Are there any good reasons *not* to ban billboards?

[Rothman]

The First Amendment and private property rights are the two best reasons I can think of.

If you put a giant inflatable phallus in your front yard, it would not be long before a nice police officer showed up with a cease-and-desist order

It's not inflatable, but https://bit.ly/3SdyZbI

Link goes to a story on the F*ck HOA subreddit -- using bitly due to the name of the subreddit -- of one family's dispute with their HOA over landscaping boulders.  Religious freedom is invoked....

HOAs are at least a contract that someone willingly enters into. And they wouldn't be as necessary if municipalities just had better zoning laws.

HOAs aren't necessary at all.

Well some people seem to think so since they willingly agree to their terms. The problem isn't that HOAs exist, it is how they are run that cause the nightmare stories. But like everything, its the outliers that cause the headlines.

Not sure how willingly the acceptance of an HOA is.  It's pretty much, "I'll try to put up with it because I want to live in this school district," rather than, "I love HOAs since they look out for my own interest!"

I never said people "love HOAs," although some apparently do. (See below.)  I said that people view them as necessary since they willingly enter the agreement to live in one.

You can't separate HOAs' existence from how they are run.  Their intended purpose invites the nightmarish management.

What?  Of course you can. Plenty of HOAs are operated just fine.

Yes, the extreme cases are indeed outliers, but I have only met one or two people that appreciate their HOA (with the admission that they're not perfect) and lots of people that outright don't.  They may not be living in a complete nightmare, but they are living in an environment of constant discomfort.

Instead of anecdotal experiences, there are actually surveys about them.

https://www.insurancequotes.com/home/honest-about-hoas

Pretty much a majority either "loves them" or has a pretty neutral view about them.

Please read the sources you provide links to, for that source does not support the statement you made...or you do not understand how the survey results were presented.  They show generational divides, but not how large each generation was represented in the sample.  Therefore, your overall statement lumping apples and oranges together is inappropriate and inaccurate.

From the poll results, a slim majority does love them (57%) while 33% hate them and the rest 10% are neutral, so it's pretty far away from just "love" and "neutral" as you described.

I am surprised there aren't more unbiased polls out there on this issue.  It's too bad this one seems to be the only one that's easily Google-able...and only from "Insurance Quotes.com."

Typing the "Source" (survey of 649 homeowners) and hoa reveals this info...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/independentamericancommunities.com/2018/11/09/honest-survey-young-homeowners-hate-hoas/amp/

Yeah you're right. Your anecdotal experiences are much more accurate. [emoji849][emoji849][emoji849]

My using anecdotes has nothing to do with your inability to understand your own source of information.  You have to contend with what the data actually showed, rather than what you incorrectly thought it meant.

[SEWIGuy]

The First Amendment and private property rights are the two best reasons I can think of.

If you put a giant inflatable phallus in your front yard, it would not be long before a nice police officer showed up with a cease-and-desist order

It's not inflatable, but https://bit.ly/3SdyZbI

Link goes to a story on the F*ck HOA subreddit -- using bitly due to the name of the subreddit -- of one family's dispute with their HOA over landscaping boulders.  Religious freedom is invoked....

HOAs are at least a contract that someone willingly enters into. And they wouldn't be as necessary if municipalities just had better zoning laws.

HOAs aren't necessary at all.

Well some people seem to think so since they willingly agree to their terms. The problem isn't that HOAs exist, it is how they are run that cause the nightmare stories. But like everything, its the outliers that cause the headlines.

Not sure how willingly the acceptance of an HOA is.  It's pretty much, "I'll try to put up with it because I want to live in this school district," rather than, "I love HOAs since they look out for my own interest!"

I never said people "love HOAs," although some apparently do. (See below.)  I said that people view them as necessary since they willingly enter the agreement to live in one.

You can't separate HOAs' existence from how they are run.  Their intended purpose invites the nightmarish management.

What?  Of course you can. Plenty of HOAs are operated just fine.

