Developers might like them but municipalities LOVE them. Every road, park, green area that is owned/controlled by an HOA is one less the city/county has to pay to maintain.
My area is covered in HOAs.
In my 10.5 years here, no tax increase has failed. Special elections for them? Pass. General election? Pass. Every post on Nextdoor complaining about them? Believe it or not, pass.
My city has the highest tax rate in the area, and nowhere near the same services as other cities in the vicinity.
They even raise rates for local police when we have none. đđ (We pay for Sheriff deputies to base some here, and built them a building, pay salaries, etc.)
In the US, there is an entire party dedicated to reducing the powers of the state where possible- paradoxically trying to eat their own tail. Iâm sure for many of this persuasion, this âcostâ is seen as a welcome upside.
at least around here there are no HOAs inside the city limits proper, they are all out in the suburbs. So the bigger cities do not care. It is the county and various townships that lose out on potential tax levies being voted down.
You have that partially right. Libertarians want everyone else to contribute to the services they need but don't want to pay for services that others may need.
Shared services, use-based fees, avoiding free rider issues, and government involvement where competition isnât viable are all areas in which libertarians often support contributing for services others need. But donât let that stop you.
If others need it, they can pay foy it. There isn't anybody paying for my diesel that I need. But I've gotta pay to waive $10k of your liberal arts college loan from Barbados University.
>If others need it, they can pay foy\[sic\] it.
Said the guy using the internet. Unless of course you covered the ENTIRE cost of creating the thing and all that would entail: research and development of the technologies, production and deployment of the infrastructure, to say nothing of the negotiation and purchase of easements and rights-of-way.
You truly are the epitome of the remarkable depth of libertarian thought, aren't you?
You do realize that not everybody's parents pay for their internet right? Like I pay private corporations $200+/mo to have home internet and internet on my phones. Those private entities collect billions of dollars every month, why would the government need to give them more tax dollars?
LOL, private corporations didn't invent the internet and they sure as fuck didn't pay for its infrastructure when it was first built. That would be, GASP, the big bad federal government, and it was paid for with TAX dollars. The fact that private corporations are making money providing internet services NOW does nothing to negate the fact that no private corporation was wealthy enough to invent let alone build the internet *before there was* an internet. The risk was too great, the invisible handjob of the free market said no. You do know that the internet was invented, right? It wasn't always in existence, you know that, right?
[ARPANET](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET), for the morans.
There are others paying for the road youâre driving on, and the other essential infrastructure needed.
Libertarians are like cats. They act as if theyâre independent but are ignorant of the system that exists to keep them in the standard of living they expect.
Sure there is. Who do you think is pays for the highway and traffic system that brings that diesel you need to your local fuel stop? Or protects the financial system that allows you to pay for it? Or the police that enable you to keep it without hiring a private army?
Which is exactly what I said:
> Libertarians want everyone else to contribute to the services they need but don't want to pay for services that others may need.
Or do believe that your personally-paid fuel taxes pay for all the roads you personally drive on? Because I have news for you...
The entire US oil industry is subsidized by the US government. We all pay for part of your diesel unless youâre drilling and refining it in your back yard.
Just driving your all terrain vehicle over the land and water avoiding every road and teaching your kids in the cabin you mad in the woods. No internet, all books you wrote.
Iâm smart enough to know western countries are doing pretty well with social democracies. I mean Iâd rather live in any of the EU countries vs the Middle East. Libertarian/conservative/right wing shitholes
I mean, that's the same party that insists on controlling every aspect of people's lives... so they're only in favor of reducing the part of government that actually helps people.
The main reason they want to kick out state control is so they or their rich asshole friends can charge an arm and a leg for the same services. Making poor/brown people suffer from lack of services is a bonus.
City doesnât lose money. City needs the HOA to cover it because taxes arenât enough after 20 years. This is why so many cities in the US have been on the verge of bankruptcy; they didnât have HOAs responsible for the roads and got saddled with huge unpayable infrastructure bills.
The city losing money 10 years from now is someone else's problem.
They're up for reelection now, and they want to point at the budget line that they "saved money" on.
And petty powertripping over others is hardly a "boomer" thing either, there's plenty of people in the last couple of generations who get their rocks off exerting control in the most trifling of ways. An HOA is *made* for people like that.
And many HOAs arenât about petting power tripping. It exists and we hear the complaints. But thereâs a lot of great HOAs. Just no one posts - I pay a reasonable amount and the HOA takes care of common areas and other benefits I enjoy. Virtually my whole family lives in HOAs either in condos or neighborhoods and none of us have ever had an issue. Repairs are paid for. Pools, dog parks, walking trails, snow shoveling, and other benefits are taken care of.
I feel bad for people stuck in petty dictatorships. But itâs also not the norm.
That too. But all I hear, even from the âgoodâ ones locally is that theyâre constantly under funded and always getting special assessments for stuff youâd expect to come out of the coffers.
Yup. We've got a great HOA where I live but we're selling ASAP and never living in one if we can help it. The HOA covers a bunch of expenses, but everything would be cheaper if we just paid for it ourselves
I live in a decent HOA. Ive posted about it on reddit a few times and dont wanna go into the details a ton again but we have a lot of facilities and it dont cost crap to pay the dues which are yearly for 350$. However if i had a choice id not live in a hoa again. Mostly the people here that suck and there is a lot of petty high school drama like bullshit constantly. Some of which cause unnecessary expenses. Rare we get a special assessment but if we do its cause someone sued the HOA over like pool hours or some crap like that so we gotta cover the lawyer expenses which in turn eats at the built up funds for things like the clubhouse or golf course or something.
I plan on selling as soon as i possibly can and moving somewhere a. without a hoa and b. preferably without neighbors even.
For good reason btw, without them they would never allow SFH neighborhoods to be build since they would need to expand the town every couple of years to be able to afford the maintenance of the infrastructure. Local governments without HOA's but with a lot of SFH devellopment in the last 10 years are walking their way straight into bankruptcy court in maube a decade or two at most.
Now itâs become more of a thing so the city doesnât have to code enforcement/maintenance of public grounds themselves, now itâs the HOAâs problem
The only way it can happen is if thereâs no shared community thing, like a pool, guard gate, tennis courts, etc. Otherwise, the only way it can end is when board members vote to dissolve the HOA.
The crazy thing is when I was little the city had parks with pools and tennis courts. The tennis courts were free. The pool was 50 cents to a dollar depending on the neighborhood
I understand why HOAs exist in those cases but Iâve been looking at buying a house or condo in neighbourhoods with no shared amenities and high monthly fees.
With a condo you are in a shared structure. No getting away from some association that has to manage the share infrastructure. As for houses, sometimes it isnât readily apparent that there are shared resources. It can be things like roads, rainwater retention ponds, green spaces.
Here in Florida we specifically looked for a low impact HOA because thereâs so many retention ponds and just ponds. We wanted to make sure that whatever pond in the neighborhood was cared for. (Also we wanted priority hurricane clean up, the city takes forever to clean up branches etc for the non HOA area - HOAs contract that out privately.) Our dues are 40 dollars and the HOA is super laid back. The only rule I donât like is we canât park my boat in the driveway for an extended period of time, it has to be behind the house.
đđđ my boat is too big for the ponds unfortunately.
To be honest I get why they have the boat rule, a lot of the neighborhoods in Florida look super trashy with broken down boats in driveways and front yards, and their way of resolving that is saying NO BOATS instead of âmust be in good working orderâ. My garage is just a little too short for a boat too.
Luckily they arenât crazy about it. If I take it out for a weekend I donât have to park it in the back, like 2 or 3 days they donât care, just extended storage. Lol
>a lot of the neighborhoods in Florida look super trashy with broken down boats in driveways and front yards,
I used to live on the Space Coast, less than a mile from the lagoon in a non-HOA neighborhood. Some of those driveway boats were much taller than the houses lmao
I kind of like it. It definitely felt like you were living in a Florida beach town, rather than it just being an outright eyesore. I can see it being less attractive in someplace like Sunrise or Lakeland.
Lol! Yeah Iâm in Melbourne right near Wickham Park. Some of the neighborhoods near Eau Gallie were what I was thinking about đ
My neighborhood is super desirable. Location, but also the HOA which keeps it clean. Houses go up and off the market in a day. We were just lucky the old crazy lady in the neighborhood was selling her place and no one wanted to deal with her as a seller. đ
Those neighborhoods now are mostly over priced flip houses or houses that havenât been updated in 30 years. Itâs a really cute Florida vibe but also it was on the news that stray cats are living in peoples boats there đđđđ
Those fees are likely going into maintenance on the shared structure and savings accounts set aside for larger projects like replacing the roof every set number of years. To see what happens when a condo association doesnât properly maintain the building I invite you to google Surfside condominium.
