this post was submitted on 09 Oct 2026
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Revenge
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I'll never understand why some people choose to live in minimum security prison.
There isn't choice in a lot of places. Every new development since at least the 90s has an hoa.
New developments are more likely to be HOAs, as city governments realized that they can't afford the money bomb that is car-based infrastructure to support single-family housing. So they foist those duties onto the HOAs, essentially making small municipal governments for every new housing development.
So.... you can avoid them for now, but only if you live in developed cities.
How do countries do this without widespread HOA equivalents? In the UK we have similar arrangements for shared spaces but not anywhere near the comical level of control on private land as in the US
It is my understanding that suburban UK housing is still much more densely developed than US-style suburbs where having a few acres per house is normal (but makes the cost of roads unsustainable).
Most suburban lots in the US are definitely not an acre. Census Bureau Survey of Construction data says it's closer to 0.25 acres or less per house as of 2023. Most suburban sprawlscapes around me are closer to 0.15 acres per house.
Especially in the southwest, like Arizona, they're doing shared side yard nonsense to cram more mcmansions.
I'm an old guy, and got my entire life I've said the same. When buying the two prior houses, no HOA was a hard requirement. But my wife and I split up later year - had to sell the house and split the money. She moved away, but I wanted to stay in the area where my friends and family are. So what I could afford was a condo, and all condos have HOAs.
Mine actually seems fine so far. I almost wish they enforced the rules more, but none of the rules seem egregious. And since the neighborhood/complex has common facilities like a pool and a meeting room, it's kind of unavoidable having some common body to be responsible for them.
I can understand it for condos where you functionally own an apartment, that way it can pay for building/grounds maintenance, but if you've got a street where none of the houses are connected, then I dont see a point, there's no benefit beyond everyone's grass looking pretty uniform and no one having outlandish holiday decorations (which, where's the fun in that). Actually now that I think about, I'm setting up an HOA who's only rule is you can't put up Christmas decor before Thanksgiving.
There are all kinds of things people can do that you might not necessarily want from your neighbors even if your houses aren't connected especially outside city limits.
Mundane things like as neighbor with german rottweilers walks his small horses off leash but doesn't pick up their poop. Maybe they only sort of listen to him and like to chase your kids or small pets.
Maybe one of the people decides they will park a trailer on the street for their mother in law for the summer that makes it hard for you to see backing out of your driveway. Or put 4 "antique" cars on cinder blocks in their front yard to work on but can't find the time and now there are rabbits that live under them and eat your garden.
Or your neighbor get chickens or small livestock next door that come alive every morning at 5a and their son decides to take up the bagpipes to play every night at 11p.
And we of course have to remember all these neighbors move in 3 years after you, and now you can't even move because nobody else wants to live next to Rottweiler guy, bagpipes guy, or the guy from hoarders storing cars on his lawn.
This is why it makes a lot of sense to have a small HOA with a handful of rules, but it still doesn't make sense to have someone with a ruler come measure your grass.
My neighborhood of over 150 lots has been terrorized by ONE SINGLE DUDE. Almost everyone is at least reasonably considerate, but it only takes one who isn't technically breaking the law to make everything kind of suck. As our local sheriff's department likes to say, there's no law against being a bad neighbor.
All of these things are just against the law where I am.
There is in many (most?) cities - every one of these is against city ordinance where I live. It's better these sort of things are handled by the city; applied to many more people it's harder to pull grass-measuring or other shenanigans.
Rabbits do not need cars to eat your garden, furry little buggers are perfectly happy with a hole anywhere in the ground. The excuses against 'car guy' are always the weirdest, especially the HOAs that don't even let you do basic oil changes yourself.
I see you read over the part where I explicitly said "outside city limits".
Seems I did.
To your point though, inside city limits the value proposition for an HOA is vanishingly small.
Yeah it sounds like we don't need a whole bunch of rules but rather a less formal arbitration process. Like, a community council that can settle disputes even if there's not a law being broken if one party is acting unreasonably. Of course, the loser could then elevate to an actual court if they feel their rights were/are violated.
No punishments, no fines, no lawyers, just a mediator to help settle minor disputes whose decisions are somewhat binding. Ideally several individuals that are elected by the community.
That would be a great way of doing it, honestly.
Edit: It was nice to have some guidelines in case you've never been a homeowner before though I will say.
Very, very basic people who are more concerned with their property values than having a hobby.
For the same reason people choose to pay 50 % of their income to their landlord.
For the greater good.
Crusty jugglers
“Small government” people want “freedom” so they eschew normal things like bylaws, but then the problems with that appear - whether it’s legitimate or Karen - and the control freaks in the neighborhood form up a HOA to deal with it, instead of offloading it to a (theoretically) uninvolved third party.
And now it’s the default way to enforce community standards.