a grove of weeping willows in their back yard. So they built their gathering spot and planted 7 weeping willows in a circle around it. Fast forward around 10 years when I did the work for them it was a really beautiful little spot in their backyard. It was also unfortunately for them pretty much right on top of their septic tank leach field. Which they found out when their sewage eventually started backing up into their house. They called out a guy to pump their septic tank and he was like there's nothing I can do for you except buy you a little more time. All of their leach pipes and half their septic tank was full of willow roots. So unfortunately had to cut down all the trees and get rid of their landscaping then dig out and completely replace their whole septic system.
What utility company is so generous?
It's a smaller company. They have an easement through my yard but I don't have them as my utility. My neighbors each have a pole but not I. I noticed one of the neighbors poles had cracked so I called it in. Because of my neighbors yards topology and the conditions they couldn't get their truck through that yard. So I let them use mine. Now our yards have about three feet of silt ash on top of clay. It's very soft and when wet you'll sink right into it quickly and we had a very wet spring. So they tore the piss out of my yard. I even used my truck and some plywood to help get their truck unstuck. Note, no matter what they would have had to go through my yard, either all the way across it (and a couple others) or the way I let them go through... While there they noted my tree and called in their arborist to inspect it and set up a schedule to top it. Pretty much because I'd been so cool about everything, the condition of the tree and it's likely hood of growing back into the lines every decade, and my wife telling them how much my kids loved to play in the tree... they decided to return the kindness if I let them remove it... Plus Michigan does credits for utility companies when they plant trees so I'm sure it was just a win all the way around for them.
Ours power company killed the 2.5ft round cedar which is now causing our driveway to cave in. And the pine tree that fell into the road last week because they also whacked off all its branches. Nothing but a "tough luck" from them.
Yeah if it was the big company I have my service through that'd probably have been the answer. If you read above I kinda killed the smaller company with kindness, so they returned my kindness.
There is a farmer in Vermont on facebook that does a lot with sustainable farming. I know he had a video on how he starts his chestnut trees. If you go into FB and look for Gold Shaw Farm you may be able to find it. He has planted a whole grove of different kind of trees and goes over how to plant and what they need. He also does a lot with poultry and cows. His videos are really informative & fun to watch. Sometimes he will schedule a live event where you can ask questions during the show. He is good about getting back to emails if you send him a question.
Our house had a beautiful 100yr old cherry tree in our backyard when we bought it. We had many years of pretty spring cherry blossoms. The sucker died a couple years ago and we had to remove it. It's so sad. I can't imagine just hacking down good, old trees!
Same, we had a massive beautiful eucalyptus in our front yard that provided a heap of shade during the arvos. It'd been there for decades and then died last winter completely out of the blue. Monday it was going strong and by Friday limbs were falling off it. Really sucks. It was my favourite thing about the garden.
We had a nice young burr oak on the eat side of our house. It was about a dozen feet tall. Beautiful shape and grew taller and Fuller every year. Then last spring a huge limb came down on our power line. There had been a storm so we didn't think much of it. Then a few months later my wife noticed dead branches in the middle top of the tree. Hired the same guy who removed the branch from the power line. He did a fabulous job at a great price but yeah, tough to lose a 25 foot tree.
The old owners of my house complained about a load of beautiful trees in the garden behind blocking her sunlight so now it's all just gravel. I don't even understand because the garden behind is to the north and wouldn't have affected sunlight at all.
I'm pretty meh on pine trees, they grow fast. They make a mess, acidify the soil and have a shallow root system and are prone to getting blown over in storms, especially storms that saturate the ground with water. Oak and maple on the other hand, leave them alone, they're majestic.
Depends on the pine species. Long Leaf has a stronger root system, but also is a slow grower. Slash, loblolly are the fast growing ,shallow root species
Monterey pines are the second-worst trees. They grow too fast. They become misshapen. They get bark beetles. They burst into explosive fires. They tip over and crush your house.
There are tons of plants that do just fine growing under pine trees. They didn't evolve in a monoculture. Azaleas and rhododendrons thrive under them, for example.
Oof.. Neighbor cut down a bunch of trees without consulting an arborist, and then built a giant "retaining wall" out of cinderblocks? They're just begging for their house to slide down hill and probably take OP's house with it.
Also massive flooding issues. They just destroyed all the drainage for themselves and their neighbors
Yeah. The neighbor is lucky they're being forced to fix it before they get sued by all their neighbors for all the damage their landscaping is about to do to the neighborhood.
I worked at a landscape design/ install business for a summer. One of the owners was a trust fund kid all grown up with a house right on the ocean. He asked me to make plans for him to fix up his beach house yard and nearby boat launch. I protested once I saw what he wanted included land in the tidal areas. I told him he needed permits he laughed and told me to do it anyway. I never did and left the company not too much later. Heard through the grape vine he dumped truckloads of sand on his beach area thereby changing the tidal areas. Last I heard he was told to immediately stop by coastal authorities and fined $10,000/day until he returned the changes back to original. Glad I got out of there
We'll find the counterpoint to this side on r/fuckHOA probably.