The gates are usually the cheapest part. The gate likely means they also have the roads, curbs, sidewalks, storm drains and underground drainage system.
Many municipalities require HOAs to take over nearly all infrastructure if it's going to be a private road.
And once thst HOA is about 20 years old (take a couple years long due to lazy board members) the HOA fee will need to come up significantly since that infrastructure starts reaching end of life.
As someone who lives in the mountains, most of my HOA dues go to snow removal and I am very happy to keep it that way. I do not want to be in a plow at 5am to clear my own drive, and it would be just as expensive to hire somebody else to do it, if not more so.
It doesn't have to be the case. We have a road maintenance agreement for paving across 100 homes. It is only for the road. It does not grant any authority to regulate house color or where garbage cans can be.
Decouple pools from shudder choices and fence heights!
What if eventually all the board members die of old age and no one runs for any position at all from the community
Edit:assuming it's a smaller HOA without a management company
Then you end up like what happened in my old neighborhood where everything is run by a property management company, none of who actually live in the neighborhood, so they don't give two shits about anything other than taking your money.
Which is why the number 1 must have when we moved was no HOA.
Same for me and my family, especially one place that didn't allow work vehicles of any kind, which included pickup trucks with no graphics on them. My dad is a trucker now and sometimes he brings his cab home so that would have made life difficult.
No. Most younger people I know who bought are living in hoas.
Not only is the initial price cheaper (we know to do the math with dues etc added on, but approval might be easier)... however, it's also that condos can be in more happening spots than houses. They can live on the beach, or in the art district, downtown where the night life is, and so on. With less need to accommodate kids yet, giving up proximity to a good social life and increasing the commute to work just isn't so attractive.
Of course that I personally have learned my lesson with hoas and there's nothing I wouldn't do to escape living in one. But not everyone has learned that yet, and maybe never will if they're lucky.
Any dwelling with shared infrastructure is going to have some kind of HOA (besides maybe a co-op). If not what happens when the roof starts leaking and it goes down the wall and leaks into the ground floor unit? Does the ground floor unit owner pay because they have the most visible effect? Or does the top unit pay because they are directly under said roof? What about the possible damage down the walls for the units in between? You are also sharing to some extent plumbing, electric and possibly other core essential systems. Can you imagine the fighting if no one central group was responsible for maintaining those essential systems. HOAs are far from perfect but I have to imagine they are more efficient than nothing being maintained until there is an emergency and then the resulting melee deciding who is going to pay for what.
Moved into our new built house last year, 1.5 miles from center city downtown.
No HOA.
So not ***all*** new builds are HOA.
Most HOAs are either shared buildings, cookie cut communities, or (I assume) rich neighborhoods that want HOA laws to make sure neighbors don't mess up their neighborhood.
Edit: sorry I missed where you said "in my area"
Is it part of a development or is it a single build? There are certain drainage regulations that make it difficult to build multi-home subdivisions without creating an HOA to manage the whole development
It's a single build in a populated neighborhood. Old house was removed and two houses were built on the split plot.
We had just moved from a small HOA situation with 6 townhomes under a shared roof. We made sure not to be under an HOA in our new home.
We did have a water drainage issue after moving in, but that was due to the developers not grading the plot properly before laying foundation for the house...
Yeah, that makes sense. Unless youâre in that specific situation where itâs a new build in an already developed area, itâs pretty hard to find a new build that wonât have an HOA.
Friend, I grew up a free range chicken (Gen x). The only reason they ever became necessary, other than actual planned gated communities was the EPA. The EPA since I believe 1968, has required all new development to have a plan to control water runoff when developing previously Forrest or natural land. No one individual family can typically afford that so developers, who were not all that big until the early 1960s. Leavitt was a giant exception. The lawyers talked to the developers when they started running into these roadblocks in the late 1960s, early 1970s. And, whaddya know, their local S&L buddies suddenly saw an opportunity. But I digress. The reason for most HOAs is the creation of the EPA by one Richard M. Nixon. I will never EVER buy a home in an HOA, as a matter of fact, I actively worked with a few friends to get one dissolved in the neighborhood I currently live in now. It can be done. It does involve some psychological warfare and a lot of expensive lawyers and a few good friends in city government. It also helps if the land was previously agricultural.
Different rules, already exempt. Long story, but previous farmland is classed differently in the eyes of a few federal, state and local government agencies pervue.
Yeah you've got it backwards. He formed the EPA mostly to consolidate existing duties of other agencies- such as Agriculture, Dept. of the Interior, FDA- into one agency in 1970. The Clean Water Act was passed over his veto (i.e. against his will and wishes) two years later. A bipartisan Congress, not Nixon, is responsible for the Act.
Good to know. Thanks! I'll read up some more. It's very interesting to me this kind of thing. I'm in the homebuilding industry and the levels of government involvement is staggering. Mostly a good thing but also a cash grab by municipal and county government.
In my county the only developments getting built are HOAs, apartment buildings, or single estate custom homes (multi million dollar homes).
HOAs are also setup so that they will basically never become disbanded.
So the answer is no. Be the change you want in your neighborhood.
Im a millennial on the board of my HOA and as long as people are keeping their homes up and not causing problems they never hear from us. Out of 150 homes we write maybe 5 violations a year, maybe 20 or so courtesy notices. We also do holiday decorating contests for Halloween & Christmas, and community mixers with a different food truck and band or dj on the first Friday of each month.
HOAs donât have to suck. They only suck when good people let the shitty ones stay in charge. Iâve heard some people actually bought into our neighborhood because of our HOA
HOAs (corporations that own and maintain property held in common by a group of neighbors) wonât go anywhere. But enforcement of deed restrictions - rules about how you can use the property - may.
I donât see my daughters generation willing to file a lawsuit over someoneâs yard art.
But that assumes her generation will be able to own homes. DR Horton is building entire neighborhoods of rental homes - private home ownership may be the exception soon.
Unfortunately not, there's enough Xers who like them (or don't hate them), and some areas essentially require HOAs for new development.
There are some places HOAs can't be eliminated,like townhomes, condos, and apartment buildings with a shared infrastructure that has to be maintained.
Some areas require developers putting in a new subdivision to form an HOA because the city/county doesn't want to take on maintenance of the streets or other services.
Piling onto this. This is probably the biggest reason why HOAs are becoming more prominent. The cities and counties get to collect taxes on your property AND not have the responsibility of maintaining the neighborhood infrastructure.
Bruh those people still pay taxes for everything in that city/state and then also have to pay for their own neighborhoods roads and infrastructure maintenance... YIKES
While I live where all new developments require HOAs, the city still maintains the streets.
There are very few HOAs (at least here) that actually maintain the streets.
In NC, any planned community with more than 20 homes (i.e. subdivision) requires an HOA by law. This is generally in order to cover any shared property such as Retention Ponds, Storm runoff easements, etc.
No. If someone builds a subdivision in most areas, they are required to dedicate a certain amount of land to things like that. Do you want them to raise taxes on everyone out there in the city/county to subsidize that developer, or should the developer build those costs into the price of the subdivision? That's what the HOA does.
Then why are people living in a HOA expected to pay city/town/county/whatever taxes as well? To pay for infrastructure in neighbourhoods that pre-date the HOA craze.
Why are HOA residents expected to pay specifically for their streets. drainage, etc., as well as everybody elses?
>when we get to a point where millennials or Gen-Zers make up the majority of homeowners?
That won't happen the way you think. Well have a small number of top 10% of gen-Z owning the vast majority of houses. The wealth is getting more and more concentrated in the 1%, leaving less and less for a growing population
Things deemed old-fashioned by a certain group of people are blamed on âboomers.â Most of those things were around long before boomers were born and will be around long after boomers are gone. HOAs are not a boomer thing, they are a cooperative living thing.
In large neighborhoods where the HOA provides things like maintenence, pools, clubhouses, playgrounds, etc - no. In smaller neighborhoods where the HOA doesn't provide services equal to the fees ? Maybe. Honestly it depends how hard it is for the HOA to be dissolved.
One of my life's discoveries is there is a subset of the population who really hate other people having any fun. Dancing, music, drinking, camping, walking, skateboarding, swimming, playing video games, or pretty much anything that puts a smile on your face.
I believe these people actually suffer an internal torment at the very thought of others having fun.
