I posted this in GD as well, but would like the WA HTF perspective.  I'm just needy like that!

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I live in a 30-home subdivision in one of the more rural cities in King
County, Washington. My wife & I have been living here for nearly
six years and pretty much keep to ourselves. It's a nice little place
to live.





The very first time we came through here, we were
house-shopping. I saw a decorative sign at the entrance to this
subdivision and the first thought to come to mind was "Home Owners'
Association". Upon further research, it was determined that one did not
exist.





Back when this place was built, supposedly an HOA was to have been established by the developer.  That did not happen.  





For well over five and a half years, all was peachy.





Towards
the latter half of last month, one of the neighbors (the neighborhood
busybody) took it upon herself to determine that the entrance sign to
the subdivision was old and no longer serviceable. She came
door-to-door and told everyone that she got an estimate to replace the
carved & painted wooden sign with one made from stone. My wife
answered the door, I was out of sight in the kitchen eating lunch but
was able to hear every syllable. She told my wife that the cost per
household was to be $100 and a new entrance sign would not only improve
our property values but inspire everyone to maintain their yards
better. My wife rebutted with a reference to a house close to the
entrance to our subdivision that is very unkempt. There's grass growing
out of control, competing with blackberries, boarded-up windows and
some roof shingles missing from the nearly 20-year-old house. That's
when Ms. Busybody told my wife that she's approached the city and
county about getting that house condemned. Since we don't have an HOA,
Ms. Busybody said that if everyone in the neighborhood got onboard a
petition, we could get the house condemned and have the property turned
into a park.





My wife told her that she needed to discuss the
matter with her husband (me) and they parted ways. I told my wife that
I heard all and said, "Do we really need to spend three grand on a
fucking rock?" That's all it took to convince my wife to see things my
way.





About a week later, while I was at drill with my ANG unit,
Ms. Busybody returned with the following flier. I copied it straight
from Adobe (I scanned it). Yes, this crazy woman believes one ought to
capitalize every single word in the English language.










My
wife politely told her that we were not going to participate in this
endeavor and broke off immediately. I'm not sure if she bladed at 45
degrees, or even had a massive adreneline dump.





This past
Wednesday, Ms. Busybody had the audacity to again come door-to-door and
solicit cash or check. My wife told her again that we were not playing
along. This is when things got interesting. Apparently, when walking
away down my driveway, Ms. Busybody muttered something about how
"everyone else is going to have to contribute more" to offset our
non-participation. My wife let loose. She told Ms. Busybody that she
didn't appreciate hearing that shit on our property and told her that
we know for a fact that there are other neighbors not contributing. I
came outside at that point. Ms. Busybody flashed us an envelope full of
money and said that everyone else is paying. I retorted with, "Well,
they do say a sucker is born every minute." Ms. Busybody didn't like
that.





I had two theories as to why Ms. Busybody decided to take
on this little project. First, I thought that they were going to sell
within six months and are trying to eke out every cent they could from
the sale of their home. The second, more remote idea I hade was that
she's grooming her resume to run for office. Well today, my second
theory has been realised. A neighbor has a banner on the front of their
house proclaiming "Ms. Busybody for REDACTED City Council".





I will update when the letters to the editors I have written get published.





What sayeth the Hive Mind?





In before:  Move out, That's what you get for living there (city / country / county / state / time zone), SSS, etc.
 

What is there to do? There isn't a HOA and I sure hope they can't impose one on you. They can't force you to pay. So what if a bunch of your neighbors are gomers? I suppose you could start an anti-sign campaign, that might be kinda fun if you have the time

We're in a not-so-similar situation here. We live down a 1/4 mile dirt road owned by the property owners, not the county. Every once and a while there is talk of paving it over. Ain't no way I'm going to pay for that. I like living down the end of a dirt road, keeps out the riff-raff, and I've got better things to spend my money on. We do chip in money and help (when asked) for gravel to fill in the pot holes, so its not like we don't participate in upkeep.

Sounds like you have a nice rock sign berm to place your target rack in front of.

