No, the other extreme is living on a piece of land without a bunch of suburbanite dumbfucks clustered all around you.  I prefer my neighbors at a distance that it would take artillery to hit them.

You mean Bud hasn't figured out the perfect crime?

Guess I have some mixed reservations about this.  I understand what the HOA is trying to do.   But.........is it in the HOA Guidelines/Rules they are allowed to do this?  As far as private property I wonder are the roads actually private or were they county/city built?  The article says the local county sheriff says they are not responsible for traffic enforcement on private property.   Okay, so who's responsible for investigating criminal activity?  How about fire department?  Are they serviced by the county/city with taxpayer funds?    In this case issuing a speeding ticket will be fully a civil matter.  Good luck with enforcement HOA!  lol

You're lucky then. I could tell you some horror stories about the first home I bought and the son who inherited the house next door when his mom died and he decided to turn it into rental/storage for his tree trimming business.

I live in a HOA now and am quite happy with it. Of course it's a moderate one and I read the agreement before buying so I knew what I was buying. Simple stuff like no RVs or boats on the street, no non running cars stored outside, etc. Many here hate them and that's fine. Live wherever the hell you want but enjoy having a dozen illegals living next door and shifty tree trimmers hanging out in the yard drinking all night after work and parking heavy equipment in the lawn when your elderly neighbor dies.

This is the problem with HOA's. They set themselves up as a separate governing entity. They are not really accountable to anyone unless you take them to court. Where they use your HOA fees against you.

I seem to be missing something.  Do people in HOA's not pay property taxes?  You know those property taxes that pay for police?  Do they not get fire or education either?  Sounds like some horse shit is going on to me.

My wife has tracked down idiots that were racing around on atvs and off road motorcycles that live in our neighborhood. It usually doesn't happen again but you would have to know my wife to appreciate it.

I pay to live in a nice neighborhood and not have some white trash hick down the street slash my home value in half when he moves in. If you don't like HOAs don't buy a home in one. Problem solved.

For fucks sake you would think people are forced to buy in one reading these threads. Also not everybody can or wants to live in the country. I have a weekend place out in the sticks but work requires me to keep residence in town.

You do realize you can live in a neighborhood without a HOA and not have any of these issues you're describing, right?

They don't do that here.  Our HOA is pretty good, all things considered.  We do have to call the LEO to have them watch the stop signs, at times, though.  Too many stop signs, people ignore them all.

Go get into an accident in the parking lot of your local Walmart and try calling the police to get a report made.  They'll tell you it's private property and they won't respond.  Now go rob the same Walmart and see if they show up.

As for the fire department we have several areas that are not incorporated and have contracted to our department for fire service.  If they didn't they'd be out of luck.

Of course you can but there is no guarantee. It only takes one or two bad owners to move in and ruin the neighborhood. Once property values drop lower and lower class people move in until eventually the neighborhood starts looking like Tijuana and you're stuck with an upside down mortgage and arson is the only way out. Happens all the time in unprotected areas.

The reason why we must have laws is glaringly obvious in this thread.  And, as is the norm, those individuals that cause us to need them are oblivious of their status.

Funny how that works.

I'll not detail what will happen to he who speeds through my neighborhood, secure inth knowledge "there ain't shit you can do about it," and runs over my only child.  Add to that the security offered with the opinions that "I know what I'm doing"; "Fuck him;" "It'll not happen to me;" He shouldn't have been so close to the road;" "I didn't see him;" "It's not really a speed limit if the law can't write me a ticket".  How much sense is that going to make when a child is pinned under your car, screaming in agony?  How powerfully will those defenses impact the judgement of your peers?

You fucks, bereft of integrity, will have no problem whup'n out the "we got ourselves a bad-ass here" pic.

Will the tickets have $400.00 in processing fees, court costs, and EMT funding charges?

What. The. Fuck?

HOAs are teh suck.

but...

private property, private matter.  Let the homeowners and the asshat board members hash that one out.  People who don't like it can vote with their feet and dollars.

As for me, I will not purchase where there is an HOA

Amen.  The further I am for other people the happier I am.

Any house I looked at for sale that I liked and had no HOA had what I described going on.  I was actually hoping to avoid an HOA.

I'm not wealthy by any stretch.. so what I can afford will have a lower income crowd.. which brings people who just let their house, yard, and everything go to shit.  All depends on where you live and what you can afford.  HOA turned out to be a good thing for me.

They do help guard against deterioration, but that is not worth living under some bored housewife's tyrant thumb to me.

I cannot express in words how orgasmically happy I am that where I live there is no HOA.

I was lucky, but wow, how lucky!

From the article this one is gated. I'd say the non gated ones would have no way to enforce such measures.

Probably told to leave and no reentry.

Same here.  Fuck them.  They harassed my wife because her car had a flat tire, so they said it was abandoned.  This happened while I was in Afghanistan and my father-in-law was on hospice.  Fuck all busybodies, HOA or otherwise.

 I would have to make their little radar thingy my new hobby.  Much fun would be had by all (OK, mostly by me).

Nosy busybodies are the worst.  My non-HOA neighborhood has at least one, possibly two.  I don't know why they live in a non-HOA neighborhood; if they want to be little dictators they should go live in a HOA neighborhood.