Yes, the extreme cases are indeed outliers, but I have only met one or two people that appreciate their HOA (with the admission that they're not perfect) and lots of people that outright don't.  They may not be living in a complete nightmare, but they are living in an environment of constant discomfort.

Instead of anecdotal experiences, there are actually surveys about them.

https://www.insurancequotes.com/home/honest-about-hoas

Pretty much a majority either "loves them" or has a pretty neutral view about them.

Please read the sources you provide links to, for that source does not support the statement you made...or you do not understand how the survey results were presented.  They show generational divides, but not how large each generation was represented in the sample.  Therefore, your overall statement lumping apples and oranges together is inappropriate and inaccurate.

From the poll results, a slim majority does love them (57%) while 33% hate them and the rest 10% are neutral, so it's pretty far away from just "love" and "neutral" as you described.

I am surprised there aren't more unbiased polls out there on this issue.  It's too bad this one seems to be the only one that's easily Google-able...and only from "Insurance Quotes.com."

Typing the "Source" (survey of 649 homeowners) and hoa reveals this info...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/independentamericancommunities.com/2018/11/09/honest-survey-young-homeowners-hate-hoas/amp/

Yeah you're right. Your anecdotal experiences are much more accurate. [emoji849][emoji849][emoji849]

My using anecdotes has nothing to do with your inability to understand your own source of information.  You have to contend with what the data actually showed, rather than what you incorrectly thought it meant.

Oh you're on that line again?  Finally figured out what "majority"  means?

The survey showed your initial premise was flawed. And now you can't wriggle your way out of it so you're making stuff up.

[Rothman]

The First Amendment and private property rights are the two best reasons I can think of.

If you put a giant inflatable phallus in your front yard, it would not be long before a nice police officer showed up with a cease-and-desist order

It's not inflatable, but https://bit.ly/3SdyZbI

Link goes to a story on the F*ck HOA subreddit -- using bitly due to the name of the subreddit -- of one family's dispute with their HOA over landscaping boulders.  Religious freedom is invoked....

HOAs are at least a contract that someone willingly enters into. And they wouldn't be as necessary if municipalities just had better zoning laws.

HOAs aren't necessary at all.

Well some people seem to think so since they willingly agree to their terms. The problem isn't that HOAs exist, it is how they are run that cause the nightmare stories. But like everything, its the outliers that cause the headlines.

Not sure how willingly the acceptance of an HOA is.  It's pretty much, "I'll try to put up with it because I want to live in this school district," rather than, "I love HOAs since they look out for my own interest!"

I never said people "love HOAs," although some apparently do. (See below.)  I said that people view them as necessary since they willingly enter the agreement to live in one.

You can't separate HOAs' existence from how they are run.  Their intended purpose invites the nightmarish management.

What?  Of course you can. Plenty of HOAs are operated just fine.

Yes, the extreme cases are indeed outliers, but I have only met one or two people that appreciate their HOA (with the admission that they're not perfect) and lots of people that outright don't.  They may not be living in a complete nightmare, but they are living in an environment of constant discomfort.

Instead of anecdotal experiences, there are actually surveys about them.

https://www.insurancequotes.com/home/honest-about-hoas

Pretty much a majority either "loves them" or has a pretty neutral view about them.

Please read the sources you provide links to, for that source does not support the statement you made...or you do not understand how the survey results were presented.  They show generational divides, but not how large each generation was represented in the sample.  Therefore, your overall statement lumping apples and oranges together is inappropriate and inaccurate.

From the poll results, a slim majority does love them (57%) while 33% hate them and the rest 10% are neutral, so it's pretty far away from just "love" and "neutral" as you described.

I am surprised there aren't more unbiased polls out there on this issue.  It's too bad this one seems to be the only one that's easily Google-able...and only from "Insurance Quotes.com."

Typing the "Source" (survey of 649 homeowners) and hoa reveals this info...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/independentamericancommunities.com/2018/11/09/honest-survey-young-homeowners-hate-hoas/amp/

Yeah you're right. Your anecdotal experiences are much more accurate. [emoji849][emoji849][emoji849]

My using anecdotes has nothing to do with your inability to understand your own source of information.  You have to contend with what the data actually showed, rather than what you incorrectly thought it meant.