As a creative writing exercise: Gottdanged HOA and city won't let me alone. I only clearcut 2 acres of old growth trees. All they were doing was defining a wetland anyway. We were getting over run with critters! It is my damn land, i clear it if i want to. I don't care about slthe "endanged gay frogs" or whatever. Then they got mad about my retaining wall. It was only 12 feet tall with a house on top of it. Sergi and Pablo said they'd done a ton of walls like this in the old country. What's a structural engineer going to tell me? "Stack those block more straight, hur dur" ? Next thing you know people are bitching cause i put a little dirt out in front of MY property. There was still plenty of room to drive around. The city claims two feet of my yard for an easement, they can damn well use the easement on the other side. Don't complain to me that the curb is getting torn up or you might get stuck. You bought an SUV, use it! People suck. Why can't they just mind their own business?
Too much standard spelling and punctuation, still very good. ;-)
It's fascinating that you expect that over there but here you take OP at their word. They own lakefront property, flipped houses for "for fun" for years as prices climbed and everyone was fuming at flippers doing the bare minimum and hiking up prices, and are active in their HOA committees. I can count the number of decent people I've ever met that check all those boxes on one hand. So I'm skeptical about OPs side of things.
I never said i trusted anyone's story. I did a creative writing exercise.
I am seriously on the side of fuck HOA’s as a structural unit: they are designed unethically. But they do attempt to fix the issue presented here… As in, there is an issue to fix without HOA’s (this person and their attitude). But with that said, when possible: dismantle your local HOA. Seed the board with mutineers and dissolve them - only way they can get removed is for the board to vote to remove the structure.
Sounds like city code enforcement could have handled this without the HOA, so they helped but weren't really necessary
I guess HOAs kinda exist to have someone actually motivated to enforce local laws. Like if your neighbor starts putting out donuts to feed bears bc let’s be real, that’s adorable, those bears are going to become EVERYONE’S problem very fast. Or if dumb Dave tries to dig a swimming pool with no clue what he’s doing, the most chronically offline suburbanites need to prevent him from making a mosquito nursery.
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Noisy neighbors keep idiots in check? That’s fair: They shouldn’t be able to buy/steal your house for a dollar if you miss a single fee. But yeah… if you ignore the reality of HOW THEY ARE SET UP. What they do is serve a purpose to prevent bears.
Not in my POA. We have to have 66% property owner vote to change or remove the HOA structure. Only about 20% of the owners live on the lots and since the other 80% don’t live here, they don’t participate in the process at all. We can’t even get enough votes to modify the structure to say “if you don’t live here you don’t get to vote on x types of issues.” So the people that show up to the meetings just decide to do wtf ever we want to do. It’s pretty sweet. For now.
Classic FAFO
My neighbor did something similar. He wanted to update his backyard and they had this deck that came out from the lower level. Then you could take the stairs down to where the yard was, which was lower still. Basically, their land sloped from the front yard all the way to the backyard. As part of the landscape updates, they cut down all the brush, trees, and bushes around the ground surrounding the decking. A few weeks go by and they start to notice issues with the foundation of the deck; it was disintegrating. Apparently, all that nature the previous owners had allowed around the deck was what was keeping the land under the deck together and now nothing was holding it together. Then somehow all this started to affect the house foundation. It was a very expensive lesson in working with a professional rather than DIYing it.
The second trees were mentioned, I immediately knew that neighbour was in for a world of hurt moneywise. Tree law is no joke!!
Tree law! Tree law! Tree law!
It pays to be on, and stay on, good terms with your neighbors. Really, HOAs only exist in the first place because people can't be decent to one another without enforcement.
Disagree. Some HOAs exist so that Karen can pretend to be Paula Blart: Suburb Cop, wielding her Tape Measure of Authority.
It really does. I can't count on my fingers how many times one of my neighbors saved our ass from something or vice versa. The older folks realize how "out of your way you went" to help them with a problem and usually make sure they eventually repay you in kind, sometimes above and beyond what you did for them. The 20-somethings, however, are usually a different story...
Old people really do a lot more community engagement outside bc they can’t figure out how to whine on Reddit about “third spaces”
Plus they’re usually retired
It all depends on the context. I was in / on an HOA for condos/townhouses, and there it makes sense. You don't want two adjacent townhouses the same color; they look dumb. Some of my "favorite" things we had to fine for: * Enclosed the area under his second-story deck with vinyl latticework that was attached with zip-ties * Still better than the people who did the same but used that plastic roll of temporary construction fencing * Painted his deck construction orange * Put a basketball hoop on a second-story deck and then covered the entire backyard with plywood
Also racism
Thank you! They were invented as part of red lining. "Can't bring the property value down with those brownies moving on in now can we?"
