Caveat emptor.
Owned a home with an HOA once before, but never again.
Unless an HOA is reformed to require all decisions by majority vote of all HOA owners/residents, with no board of directors dictates on anything, it will become a fascist organization.
I hate HOAs! Up in Maine where we (my parents) had a cabin (4 bedrooms 2 1/2 baths) the HOA of this resort area (nice lake) got in and tried to ban motors over 10 horsepower. Most of the cottage owners were there to enjoy boating, butthe HOA Board were retirees who hated waterskiiers. (One idiot used to ‘fish’ in the middle of our waterski course.) We decided to vote them out a month later when there was fraud going on...
Small government at work. I wouldn’t want my property devalued by a bunch of kids partying under a short-term rental next door.
It was the CA invasion that caused HOAs and the skyrocketing 10% yearly property tax hike in TX.
In all my experience the only agency that attracts more petty tyrants then an upscale HOA is the California Coastal Commission. Once ‘Karen’ feels that first hit of intoxication from power over someone she is instantly hooked and wants more and more.
HOA Nazi here.
Actually, I am an UBER HOA Nazi as I am the President of my HOA and Chairman of the PID my HOA is a small part of.
I didn’t set out to have these positions. I was more or less voluntold.
Joined my HOA board because they seemed to be making stupid decisions and I wanted that to stop. I got an education. The rules HOAs operate under are set by the developer and are virtually impossible to change. In the 17 years our HOA has been in existence we have changed exactly one...and got sued for doing it. We won.
Your story resonated with me because we just recently had to send notice to our residents that our covenants do not allow them to AirBnB their homes. It isn’t that we don’t want to let them...we are legally obligated to enforce the regulations as written and they are pretty specific in forbidding short term rentals. If we were to selectively enforce the rules we would find ourselves open to legal liability from residents for whom we did enforce the rules.
The real villains in all of this are the developers. You need to read the R and Rs VERY carefully before you buy into a planned community. They put all sorts of crap in there that you may not be able to live with.
HOAs that are created AFTER the neighborhood is built are a different animal. Those rules are usually more subject to change.
The person in the story should have been more proactive like joining the Board and/or becoming a Board member. No sympathy is given by me.
Residents where I live do not want to be Board members or attend meetings.
Check the deed you signed when you bought the property. The only restrictions you are REQUIRED to obey are the ones written on the deed. The HOA cannot enforce anything else.
The wife and I were in a HOA here in central Texas for 10 years. Won’t make that choice again but we did sell at almost twice what we paid just 10 years earlier. That was 16 years ago.