Oh you're on that line again?  Finally figured out what "majority"  means?

The survey showed your initial premise was flawed. And now you can't wriggle your way out of it so you're making stuff up.

That's not true, especially now with the deeper look at the methodology JeffandNicole provided.

You're just being argumentative at this point and not considering what your survey actually said and who by.  You seem to have quickly Googled it, posted it without really critically thinking about it (hence your "love it or neutral" statement that incorrectly summarized it) and then are ignoring the problems with it that have been pointed out to you.

[SEWIGuy]

The First Amendment and private property rights are the two best reasons I can think of.

If you put a giant inflatable phallus in your front yard, it would not be long before a nice police officer showed up with a cease-and-desist order

It's not inflatable, but https://bit.ly/3SdyZbI

Link goes to a story on the F*ck HOA subreddit -- using bitly due to the name of the subreddit -- of one family's dispute with their HOA over landscaping boulders.  Religious freedom is invoked....

HOAs are at least a contract that someone willingly enters into. And they wouldn't be as necessary if municipalities just had better zoning laws.

HOAs aren't necessary at all.

Well some people seem to think so since they willingly agree to their terms. The problem isn't that HOAs exist, it is how they are run that cause the nightmare stories. But like everything, its the outliers that cause the headlines.

Not sure how willingly the acceptance of an HOA is.  It's pretty much, "I'll try to put up with it because I want to live in this school district," rather than, "I love HOAs since they look out for my own interest!"

I never said people "love HOAs," although some apparently do. (See below.)  I said that people view them as necessary since they willingly enter the agreement to live in one.

You can't separate HOAs' existence from how they are run.  Their intended purpose invites the nightmarish management.

What?  Of course you can. Plenty of HOAs are operated just fine.

Yes, the extreme cases are indeed outliers, but I have only met one or two people that appreciate their HOA (with the admission that they're not perfect) and lots of people that outright don't.  They may not be living in a complete nightmare, but they are living in an environment of constant discomfort.

Instead of anecdotal experiences, there are actually surveys about them.

https://www.insurancequotes.com/home/honest-about-hoas

Pretty much a majority either "loves them" or has a pretty neutral view about them.

Please read the sources you provide links to, for that source does not support the statement you made...or you do not understand how the survey results were presented.  They show generational divides, but not how large each generation was represented in the sample.  Therefore, your overall statement lumping apples and oranges together is inappropriate and inaccurate.

From the poll results, a slim majority does love them (57%) while 33% hate them and the rest 10% are neutral, so it's pretty far away from just "love" and "neutral" as you described.

I am surprised there aren't more unbiased polls out there on this issue.  It's too bad this one seems to be the only one that's easily Google-able...and only from "Insurance Quotes.com."

Typing the "Source" (survey of 649 homeowners) and hoa reveals this info...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/independentamericancommunities.com/2018/11/09/honest-survey-young-homeowners-hate-hoas/amp/

Yeah you're right. Your anecdotal experiences are much more accurate. [emoji849][emoji849][emoji849]

My using anecdotes has nothing to do with your inability to understand your own source of information.  You have to contend with what the data actually showed, rather than what you incorrectly thought it meant.

Oh you're on that line again?  Finally figured out what "majority"  means?

The survey showed your initial premise was flawed. And now you can't wriggle your way out of it so you're making stuff up.

That's not true, especially now with the deeper look at the methodology JeffandNicole provided.

You're just being argumentative at this point and not considering what your survey actually said and who by.  You seem to have quickly Googled it, posted it without really critically thinking about it (hence your "love it or neutral" statement that incorrectly summarized it) and then are ignoring the problems with it that have been pointed out to you.

You mean by the guy who doesn't understand what "majority" means?

Yeah, excuse me for not taking you seriously.

[ethanhopkin14]

The First Amendment and private property rights are the two best reasons I can think of.