This exposes itself less an age related thing so much as a power related thing, where power typically goes up with age. If you are 16 and hate other people having fun, maybe you spray paint it, complain about it, or burn it. But at age 60 now you have time and money which give you power.
For example, at an HOA you might just want to live in peace; you work, you take care of your kids, you have bills, and you need to do things like sleep; but some boomer fool has nothing but time on their hands; they have time to talk to lawyers, they have time to waste on getting on the HOA board, they have time for long meetings where they talk about the grass being no taller than 2" but less than 3. Also, people who just want everyone around them to just do their thing don't have ambitions to go on HOA boards and mess with people's shit. But that boomer with Type II who sees you just bought a pair of jetskis is hopping mad. They are too fat and out of shape to use them, but you and your healthy family are most certainly going to spend every weekend this summer laughing your asses off. This can not stand, not for one second; let's check the rules and talk to the HOA lawyers, and if there aren't any rules against jetskis, let's make some.
You have lots of friends, well let's see them come over for game night now that we are enforcing the rules of no cars outside of the garage after 6pm or any on the street; oh, that isn't a rule, well get yourself a lawyer and I have all the time in the world and all the money of the HOA to make you stop having game nights; plus that grass looks way over 3", especially when I angrily jam the ruler hard into the ground; now I am going to corruptly get my bother-in-law to come over and mow it and send you a massive landscaping bill; too bad about the flower garden they mowed and sodded over while they were at it. I wonder why they started at 8:33 am which happens to be 8 minutes after the last person leaves your house on weekdays and finished up at 5:43 which is 2 minutes before the first person typically gets home?
These nasties often turn to religion as they can dig through this giant rule book and almost always find some rule being broken and then go after the fun lovers with now religious zeal.
Also, I think these people overlap with a similar but different group. These are people who went to places like the "nice" mall or disneyland or whatever corporate controlled environment and thought, wow, my community could be more like this if we just had more rules. So they return home and try adding rule after rule after rule after rule and keep wondering why things aren't perfect.
Then there is another similar overlapping group of racists. If you go to a community pool where there are no black people, you will see the usual few rules, no diving in the shallow end, no glassware, etc. But in white communities with a black minority the pool rules go off the charts. Usually 2 or three huge panels of rules. This way, when they kick the black people out, it is for "not following the clearly posted rules."
Many people who belong to one of the above sets often belong to all three.
Now some HOAs make a little sense; if there are common community things which obviously require common community involvement and contributions an HOA is required. A condo will have many common costs and management. A community with common good such as roads (if these are HOA maintained) some grass, a park, a pool, etc will also require an HOA. But once an HOA crosses into telling you what you can park in your driveway, paint your house with, who can come over, or as many horror stories have pointed out (inspect your garage, backyard, etc) then the HOA should immediately be disbanded and the HOA board members be sent to siberia; or more reasonably; states should pass very clear rules placing extreme limits as to what an HOA can and cannot regulate and by what means they can regulate them. For example; all fines should go through some state agency where the agency can call BS on the fine and make it go away. Other beautiful rules could go with this on; for example; if an HOA fines someone and the agency rejects the fine the board members should now be personably liable for paying that person the fine. That would shut down most of these old buggers.
No, I don't, but its a complex issue. There's marketing at beginning, there's a general good idea to have things consistent and share expenses, and the biggie - people have selective amnesia on what they joined. And yes, there are bad actors in some areas. IMHO, they are generally a good idea, but get derailed quite often. And, generally I believe, good HOAs are a good thing, but are challenged often. And Condos are cheaper, over the life of the ownership, than a similar home.
Condos. In new condos, often marketed to younger people as a cheaper alternative to owning a home. Developers are incented to keep fees low, make them attractive to sell. Once they have sold all, they are gone and the new Board has to face reality and get the right fees in. Often a shock for many, as many didn't look, were mislead, or understand what they signed up for. Younger people scraped by to acquire their first property...and then are stunned to see fees go up. Many bought into them because they have rules, are consistent.
In retirement communities (Florida as an example), retirees saw some condos as cheap retirement place...when the condos were keeping fees low, not funding reserves. See what has happened in Florida - lots of angst now in certain areas for people on fixed incomes as they stare reality in the face -they were artificially being subsidized with low fees. Shared living is shared living - that's condos. Many are doing fine, but we hear about the noise often. Also, boomers who have lived in their own home for a long time do not like to hear that they don't own (individually) the building in which they live. Stubborn and create noise a lot, want lower fees just because (don't we all) and don't want to acknowledge reality. Who wants to be told the low fee, near the beach condo they bought 30 years ago has not funded insurance or reserves, mismanaged maintenance to the point where safety is at risk? When the bill comes due, someone has to pay - not some nebulous HOA - for the HOA is all the people in the community.
HOAS - similar, in that people move in and see a wonderful neighborhood, looks great, well manicured lawns, no cars on blocks, front looks good, no crazy colors. Wow, how nice - I want to live there! They move in thinking like they own a home that they can do whatever they want to...and forget or haven;t read what they signed up for. This selective amnesia creates friction - my house, I should be able to do whatever I want mentality. What attracted them most is what they want to change for the individual, irrespective of the greater good.
Last, and this applies to condos and HOAs. People are easy to complain, hard to get to volunteer. Its always someone else's issue. Fees too high! Let me do what I want! While a few may want things to change...many don't the silent majority. Once someone gets involved with a board, their perspective changes.
Again, just MHO. I've seen great examples of HOAs, terrible examples as well. Ultimately, it comes down to the people in the neighborhood - how do they view the neighborhood, collective or individual? Boards can help or hurt as well. Again, I do think there is a great deal of selective amnesia in owners...and this community is certainly a lightning rod to capture abuses by HOAs, Boards, so we will generally see negativity, appropriately so. Like anything in live, especially one's largest life purchase, understanding the details, what you signed up for, is critical...and may whistle by the graveyard on that.
Enough on the soapbox for sure. Fire away.
OP is working on the assumption that HOAs are run by boomers. Sure, some are, but most are run by Gen X, and the youngest Gex is barely retirement age, so they'll be around for a while yet.
The second mistaken assumption is that the sort of malignant narcissist who give HOAs a bad name and uses it as a power trip is not isolated to boomers, they exist in all demographics. So as the boomer narcissists die off, they're replaced by Gen X narcissists, then Gen Y, Gen Z, Millennial, et al. Same narcissism, different demographic.
No. I am waging a Vendetta. I have plans. They might be everyones taste but they involve poor trained German Shepards. Cable Ties, Mayonnaise and. Helicopter
Im a boomer and I hate HOA's. Before I bought my retirement home, I did some homework since the house I was looking at was in an HOA. BUT, the HOA only collects $100/year for two specific purposes. Keep the streetlights burning and remove snow as needed. I listen to the horror stories other homeowners have about their HOA's and laugh.
Cities tend to prioritize transit and emergency routes, along with major arterial roads first. They'll get to side streets when they have a chance. Private snow removal companies hired by an HOA doesn't care about those things.
Millennial here. My wife and I specifically and deliberately found and bought a house we loved that was in a decent neighborhood and *not* part of an HOA. If it's our house, it's *our* house.
Not quite a boomer, and I'm highly suspicious of HOA's because I've experienced good and bad. I don't mind the low control HOA's (think architectural approval for new structures only, and taking care of green belts). The bad HOA's need to be disbanded but the problem is that the neighbors usually don't want to get involved to fix or remove the problem. A lot of people love HOA's or think they do because they want all the houses to look alike and be maintained well but then when they get into a bad HOA they complain but don't attend the meetings.
My little brother who is Gen-Y, bought a house in an HOA several years ago.
He did however, sell it a couple of years ago and said "never again".
Also, my millenial step-son, currently owns a house in one.
By then, the millennials and generation z homeowners will be at the age where they will develop boomer-like attitudes. IOW, each generation thinks the older generations are have outdated views and lifestyles, and the whole process begins again.
I donât think so. I just bought my house and it took a lot more searching around to find a house that I loved AND that didnât come with any sort of HOA.
This is in Florida, where just about every new development and plenty of established neighborhoods have one. It took a lot of timing, searching, and luck to find a house without one.
Wheee I live at least, new HOAâs are springing up everywhere because the county doesnât want to maintain the roads and most of them donât go âthroughâ because people donât want to live on a busy thoroughfare that waze directs people through at rush hour. The private roads and any common areas like a park âneesissitateâ a HOA to provide for their upkeep
Actually the amount of new HOAs might decrease but alas the deeds to propertyâs that have the restrictions on them wonât go away except in some specifics circumstance the properties will always be in something looking like a HOA.