My neighbors are a bunch of shit-birds.
I too live on a dirt road, and like it that way.  
Everybody bitches about the road when the potholes get big, but none of them actually fill the potholes in but me.
A few try to "grade" the road...unfortunately, since their isn't very much gravel on the road anyway, all they actually succeed in doing is smearing the mud around a little and the potholes are back a couple of days later.
I have to go around and fill the potholes with 5/8" minus myself from my gravel pile because these cheap-assed useless bastard neighbors of mine absolutely refuse to spend a stinking dime to keep up the road.

Just reaffirms my long held opinion about most of humanity...

Exactly.

If they can impose an HOA, I think I'd make ol' Strat look like a kindergarten teacher.




 

If he didn't sign an agreement to participate in an HOA when he purchased his home there's nothing they can do to him now. HOA's have their pro's and con's.
I personally would never be involved with one.

I guarandamntee that there is no such document and my hand has never laid on any such document.

Ms. Busybody's wet-dream is to have an HOA.  She can go pound sand.



 

Meh... Next time she knocks on the door, answer it in the nude.

Fuck them and fuck Mrs. Busybody.  She sounds like an annoying bitch.

I suggest takin' a crap on her front porch in the wee hours of the morning.

no NOA recorded(check puplic records)......ya dont have to do jack shit if you dont want to. Even if there was an old one, unless its been in use(meetings, dues ect) over a certain period of time(and it sure sounds like it not, if ever was) the HOA dies. Many HOA from the 70-80's are dieing off and to be honest you can tell the difference. Me I got crap all over my place...I know where i belong.

HOA have there pluses and minus(too much so, always a freakin nazi in the group) but do tend to keep up a nieghborhood better. Some of the rural ones are not bad as they are pretty darn loose and if there is a road(paved) its a good thing(to at least have a road maintence agreement) Because of what I do, I have had to be VP of more than a few HOA...........and it DRIVES ME NUTS!!!!! I just want to get up and slap the asstards

The way to find out which side of right you are on is so easy.  Go to the title company that did your closing, and ask them for a copy of the CC&R's for REDACTED homes.  Everything you need to know about how the HOA works is in there.  Don't forget that CC&R's run with the land, and the only way to remove them is if _every_ owner agrees to the action.  Any questions about the CC&R's should be answered by an attorney.

Good luck.

Open carry?

I'm builing my house on 5 acres, so I don't care.  No offense meant.

still might be CCR's.....I know a ton of 5 acre tracks with them

tag for later reading

I fucking hate HOA's.  Ours is a complete FUBAR mess.  Dues started at $100 per year. No biggie.  Similar Mrs. Busybody (also street gossip) became HOA president and raised the dues to $250 a year with only her little group of cronies at one of the annual meetings.  Ok, $250 per YEAR is still not bad, until you see the budget... ~66% of our dues go to a Management company.  We are a single street community of 42 houses, so of the 10k that is coming in $6,500 is going to some company to schedule an annual meeting and send to notices to people because their yard is unkept.  Another ~25% goes into a fund to repave our cul-de-sac's that are not city streets.  These are roads used by 6 houses and the blacktop has a 20 year life.  I'm REALLY happy that about 10% of my money (an entire $25) actually goes to maintaining our Community Sign, and water retention pond.  At one of our last meetings, we had a similar discussion about our community sign, I told them I'd be happy to cut it down and get rid of it so that no one had to maintain it.

What disturbs me most is how she wants to forcibly evict someone from their own home.

She's also running for city council.  Not HOA.  City. Fucking. Council.



They make budgets and ordinances.  You know, with a mayor and shit?

After seeing my inlaws informed that their Christmas lights had been left up too long, on January 2nd, by the HOA of a neighborhood they lived in at the time, I don't think I could ever subject myself to that sort of oversight. I would either wind up with a huge lien against my home or, more likely, the neighborhood Nazis would end up missing and presumably dead.

You don't happen to have the address to which I can order a subscription to any newsletter you might offer do you?

sounds like you need to find a species of endangered beetle release it on the sign and take pictures, then when she runs for office let the local newspaper run a story about her assault on endangered species you led the resistance against. Of course the same article could point out her attempts to forcibly extract payment etc.. oh by the way, she killed the endangered beetle species while cleaning around the sign.