I can see their side of it too. And I'm one of those folks who dislikes HOA's out of principle, and won't ever live in one. However, being in Florida, and working in security management, I know a little about what they've been doing and why. Some of these HOA communities are pretty large, have significant numbers of residents, and some fairly major 'main' streets and intersections. There's lots of kids walking around, playing, etc. There's elderly folks puttering around on golf carts. And there's a bunch of asshats that think they can blow through every stop sign and drive 50 down a road signed at 25.

In the cases I am aware of, the HOA has repeatedly asked the local police to assist them. No dice. First, PD's don't want to waste manpower on private communities. They don't even bother patrolling them at all in most cases. They'll only respond to actual calls for service. One reason why so many of these communities have private security. Second, unless the roads and traffic control signs & devices are FL DOT compliant, even if the police want to, they can't legally issue traffic citations on those roads.

Like anything, some of these places are going to do a half-ass job of it, and others are going to do it right. We've got private communities who have their own security EMT/Paramedics, run radar & do traffic, and have K9s as well. Others, not so much.

And for those wondering how they're able to get anyone to comply, don't forget, homeowners living there signed off on the HOA rules. The HOA has a lot of leverage on them. Homeowners are responsible for their visitor's conduct. Every car and visitor is logged in and out. Every resident has their tag # in a database. When security gets someone on radar speeding, they don't force them to stop. Yes, they light them up and essentially perform a traffic stop. However, it's basically a 'request to stop'. If the person refuses, they don't do anything more than follow them and be sure to get their tag #. If it's a resident, they'll probably get a violation notice in the mail from the HOA and either pay it, or appeal it with the HOA board. If it's a visitor, security knows what resident they were going to, and the resident gets a violation notice in the mail. Visitor was a contractor and acting like an ass? OK, no more contractors from company XYZ allowed on the property at all.

And for the most part, it works pretty well. Free market and all that.. The residents WANT the enforcement for the most part. Peer pressure on those that don't conform works wonders. Businesses don't want to lose all those potential customers inside, so they tend to get pissed if one of their employee's is making them look bad. Amazing what a simple phone call to a business owner discussing their driver's speeding through a 'school zone' and refusing to stop for the security guys will accomplish.

I'd never live like that, but for those that do, they chose that lifestyle and most of them seem to like it.

I can't imagine living in a neighborhood large enough to have private security, ambulance/EMT service, and all that.

My neighborhood is 1 road and has ~10 houses.

Un fucking believable. That's all we need is to give more power to Billy Bob at the HOA.

Do you people realize that most HOA's can actually put liens against your house? And if you - for instance - don't pay your dues, they can actually force-sell your house out from under you? There was a big story recently here in TX where the wife of a soldier deployed in Afghanistan couldn't pay the dues and they lost the house. The HOA then turned around and sold it to someone else for a ridiculously low price. (Apparently a sweetheart deal to a friend of the HOA president.)

To start giving police power to your neighbors is a sure recipe for loss of liberty. Where are the courts, the presumption of innocence, the training, the certification, the checks and balances? No, this will end up being a tiny Hugo Chavez-style dictatorship.

Fuck HOA's, and fuck HOA's assuming police power with fire.

No  HOA here and none of that is seen. You don't need to have a HOA to have a decent neighborhood.

There's these things called zoning ordinances....

Amen.

The place would be full of guys named Brad and Todd, and their wives Tiffany and Sheila.  Ralph Lauren would be the official uniform.  Contractors would make a fortune installing mailboxes and hanging pictures.

We do too. And the "Funny" part is that 9 out of ten speeders in a residential area are residents of either that subdivision, or of the municipality I work for and alot of them get highly bent when issued a citation for speeding in a residential area.

I find it especially ironic when I pull over the resident who called the alderman or the Chief ranting and raving about speeders in the neighborhood, and have to issue them a citatioon for speeding.

On topic...if its a private street...that's their decision.

They must not be enforced.. because I see junkyards for front yards all over this county in the non HOA areas.

Your HOA got a Charter? I looked through Title 15.2 of the VA Code and am not seeing how they can do this.

Are the areas not zoned?

The most annoying neighbor in my non-HOA neighborhood is the one who leaves his floodlights on outside all night and they shine in my house's general direction.  He likely doesn't know it, so I'll go chat with him about it in a bit.

That's seriously the worst thing in my neighborhood right now.

Seems like a good reason to burn tires.....

Just wait till they form their own swat team.

Good, then they can do no-knock warrantless home inspections to make sure people don't have evil things like incandescent light bulbs or hi-cap soda bottles.

yeah, this is over the line for HOA



(sorry to irk some ARFCOMr's here by replying to my own thread)


 

Did that guy call in complaining about a teenager doing 50 in a 25 get ticketed for 29 in the neighborhood?

That would be a legit gripe.

People go 90 through Non HOA neighborhoods like they do in HOA neighborhoods. It isn't an isolated problem, the only difference is one group enacted a solution without using guns, police, taxpayer dollars, etc....


Unlike other governmental systems, you have to choose to live there. What is the problem?

Issue all the tickets you want, HOA; I'm just gonna wipe my ass with them.
 

Give the HOA president's name to all your friends.