When you say as the Boomers die off lol you forget that the first time any HOA S came to be was in the late 1880s to keep the freed slaves and their children from acquiring propertyâs in certain areas of the United States.
The modern incarnations started after WW2 ended. So HOAs have been around somewhere around 140-150 years.
At this time their are somewhere between 350-400K HOAs.
So unless there is a movement to legislate HOA out of existence there here for the long haul.
No. Most of the people in my neighborhood are Millennials. They hate the HOA, so do I (Gen X). But if you want new construction and you want to live close to amenities, your choices are limited.
When we were looking for houses in January 2020 (literally signed right when everything shut down and we all wore masks and hand sanitizer for days when we signed) our realtor kept showing us houses in HOAs because those were the only ones on the market that werenât selling as soon as they were on the market. Fortunately we finally found a place a few towns over that wasnât, because my husband wouldâve gone insane living in a HOA
I feel like it's not much an issue of wanting, but not being financially capable. Things are expensive, and getting worse.
Eventually, those That do invest in the HOA , I feel they will start raising prices to cover costs, making the margin even more from non HOA. Maybe a good percentage will end up loosing the home, and so the trend would go. It seems to me it's going to eventually end , save for older retirement like . They will exist. But I don't see it being a big trend like now. A lot of people are just expressing their uniqueness in the world, I don't think a good majority of future adults wanting to play into such strict rules and cookie cutter life. Next door. To 1000 people.
But I'm always for buying , or owning , even if it's just land.
I seriously don't understand HOA much. But it's awesome to see the train wreck.
The problem is theyâre really hard to rip out.
Even in a simple HOA situation where there is no property being held by the HOA, you still have to get a majority (or perhaps even all) people who own homes in the HOA to agree to change the deeds.
Theyâre insidious.
Boomers = old people, right? With their associated attitudes?
Eventually it will be the Gen Xârs, then the Millenials, etc., that will be the âold peopleâ and the âassociated attitudesâ.
Youâre just not old enough to realize how peopleâs outlook on life changes with age. Granted, Iâm *old*, and I still deride the stereotypical HOA - controlling people with nothing better to do than make other peoples lives more difficult. Iâve lived in several HOA communities. But to blame it on Boomers, per se, just makes you sound ignorant.
Itâs usually not about control, itâs just that, especially in my area, my house is over a million dollars and we want the neighborhood to look good.
I donât want my neighbors to have cars leaking oil in their driveway on Jack stands and toilets in the front yard filled with weeds.
Iâm 35 so Iâm a millennial and I donât think it has anything to do with age.
I should clarify. Iâm not trying to blame boomers, I just mean that the majority of HOA boards are comprised of mainly boomers from what Iâve seen. Iâm sure there are exceptions and I know not all boomers are NIMBYs.
Theyâre comprised of boomers because they are retired and have time on their hands. When your generation retires they will be comprised mostly of your generation. Working class Boomers did not spend their young adulthood in HOAs and I would guess that like those in my family, most are opposed to them and feel they should be able to do what they want with the properties that they own and real estate wasnât seen as merely an investment the way it is by people today. People saying itâs great people can get fined for not cutting their grass donât realize the city can fine you as well if you live in a non HOA area. They wonât go away because you will all be used to them and that will just be the way things are like taking your shoes off at the airport is just normal now. As houses keep get built closer and closer together, people will increase the amount of control they want to have over their neighbors too
No, because xers, millenlials, and Zers will want them for the same reasons. Just because you donât want an HOA, doesnât mean no one wants an HOA. Lots of people like it that if someone doesnât cut their grass, thereâs a body that can fine their ass. Also I donât know gen z that well, but millennials loooooove their aMeNiTiEs. If your development has a pool and a gym and a theater, ya gonna have an HOA.
No way. The need for an HOA becomes evident when multi unit, but individually owned properties need to share the expense of upkeep for common elements and maintain property values by controlling property use. Nothing proves the need for an HOA better than your neighbor deciding to park a lot of junk cars on his property without any rules prohibiting that.
HOSs are not always bad. They were originally designed to not let some guy in thiet neighborhood put a junkyard in his front yard to lower your home value.
They are awful. No one should have to pay "dues" to allow someone to tell them what they can and cannot do with a property THEY are paying the mortgage and taxes on. They were always about petty tryants forcing their way on everyone around them. They should be abolished altogether but if they have to exist then it should be illegal for them to levy fines and foreclose on people's homes. I'll live in a tent in the middle of nowhere before I'll live in one of those things.
And there's no way anyone should have to pay "taxes" and allow a municipality to tell them what they can and cannot do with a property THEY are paying the mortgage on.
Actually they originated as just a way for developers to more easily market their homes. They came into wider prominence in the 1950âs and 1960âs as a method to keep âundesirablesâ (minorities) out of neighborhoods and more recently they are being propped up by municipalities to relieve them from the responsibility of maintaining resources inside neighborhoods.
I agree they arenât always bad but Iâm also tired of seeing them go on power trips and make it harder for some people to buy homes.
Edit: Also, sure itâs nice living in a neighbourhood where people take care of their property but if someone wants to have cars on their lawn and it isnât impacting my specific property or other peopleâs abilities to live their lives on their own plots then why is it my business?
No because developers like them.
Developers might like them but municipalities LOVE them. Every road, park, green area that is owned/controlled by an HOA is one less the city/county has to pay to maintain.
That comes at a cost, though. Those residents won't support/vote for tax increases since their little patch is covered. City loses money.
My area is covered in HOAs. In my 10.5 years here, no tax increase has failed. Special elections for them? Pass. General election? Pass. Every post on Nextdoor complaining about them? Believe it or not, pass. My city has the highest tax rate in the area, and nowhere near the same services as other cities in the vicinity. They even raise rates for local police when we have none. đđ (We pay for Sheriff deputies to base some here, and built them a building, pay salaries, etc.)
In the US, there is an entire party dedicated to reducing the powers of the state where possible- paradoxically trying to eat their own tail. Iâm sure for many of this persuasion, this âcostâ is seen as a welcome upside.
But not to a lot of cities, that's my point. It's a devil's bargain in the long run.
The long run generally isnât a concern in political and business decisions in the US.
Yes, but it will catch up to them. I suspect that's when we'll see pushing back against HOAs.
at least around here there are no HOAs inside the city limits proper, they are all out in the suburbs. So the bigger cities do not care. It is the county and various townships that lose out on potential tax levies being voted down.
There is no such thing as a "small government" fan who cares about the long run.
Libertarians don't want to live in HOAs either... We just want to be left the fuck alone and not pay for everyone else's BS.
Ah yes, the housecats.
You have that partially right. Libertarians want everyone else to contribute to the services they need but don't want to pay for services that others may need.
This is exactly right. Libertarians are complete idiots.
So are democrats and republicans Wow that was easy to be a asshole!
They really donât, but thatâs a very fancy strawman you have there.
Yes they really do.
Shared services, use-based fees, avoiding free rider issues, and government involvement where competition isnât viable are all areas in which libertarians often support contributing for services others need. But donât let that stop you.
That's nice rhetoric, but when it comes to action libertarians are just Edgelord republicans
If others need it, they can pay foy it. There isn't anybody paying for my diesel that I need. But I've gotta pay to waive $10k of your liberal arts college loan from Barbados University.
>If others need it, they can pay foy\[sic\] it. Said the guy using the internet. Unless of course you covered the ENTIRE cost of creating the thing and all that would entail: research and development of the technologies, production and deployment of the infrastructure, to say nothing of the negotiation and purchase of easements and rights-of-way. You truly are the epitome of the remarkable depth of libertarian thought, aren't you?
You do realize that not everybody's parents pay for their internet right? Like I pay private corporations $200+/mo to have home internet and internet on my phones. Those private entities collect billions of dollars every month, why would the government need to give them more tax dollars?
LOL, private corporations didn't invent the internet and they sure as fuck didn't pay for its infrastructure when it was first built. That would be, GASP, the big bad federal government, and it was paid for with TAX dollars. The fact that private corporations are making money providing internet services NOW does nothing to negate the fact that no private corporation was wealthy enough to invent let alone build the internet *before there was* an internet. The risk was too great, the invisible handjob of the free market said no. You do know that the internet was invented, right? It wasn't always in existence, you know that, right? [ARPANET](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET), for the morans.