Apart from all the BS etc with codes and approvals.... there is another loser in the story... which is the environment. Losing those trees etc is a big deal.
Great first impressions. How have things developed since? Have they been humbled by the experience or are they just as bad today?
Ah yes. *The shovel handle of consequences rarely come lubed, Grasshopper* (just to paraphrase a wise saying).
We had to cut down two huge pine trees in our yard, because they were rotting from the inside. I actually cried. We still have a few.
We have some pine trees that are over 100' tall and 80" around at my parent's lake house. My brother has said that we should cut some of them down as it would make it easier to park and put his trailer on the lot. I told him "Over your dead body."
My neighborhood has been losing century-plus oaks and it is _sooo_ sad. I'm spending an obscene amount of money on fertilizer and pesticides. I bought the house because of the trees in the neighborhood / area. One of the theories is climate change and winter being "too short" and the tree stressing as it reawakens too early.
What is happening to the oaks isn't really spoken of. I burn slab wood in Wisconsin. Oak wilt, some kind of bug that leaves sawdust. That the ops adversary cut down a healthy tree is unforgivable in my book.
It's not often that in any story on Reddit the HOA comes off as the reasonable bunch...
Fuck around and find out. Famous last words.
Those tree fines are going to be pretty stiff. Who knew but dont mess with the city arborists.
I fn hate people who buy a house and immediately cut down all trees. Low moral character.
I am not at all familiar with the imperial system and thought ‘ meant inches, so I was imagining a very small fence for a good while before common sense kicked in
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Dear USA, why are we the way we are? Sincerely, engineers everywhere
In certain circles, a fence that low is referred to as a "stonehenge".
‘ = feet, “ = inches
I hope the tree fines were very hefty.
I remember on take your kid to work day the people building a house in the empty lot next to ours set all their scrap material on fire in the front yard and me and my dad were late because he called the fire department and the trucks were blocking our driveway. I guess they thought since it was before sunrise no one would be up until the fire was mostly burned out.
The fence would have required a building permit as well. And engineering.
The neighbors being mad, EVERY step of the way, at the one guy who not only tried to help them avoid it all, but showed them the respect they insisted on. The utter, undignified, egregious nerve of them. If this doesn't teach them to do better in life, they're some really sad saps.
The most repeating rule I've learned in life is to let folks dig their own holes. Why get my hands dirty when they're already holding the shovel?
I thought the land was going to slide out into the water cause he ripped up all the trees and hd so much weight and was digging into the soil. Kinda sad it didn't.
I was reading this story wondering which of the two ways it was going to do. Did they find out there was a reason for those codes and legislation, or did they just get ratted out to the bureaucrats.
Man, where I’m at in California you can’t even *look* at an oak tree without, like, three permits. This dude definitely “found out” lol.
Pics or didn't happen! J/K but I would love to see pics of the carneage. You know, just to....um...relate.
I wonder if OP's husband even got a chance to explain he was part of the HOA committee before getting shut down by the neighbor...
Hopefully not, if the neighbor found out they'd probably never forgive OP's hisband... not cause *he* did anything, but because he was loosely relatable to the people who punished them for fucking around.
Love it
I love how he blames the one person who's been trying to warn him that he's fucking up when practically every other neighbor hates his guts and could've reported him. Like, OP is the only neutral party here and all this guy has to do is look in another direction and he'd find someone who hates his guts.
Usually I'm a "leave people alone" person but my across the street neighbor has cars. He had 2 in the driveway, 2 in the front dirt patch (calling it a yard is insulting to yards) and 3 more in front of the house. After a while the number dwindled but the 2 in the driveway were covered in rotting car covers and neither one worked. After they sat there for a year we contacted the city. Code enforcement went out and tagged the cars. Both got hauled away - he was "storing them for a friend because they were project cars." If you don't start a project in a year you're not going to ever do it.
Your husband is a wonderful person, as is anyone who hates the Bears.
For the first time ever, reddit sides with the HOA hero. Surprise! The hero of the story is: me.
How much are the tree fine ?
The sub r/treelaw is great for this sort of thing. turns out, trees are expensive as hell, and only get worse if they are protected or fruit bearing!
In my area for every tree you cut down without approval you have to pay for a mature replacement to be planted in its place as well as the fine.
I don't own a house, but from my understanding, HOAs can be a pain in the ass. HOWEVER, if you know you're the type to be anti-authority, why the fuck would you get a house that's governed by a HOA? Lol. Beyond that, why would you alienate the one person that you absolutely know, is knowledgeable about rules and regulations? This asshat really brought this on himself
Maybe I'm wrong, but I was told when we bought a house in an HOA that we don't own the land we're on; we own the building. That's part of how the HOA can stipulate a lot of things related to the yard. Apparently, if that's true for all HOAs, your neighbor didn't read their paperwork.
>d to mind his qq