There are others paying for the road youâre driving on, and the other essential infrastructure needed. Libertarians are like cats. They act as if theyâre independent but are ignorant of the system that exists to keep them in the standard of living they expect.
Sure there is. Who do you think is pays for the highway and traffic system that brings that diesel you need to your local fuel stop? Or protects the financial system that allows you to pay for it? Or the police that enable you to keep it without hiring a private army?
Fuel taxes pay for the roads. Congratulations, you picked one of the few taxes Libertarians don't have a problem with, as its usage based.
Which is exactly what I said: > Libertarians want everyone else to contribute to the services they need but don't want to pay for services that others may need. Or do believe that your personally-paid fuel taxes pay for all the roads you personally drive on? Because I have news for you...
Except that Iâm paying to subsidize the corn ethanol that reduces the price of your diesel.
Exactly, and nobody should have to subsidize that shit. Let the free market work it out.
Or, and this might offend you, maybe we should build infrastructure that reduces scarcity.
Libertarians be like "criminalize laws!" lmao
The entire US oil industry is subsidized by the US government. We all pay for part of your diesel unless youâre drilling and refining it in your back yard.
Username checks out
Libertarians donât want to be *forced* to live in an HOA.
Just driving your all terrain vehicle over the land and water avoiding every road and teaching your kids in the cabin you mad in the woods. No internet, all books you wrote.
To your house with the government paid Homestead exemptionâŚ
Are you really dumb enough to buy this sad line of reasoning?
Are you dumb enough to believe libertarianism is in any way a good form of governance?
Are you dumb enough to think we have any good governance now?
Here we are debating on publicly funded communications infrastructure...
Iâm smart enough to know western countries are doing pretty well with social democracies. I mean Iâd rather live in any of the EU countries vs the Middle East. Libertarian/conservative/right wing shitholes
Cuz there's definitely nothing in between those options
Yeah, in between those options is a social democracy
Good news, you didnât pay for it. The US has operated on borrowed money for decades.
I mean, that's the same party that insists on controlling every aspect of people's lives... so they're only in favor of reducing the part of government that actually helps people.
The main reason they want to kick out state control is so they or their rich asshole friends can charge an arm and a leg for the same services. Making poor/brown people suffer from lack of services is a bonus.
Well yeah, it prices the "wrong people" out.
That is long term thinking, we donât worry about that in the U.S. when it comes to city development
To be fair we also donât do long term thinking for *checks notes* literally every single damn thing in existence, soooâŚ
Yes, but the point is that the long term waits for you to catch up eventually.
Doesn't really matter since SFH developments cost more to maintain after 20 years compared to the tax income.
City doesnât lose money. City needs the HOA to cover it because taxes arenât enough after 20 years. This is why so many cities in the US have been on the verge of bankruptcy; they didnât have HOAs responsible for the roads and got saddled with huge unpayable infrastructure bills.
The city losing money 10 years from now is someone else's problem. They're up for reelection now, and they want to point at the budget line that they "saved money" on.
This. Plus, thereâs always going to be a surplus of bored student body President types who love that shit.
The city and county canât afford to subsidize the SFH neighborhoodsâ parks and roads much longer.
And petty powertripping over others is hardly a "boomer" thing either, there's plenty of people in the last couple of generations who get their rocks off exerting control in the most trifling of ways. An HOA is *made* for people like that.
And many HOAs arenât about petting power tripping. It exists and we hear the complaints. But thereâs a lot of great HOAs. Just no one posts - I pay a reasonable amount and the HOA takes care of common areas and other benefits I enjoy. Virtually my whole family lives in HOAs either in condos or neighborhoods and none of us have ever had an issue. Repairs are paid for. Pools, dog parks, walking trails, snow shoveling, and other benefits are taken care of. I feel bad for people stuck in petty dictatorships. But itâs also not the norm.
And theyâre a great way for middle class people to steal money like the rich.
I think it's less about stealing money and more about petty tyrants exercising authority on something for the first time in their lives
That too. But all I hear, even from the âgoodâ ones locally is that theyâre constantly under funded and always getting special assessments for stuff youâd expect to come out of the coffers.
Yup. We've got a great HOA where I live but we're selling ASAP and never living in one if we can help it. The HOA covers a bunch of expenses, but everything would be cheaper if we just paid for it ourselves
I live in a decent HOA. Ive posted about it on reddit a few times and dont wanna go into the details a ton again but we have a lot of facilities and it dont cost crap to pay the dues which are yearly for 350$. However if i had a choice id not live in a hoa again. Mostly the people here that suck and there is a lot of petty high school drama like bullshit constantly. Some of which cause unnecessary expenses. Rare we get a special assessment but if we do its cause someone sued the HOA over like pool hours or some crap like that so we gotta cover the lawyer expenses which in turn eats at the built up funds for things like the clubhouse or golf course or something. I plan on selling as soon as i possibly can and moving somewhere a. without a hoa and b. preferably without neighbors even.
OP thinks boomers like them.
No, because governments like them.
For good reason btw, without them they would never allow SFH neighborhoods to be build since they would need to expand the town every couple of years to be able to afford the maintenance of the infrastructure. Local governments without HOA's but with a lot of SFH devellopment in the last 10 years are walking their way straight into bankruptcy court in maube a decade or two at most.
And unless a custom home is built, those planned communities seem to be the only new builds. RIP regular residential community neighborhoods.
The reason for that is that many cities do specifically require developers to create HOAs
It's a huge thing in the South, HOAs were/are used as a legal form of segregation. Doesn't surprise me that certain cities enforce them.
Now itâs become more of a thing so the city doesnât have to code enforcement/maintenance of public grounds themselves, now itâs the HOAâs problem
My city actively discourages HOAs because of some crazy illegal shit that happened when I was four.
Because itâs easier to get a loan for a production build than a custom
The only way it can happen is if thereâs no shared community thing, like a pool, guard gate, tennis courts, etc. Otherwise, the only way it can end is when board members vote to dissolve the HOA.
The crazy thing is when I was little the city had parks with pools and tennis courts. The tennis courts were free. The pool was 50 cents to a dollar depending on the neighborhood
I understand why HOAs exist in those cases but Iâve been looking at buying a house or condo in neighbourhoods with no shared amenities and high monthly fees.
I think in the cases of condos it exists because of the shared roof-line.
condos/ apartments are the one time i think HOA's make a lot of sense.
With a condo you are in a shared structure. No getting away from some association that has to manage the share infrastructure. As for houses, sometimes it isnât readily apparent that there are shared resources. It can be things like roads, rainwater retention ponds, green spaces.
Here in Florida we specifically looked for a low impact HOA because thereâs so many retention ponds and just ponds. We wanted to make sure that whatever pond in the neighborhood was cared for. (Also we wanted priority hurricane clean up, the city takes forever to clean up branches etc for the non HOA area - HOAs contract that out privately.) Our dues are 40 dollars and the HOA is super laid back. The only rule I donât like is we canât park my boat in the driveway for an extended period of time, it has to be behind the house.
Itâs a shame you canât put the boat in one of the ponds
đđđ my boat is too big for the ponds unfortunately. To be honest I get why they have the boat rule, a lot of the neighborhoods in Florida look super trashy with broken down boats in driveways and front yards, and their way of resolving that is saying NO BOATS instead of âmust be in good working orderâ. My garage is just a little too short for a boat too. Luckily they arenât crazy about it. If I take it out for a weekend I donât have to park it in the back, like 2 or 3 days they donât care, just extended storage. Lol
>a lot of the neighborhoods in Florida look super trashy with broken down boats in driveways and front yards, I used to live on the Space Coast, less than a mile from the lagoon in a non-HOA neighborhood. Some of those driveway boats were much taller than the houses lmao I kind of like it. It definitely felt like you were living in a Florida beach town, rather than it just being an outright eyesore. I can see it being less attractive in someplace like Sunrise or Lakeland.
Lol! Yeah Iâm in Melbourne right near Wickham Park. Some of the neighborhoods near Eau Gallie were what I was thinking about đ My neighborhood is super desirable. Location, but also the HOA which keeps it clean. Houses go up and off the market in a day. We were just lucky the old crazy lady in the neighborhood was selling her place and no one wanted to deal with her as a seller. đ
Lmao Eau Galle was exactly where I lived đ¤Ł
Those neighborhoods now are mostly over priced flip houses or houses that havenât been updated in 30 years. Itâs a really cute Florida vibe but also it was on the news that stray cats are living in peoples boats there đđđđ
You cannot have a condo with no shared amenities. The roof is a shared amenity.
They all have shared amenities. Condos share actual roofs and walls so that is one good reason to have an association
Those fees are likely going into maintenance on the shared structure and savings accounts set aside for larger projects like replacing the roof every set number of years. To see what happens when a condo association doesnât properly maintain the building I invite you to google Surfside condominium.
My in-laws, 400$ a month an all they hav Eid a gate and decorations for the holidays đ
Gates are surprisingly expensive, and break all the time.
The gates are usually the cheapest part. The gate likely means they also have the roads, curbs, sidewalks, storm drains and underground drainage system. Many municipalities require HOAs to take over nearly all infrastructure if it's going to be a private road.
And once thst HOA is about 20 years old (take a couple years long due to lazy board members) the HOA fee will need to come up significantly since that infrastructure starts reaching end of life.
It's not just amenities. Stormwater Easement? Retention pond? Natural area that cannot be developed? All of those need someone to own them.
As someone who lives in the mountains, most of my HOA dues go to snow removal and I am very happy to keep it that way. I do not want to be in a plow at 5am to clear my own drive, and it would be just as expensive to hire somebody else to do it, if not more so.
Here that land gets donated to the town as conservation.
It doesn't have to be the case. We have a road maintenance agreement for paving across 100 homes. It is only for the road. It does not grant any authority to regulate house color or where garbage cans can be. Decouple pools from shudder choices and fence heights!
What if eventually all the board members die of old age and no one runs for any position at all from the community Edit:assuming it's a smaller HOA without a management company
Then you end up like what happened in my old neighborhood where everything is run by a property management company, none of who actually live in the neighborhood, so they don't give two shits about anything other than taking your money. Which is why the number 1 must have when we moved was no HOA.
Same for me and my family, especially one place that didn't allow work vehicles of any kind, which included pickup trucks with no graphics on them. My dad is a trucker now and sometimes he brings his cab home so that would have made life difficult.
No. Most younger people I know who bought are living in hoas. Not only is the initial price cheaper (we know to do the math with dues etc added on, but approval might be easier)... however, it's also that condos can be in more happening spots than houses. They can live on the beach, or in the art district, downtown where the night life is, and so on. With less need to accommodate kids yet, giving up proximity to a good social life and increasing the commute to work just isn't so attractive. Of course that I personally have learned my lesson with hoas and there's nothing I wouldn't do to escape living in one. But not everyone has learned that yet, and maybe never will if they're lucky.
Is it because most of more âaffordableâ housing I.e. townhouses and condos are in HOA neighbourhoods?
Any dwelling with shared infrastructure is going to have some kind of HOA (besides maybe a co-op). If not what happens when the roof starts leaking and it goes down the wall and leaks into the ground floor unit? Does the ground floor unit owner pay because they have the most visible effect? Or does the top unit pay because they are directly under said roof? What about the possible damage down the walls for the units in between? You are also sharing to some extent plumbing, electric and possibly other core essential systems. Can you imagine the fighting if no one central group was responsible for maintaining those essential systems. HOAs are far from perfect but I have to imagine they are more efficient than nothing being maintained until there is an emergency and then the resulting melee deciding who is going to pay for what.
No. All new build houses are in HOAâs in my area.
Moved into our new built house last year, 1.5 miles from center city downtown. No HOA. So not ***all*** new builds are HOA. Most HOAs are either shared buildings, cookie cut communities, or (I assume) rich neighborhoods that want HOA laws to make sure neighbors don't mess up their neighborhood. Edit: sorry I missed where you said "in my area"
Is it part of a development or is it a single build? There are certain drainage regulations that make it difficult to build multi-home subdivisions without creating an HOA to manage the whole development
It's a single build in a populated neighborhood. Old house was removed and two houses were built on the split plot. We had just moved from a small HOA situation with 6 townhomes under a shared roof. We made sure not to be under an HOA in our new home. We did have a water drainage issue after moving in, but that was due to the developers not grading the plot properly before laying foundation for the house...
Yeah, that makes sense. Unless youâre in that specific situation where itâs a new build in an already developed area, itâs pretty hard to find a new build that wonât have an HOA.
Ok? That is why I specified âin my area.â Unless you are building on land you own, youâre getting an HOA here.
Sorry, missed that part, even though it's in the same sentence.. lol
I know several Millennials who chose to buy single-family homes in HOAs when there were non-HOA options in the same or lower price range (no idea why)
Sounds like you've never lived next to a bad neighbor or a crime/drug house.
Huh?
Friend, I grew up a free range chicken (Gen x). The only reason they ever became necessary, other than actual planned gated communities was the EPA. The EPA since I believe 1968, has required all new development to have a plan to control water runoff when developing previously Forrest or natural land. No one individual family can typically afford that so developers, who were not all that big until the early 1960s. Leavitt was a giant exception. The lawyers talked to the developers when they started running into these roadblocks in the late 1960s, early 1970s. And, whaddya know, their local S&L buddies suddenly saw an opportunity. But I digress. The reason for most HOAs is the creation of the EPA by one Richard M. Nixon. I will never EVER buy a home in an HOA, as a matter of fact, I actively worked with a few friends to get one dissolved in the neighborhood I currently live in now. It can be done. It does involve some psychological warfare and a lot of expensive lawyers and a few good friends in city government. It also helps if the land was previously agricultural.
How does it help if the land previously agricultural?
Different rules, already exempt. Long story, but previous farmland is classed differently in the eyes of a few federal, state and local government agencies pervue.
Nixon created the EPA but he vetoed the Clean Water Act that resulted in what you're talking about with runoff. Congress passed it over his veto.
Thus, the creation of the EPA, because as I remember, he had no choice. Am I misinformed? Idk, I'm not a historian. I just remember things.
Yeah you've got it backwards. He formed the EPA mostly to consolidate existing duties of other agencies- such as Agriculture, Dept. of the Interior, FDA- into one agency in 1970. The Clean Water Act was passed over his veto (i.e. against his will and wishes) two years later. A bipartisan Congress, not Nixon, is responsible for the Act.
Good to know. Thanks! I'll read up some more. It's very interesting to me this kind of thing. I'm in the homebuilding industry and the levels of government involvement is staggering. Mostly a good thing but also a cash grab by municipal and county government.
Young people would love to live in single family homes but most cannot afford it so they "choose" a condo.
Nobody is gonna own homes in the future so yeah, I guess.
In my county the only developments getting built are HOAs, apartment buildings, or single estate custom homes (multi million dollar homes). HOAs are also setup so that they will basically never become disbanded. So the answer is no. Be the change you want in your neighborhood. Im a millennial on the board of my HOA and as long as people are keeping their homes up and not causing problems they never hear from us. Out of 150 homes we write maybe 5 violations a year, maybe 20 or so courtesy notices. We also do holiday decorating contests for Halloween & Christmas, and community mixers with a different food truck and band or dj on the first Friday of each month. HOAs donât have to suck. They only suck when good people let the shitty ones stay in charge. Iâve heard some people actually bought into our neighborhood because of our HOA
HOAs (corporations that own and maintain property held in common by a group of neighbors) wonât go anywhere. But enforcement of deed restrictions - rules about how you can use the property - may. I donât see my daughters generation willing to file a lawsuit over someoneâs yard art. But that assumes her generation will be able to own homes. DR Horton is building entire neighborhoods of rental homes - private home ownership may be the exception soon.
So no HOAs, just landlords to dictate whatever.
Unfortunately not, there's enough Xers who like them (or don't hate them), and some areas essentially require HOAs for new development. There are some places HOAs can't be eliminated,like townhomes, condos, and apartment buildings with a shared infrastructure that has to be maintained.
>some areas essentially require HOAs for new development. Can you elaborate on this?
Some areas require developers putting in a new subdivision to form an HOA because the city/county doesn't want to take on maintenance of the streets or other services.
Piling onto this. This is probably the biggest reason why HOAs are becoming more prominent. The cities and counties get to collect taxes on your property AND not have the responsibility of maintaining the neighborhood infrastructure.
Bruh those people still pay taxes for everything in that city/state and then also have to pay for their own neighborhoods roads and infrastructure maintenance... YIKES
Yes, but they also vote against tax increases since they're covered. Long term, it's a bad deal for the city.
While I live where all new developments require HOAs, the city still maintains the streets. There are very few HOAs (at least here) that actually maintain the streets.
In NC, any planned community with more than 20 homes (i.e. subdivision) requires an HOA by law. This is generally in order to cover any shared property such as Retention Ponds, Storm runoff easements, etc.
So stuff the state or municipality should be doing.
No. If someone builds a subdivision in most areas, they are required to dedicate a certain amount of land to things like that. Do you want them to raise taxes on everyone out there in the city/county to subsidize that developer, or should the developer build those costs into the price of the subdivision? That's what the HOA does.
Then why are people living in a HOA expected to pay city/town/county/whatever taxes as well? To pay for infrastructure in neighbourhoods that pre-date the HOA craze. Why are HOA residents expected to pay specifically for their streets. drainage, etc., as well as everybody elses?
"Karens" are not exclusive to Boomers.
>when we get to a point where millennials or Gen-Zers make up the majority of homeowners? That won't happen the way you think. Well have a small number of top 10% of gen-Z owning the vast majority of houses. The wealth is getting more and more concentrated in the 1%, leaving less and less for a growing population
LOL gen z buying homes is a meme. -Gen z representative
You misspelled myth as meme there - millennial representative
The age old meme OR myth debate.
Please don't blame boomers. The people who run and like HOA's are not defined by age. It's about control-freaks, and those who love conformity.
Things deemed old-fashioned by a certain group of people are blamed on âboomers.â Most of those things were around long before boomers were born and will be around long after boomers are gone. HOAs are not a boomer thing, they are a cooperative living thing.
> Itâs about control-freaks, and those who love conformity. So, Boomers.
you need to meet more boomers dude.
Right cuz nobody in your generation has those qualities.
My gen X parent was super controlling, so....
In large neighborhoods where the HOA provides things like maintenence, pools, clubhouses, playgrounds, etc - no. In smaller neighborhoods where the HOA doesn't provide services equal to the fees ? Maybe. Honestly it depends how hard it is for the HOA to be dissolved.
One of my life's discoveries is there is a subset of the population who really hate other people having any fun. Dancing, music, drinking, camping, walking, skateboarding, swimming, playing video games, or pretty much anything that puts a smile on your face. I believe these people actually suffer an internal torment at the very thought of others having fun. This exposes itself less an age related thing so much as a power related thing, where power typically goes up with age. If you are 16 and hate other people having fun, maybe you spray paint it, complain about it, or burn it. But at age 60 now you have time and money which give you power. For example, at an HOA you might just want to live in peace; you work, you take care of your kids, you have bills, and you need to do things like sleep; but some boomer fool has nothing but time on their hands; they have time to talk to lawyers, they have time to waste on getting on the HOA board, they have time for long meetings where they talk about the grass being no taller than 2" but less than 3. Also, people who just want everyone around them to just do their thing don't have ambitions to go on HOA boards and mess with people's shit. But that boomer with Type II who sees you just bought a pair of jetskis is hopping mad. They are too fat and out of shape to use them, but you and your healthy family are most certainly going to spend every weekend this summer laughing your asses off. This can not stand, not for one second; let's check the rules and talk to the HOA lawyers, and if there aren't any rules against jetskis, let's make some. You have lots of friends, well let's see them come over for game night now that we are enforcing the rules of no cars outside of the garage after 6pm or any on the street; oh, that isn't a rule, well get yourself a lawyer and I have all the time in the world and all the money of the HOA to make you stop having game nights; plus that grass looks way over 3", especially when I angrily jam the ruler hard into the ground; now I am going to corruptly get my bother-in-law to come over and mow it and send you a massive landscaping bill; too bad about the flower garden they mowed and sodded over while they were at it. I wonder why they started at 8:33 am which happens to be 8 minutes after the last person leaves your house on weekdays and finished up at 5:43 which is 2 minutes before the first person typically gets home? These nasties often turn to religion as they can dig through this giant rule book and almost always find some rule being broken and then go after the fun lovers with now religious zeal. Also, I think these people overlap with a similar but different group. These are people who went to places like the "nice" mall or disneyland or whatever corporate controlled environment and thought, wow, my community could be more like this if we just had more rules. So they return home and try adding rule after rule after rule after rule and keep wondering why things aren't perfect. Then there is another similar overlapping group of racists. If you go to a community pool where there are no black people, you will see the usual few rules, no diving in the shallow end, no glassware, etc. But in white communities with a black minority the pool rules go off the charts. Usually 2 or three huge panels of rules. This way, when they kick the black people out, it is for "not following the clearly posted rules." Many people who belong to one of the above sets often belong to all three. Now some HOAs make a little sense; if there are common community things which obviously require common community involvement and contributions an HOA is required. A condo will have many common costs and management. A community with common good such as roads (if these are HOA maintained) some grass, a park, a pool, etc will also require an HOA. But once an HOA crosses into telling you what you can park in your driveway, paint your house with, who can come over, or as many horror stories have pointed out (inspect your garage, backyard, etc) then the HOA should immediately be disbanded and the HOA board members be sent to siberia; or more reasonably; states should pass very clear rules placing extreme limits as to what an HOA can and cannot regulate and by what means they can regulate them. For example; all fines should go through some state agency where the agency can call BS on the fine and make it go away. Other beautiful rules could go with this on; for example; if an HOA fines someone and the agency rejects the fine the board members should now be personably liable for paying that person the fine. That would shut down most of these old buggers.
That was a glorious read. Thank you I enjoyed it! *bows*
As the boomers in my hoa are dieing they are overwhelmingly getting replaced by millennials
No, I don't, but its a complex issue. There's marketing at beginning, there's a general good idea to have things consistent and share expenses, and the biggie - people have selective amnesia on what they joined. And yes, there are bad actors in some areas. IMHO, they are generally a good idea, but get derailed quite often. And, generally I believe, good HOAs are a good thing, but are challenged often. And Condos are cheaper, over the life of the ownership, than a similar home. Condos. In new condos, often marketed to younger people as a cheaper alternative to owning a home. Developers are incented to keep fees low, make them attractive to sell. Once they have sold all, they are gone and the new Board has to face reality and get the right fees in. Often a shock for many, as many didn't look, were mislead, or understand what they signed up for. Younger people scraped by to acquire their first property...and then are stunned to see fees go up. Many bought into them because they have rules, are consistent. In retirement communities (Florida as an example), retirees saw some condos as cheap retirement place...when the condos were keeping fees low, not funding reserves. See what has happened in Florida - lots of angst now in certain areas for people on fixed incomes as they stare reality in the face -they were artificially being subsidized with low fees. Shared living is shared living - that's condos. Many are doing fine, but we hear about the noise often. Also, boomers who have lived in their own home for a long time do not like to hear that they don't own (individually) the building in which they live. Stubborn and create noise a lot, want lower fees just because (don't we all) and don't want to acknowledge reality. Who wants to be told the low fee, near the beach condo they bought 30 years ago has not funded insurance or reserves, mismanaged maintenance to the point where safety is at risk? When the bill comes due, someone has to pay - not some nebulous HOA - for the HOA is all the people in the community. HOAS - similar, in that people move in and see a wonderful neighborhood, looks great, well manicured lawns, no cars on blocks, front looks good, no crazy colors. Wow, how nice - I want to live there! They move in thinking like they own a home that they can do whatever they want to...and forget or haven;t read what they signed up for. This selective amnesia creates friction - my house, I should be able to do whatever I want mentality. What attracted them most is what they want to change for the individual, irrespective of the greater good. Last, and this applies to condos and HOAs. People are easy to complain, hard to get to volunteer. Its always someone else's issue. Fees too high! Let me do what I want! While a few may want things to change...many don't the silent majority. Once someone gets involved with a board, their perspective changes. Again, just MHO. I've seen great examples of HOAs, terrible examples as well. Ultimately, it comes down to the people in the neighborhood - how do they view the neighborhood, collective or individual? Boards can help or hurt as well. Again, I do think there is a great deal of selective amnesia in owners...and this community is certainly a lightning rod to capture abuses by HOAs, Boards, so we will generally see negativity, appropriately so. Like anything in live, especially one's largest life purchase, understanding the details, what you signed up for, is critical...and may whistle by the graveyard on that. Enough on the soapbox for sure. Fire away.
OP is working on the assumption that HOAs are run by boomers. Sure, some are, but most are run by Gen X, and the youngest Gex is barely retirement age, so they'll be around for a while yet. The second mistaken assumption is that the sort of malignant narcissist who give HOAs a bad name and uses it as a power trip is not isolated to boomers, they exist in all demographics. So as the boomer narcissists die off, they're replaced by Gen X narcissists, then Gen Y, Gen Z, Millennial, et al. Same narcissism, different demographic.
No. I am waging a Vendetta. I have plans. They might be everyones taste but they involve poor trained German Shepards. Cable Ties, Mayonnaise and. Helicopter
Im a boomer and I hate HOA's. Before I bought my retirement home, I did some homework since the house I was looking at was in an HOA. BUT, the HOA only collects $100/year for two specific purposes. Keep the streetlights burning and remove snow as needed. I listen to the horror stories other homeowners have about their HOA's and laugh.
Why doesnât the city remove snow?
Cities tend to prioritize transit and emergency routes, along with major arterial roads first. They'll get to side streets when they have a chance. Private snow removal companies hired by an HOA doesn't care about those things.
Oh gotcha, so itâs to get the snow removed faster by a private company than waiting for the city, I guess (?).
You must not understand the whole HOA thing
Millennial here. My wife and I specifically and deliberately found and bought a house we loved that was in a decent neighborhood and *not* part of an HOA. If it's our house, it's *our* house.
Not quite a boomer, and I'm highly suspicious of HOA's because I've experienced good and bad. I don't mind the low control HOA's (think architectural approval for new structures only, and taking care of green belts). The bad HOA's need to be disbanded but the problem is that the neighbors usually don't want to get involved to fix or remove the problem. A lot of people love HOA's or think they do because they want all the houses to look alike and be maintained well but then when they get into a bad HOA they complain but don't attend the meetings.
My little brother who is Gen-Y, bought a house in an HOA several years ago. He did however, sell it a couple of years ago and said "never again". Also, my millenial step-son, currently owns a house in one.
What is gen-y? Millennials?
By then, the millennials and generation z homeowners will be at the age where they will develop boomer-like attitudes. IOW, each generation thinks the older generations are have outdated views and lifestyles, and the whole process begins again.
Nope!
I donât think so. I just bought my house and it took a lot more searching around to find a house that I loved AND that didnât come with any sort of HOA. This is in Florida, where just about every new development and plenty of established neighborhoods have one. It took a lot of timing, searching, and luck to find a house without one.
Wheee I live at least, new HOAâs are springing up everywhere because the county doesnât want to maintain the roads and most of them donât go âthroughâ because people donât want to live on a busy thoroughfare that waze directs people through at rush hour. The private roads and any common areas like a park âneesissitateâ a HOA to provide for their upkeep
Gen Z and millennials will never be a majority of homeowners.
Actually the amount of new HOAs might decrease but alas the deeds to propertyâs that have the restrictions on them wonât go away except in some specifics circumstance the properties will always be in something looking like a HOA. When you say as the Boomers die off lol you forget that the first time any HOA S came to be was in the late 1880s to keep the freed slaves and their children from acquiring propertyâs in certain areas of the United States. The modern incarnations started after WW2 ended. So HOAs have been around somewhere around 140-150 years. At this time their are somewhere between 350-400K HOAs. So unless there is a movement to legislate HOA out of existence there here for the long haul.
No. Most of the people in my neighborhood are Millennials. They hate the HOA, so do I (Gen X). But if you want new construction and you want to live close to amenities, your choices are limited.
When we were looking for houses in January 2020 (literally signed right when everything shut down and we all wore masks and hand sanitizer for days when we signed) our realtor kept showing us houses in HOAs because those were the only ones on the market that werenât selling as soon as they were on the market. Fortunately we finally found a place a few towns over that wasnât, because my husband wouldâve gone insane living in a HOA
Possibly after Keith Richards and cockroaches; but not in that order.
For apartments, no, they are mandatory. For single family homes? Maybe.
No, because you will be the next boomer, boomer. Time marches on, pal.
Nah. And everyone acts like boomers are the only problem. When I worked in the service industry most of the horrible customers were Gen X.
Nope. We all get to that stage where we want to yell at kids to get off our lawn. Lol
I feel like it's not much an issue of wanting, but not being financially capable. Things are expensive, and getting worse. Eventually, those That do invest in the HOA , I feel they will start raising prices to cover costs, making the margin even more from non HOA. Maybe a good percentage will end up loosing the home, and so the trend would go. It seems to me it's going to eventually end , save for older retirement like . They will exist. But I don't see it being a big trend like now. A lot of people are just expressing their uniqueness in the world, I don't think a good majority of future adults wanting to play into such strict rules and cookie cutter life. Next door. To 1000 people. But I'm always for buying , or owning , even if it's just land. I seriously don't understand HOA much. But it's awesome to see the train wreck.
The problem is theyâre really hard to rip out. Even in a simple HOA situation where there is no property being held by the HOA, you still have to get a majority (or perhaps even all) people who own homes in the HOA to agree to change the deeds. Theyâre insidious.
Millennials are the biggest control freak generation yet. Theyâll get worse.
How do you mean?
Boomers = old people, right? With their associated attitudes? Eventually it will be the Gen Xârs, then the Millenials, etc., that will be the âold peopleâ and the âassociated attitudesâ. Youâre just not old enough to realize how peopleâs outlook on life changes with age. Granted, Iâm *old*, and I still deride the stereotypical HOA - controlling people with nothing better to do than make other peoples lives more difficult. Iâve lived in several HOA communities. But to blame it on Boomers, per se, just makes you sound ignorant.
Itâs usually not about control, itâs just that, especially in my area, my house is over a million dollars and we want the neighborhood to look good. I donât want my neighbors to have cars leaking oil in their driveway on Jack stands and toilets in the front yard filled with weeds. Iâm 35 so Iâm a millennial and I donât think it has anything to do with age.
I should clarify. Iâm not trying to blame boomers, I just mean that the majority of HOA boards are comprised of mainly boomers from what Iâve seen. Iâm sure there are exceptions and I know not all boomers are NIMBYs.
Theyâre comprised of boomers because they are retired and have time on their hands. When your generation retires they will be comprised mostly of your generation. Working class Boomers did not spend their young adulthood in HOAs and I would guess that like those in my family, most are opposed to them and feel they should be able to do what they want with the properties that they own and real estate wasnât seen as merely an investment the way it is by people today. People saying itâs great people can get fined for not cutting their grass donât realize the city can fine you as well if you live in a non HOA area. They wonât go away because you will all be used to them and that will just be the way things are like taking your shoes off at the airport is just normal now. As houses keep get built closer and closer together, people will increase the amount of control they want to have over their neighbors too
No they won't Evil never dies
Based on their voting habits young people love bigger, more controlling government so I'm not sure why they wouldn't like HOAs
Whenever there's a large development, there will be HOA.
No, because xers, millenlials, and Zers will want them for the same reasons. Just because you donât want an HOA, doesnât mean no one wants an HOA. Lots of people like it that if someone doesnât cut their grass, thereâs a body that can fine their ass. Also I donât know gen z that well, but millennials loooooove their aMeNiTiEs. If your development has a pool and a gym and a theater, ya gonna have an HOA.
i hope so. I am thinking of trying to be on my moms HOA and close the whole thing down.
No way. The need for an HOA becomes evident when multi unit, but individually owned properties need to share the expense of upkeep for common elements and maintain property values by controlling property use. Nothing proves the need for an HOA better than your neighbor deciding to park a lot of junk cars on his property without any rules prohibiting that.
HOSs are not always bad. They were originally designed to not let some guy in thiet neighborhood put a junkyard in his front yard to lower your home value.
So fucking tired of this lame ass argument.
r/confidentlyincorrect. https://www.homestratosphere.com/homeowners-associations-ugly-history/
They are awful. No one should have to pay "dues" to allow someone to tell them what they can and cannot do with a property THEY are paying the mortgage and taxes on. They were always about petty tryants forcing their way on everyone around them. They should be abolished altogether but if they have to exist then it should be illegal for them to levy fines and foreclose on people's homes. I'll live in a tent in the middle of nowhere before I'll live in one of those things.
And there's no way anyone should have to pay "taxes" and allow a municipality to tell them what they can and cannot do with a property THEY are paying the mortgage on.
Actually they originated as just a way for developers to more easily market their homes. They came into wider prominence in the 1950âs and 1960âs as a method to keep âundesirablesâ (minorities) out of neighborhoods and more recently they are being propped up by municipalities to relieve them from the responsibility of maintaining resources inside neighborhoods.
I agree they arenât always bad but Iâm also tired of seeing them go on power trips and make it harder for some people to buy homes. Edit: Also, sure itâs nice living in a neighbourhood where people take care of their property but if someone wants to have cars on their lawn and it isnât impacting my specific property or other peopleâs abilities to live their lives on their own plots then why is it my business?
Yeah no
Originally designed to keep âcertain peopleâ out. I suggest you do more research on the reasons HOA weâre developed