If you put a giant inflatable phallus in your front yard, it would not be long before a nice police officer showed up with a cease-and-desist order

It's not inflatable, but https://bit.ly/3SdyZbI

Link goes to a story on the F*ck HOA subreddit -- using bitly due to the name of the subreddit -- of one family's dispute with their HOA over landscaping boulders.  Religious freedom is invoked....

HOAs are at least a contract that someone willingly enters into. And they wouldn't be as necessary if municipalities just had better zoning laws.

HOAs aren't necessary at all.

Well some people seem to think so since they willingly agree to their terms. The problem isn't that HOAs exist, it is how they are run that cause the nightmare stories. But like everything, its the outliers that cause the headlines.

Not sure how willingly the acceptance of an HOA is.  It's pretty much, "I'll try to put up with it because I want to live in this school district," rather than, "I love HOAs since they look out for my own interest!"

I never said people "love HOAs," although some apparently do. (See below.)  I said that people view them as necessary since they willingly enter the agreement to live in one.

You can't separate HOAs' existence from how they are run.  Their intended purpose invites the nightmarish management.

What?  Of course you can. Plenty of HOAs are operated just fine.

Yes, the extreme cases are indeed outliers, but I have only met one or two people that appreciate their HOA (with the admission that they're not perfect) and lots of people that outright don't.  They may not be living in a complete nightmare, but they are living in an environment of constant discomfort.

Instead of anecdotal experiences, there are actually surveys about them.

https://www.insurancequotes.com/home/honest-about-hoas

Pretty much a majority either "loves them" or has a pretty neutral view about them.

Please read the sources you provide links to, for that source does not support the statement you made...or you do not understand how the survey results were presented.  They show generational divides, but not how large each generation was represented in the sample.  Therefore, your overall statement lumping apples and oranges together is inappropriate and inaccurate.

From the poll results, a slim majority does love them (57%) while 33% hate them and the rest 10% are neutral, so it's pretty far away from just "love" and "neutral" as you described.

I am surprised there aren't more unbiased polls out there on this issue.  It's too bad this one seems to be the only one that's easily Google-able...and only from "Insurance Quotes.com."

Typing the "Source" (survey of 649 homeowners) and hoa reveals this info...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/independentamericancommunities.com/2018/11/09/honest-survey-young-homeowners-hate-hoas/amp/

Yeah you're right. Your anecdotal experiences are much more accurate. [emoji849][emoji849][emoji849]

My using anecdotes has nothing to do with your inability to understand your own source of information.  You have to contend with what the data actually showed, rather than what you incorrectly thought it meant.

Oh you're on that line again?  Finally figured out what "majority"  means?

The survey showed your initial premise was flawed. And now you can't wriggle your way out of it so you're making stuff up.

That's not true, especially now with the deeper look at the methodology JeffandNicole provided.

You're just being argumentative at this point and not considering what your survey actually said and who by.  You seem to have quickly Googled it, posted it without really critically thinking about it (hence your "love it or neutral" statement that incorrectly summarized it) and then are ignoring the problems with it that have been pointed out to you.

You mean by the guy who doesn't understand what "majority" means?

Yeah, excuse me for not taking you seriously.

Just throwing this in, I hate, despise and loath my HOA.  That's my opinion, though. 

[Rothman]

The First Amendment and private property rights are the two best reasons I can think of.

If you put a giant inflatable phallus in your front yard, it would not be long before a nice police officer showed up with a cease-and-desist order

It's not inflatable, but https://bit.ly/3SdyZbI

Link goes to a story on the F*ck HOA subreddit -- using bitly due to the name of the subreddit -- of one family's dispute with their HOA over landscaping boulders.  Religious freedom is invoked....

HOAs are at least a contract that someone willingly enters into. And they wouldn't be as necessary if municipalities just had better zoning laws.

HOAs aren't necessary at all.

Well some people seem to think so since they willingly agree to their terms. The problem isn't that HOAs exist, it is how they are run that cause the nightmare stories. But like everything, its the outliers that cause the headlines.

Not sure how willingly the acceptance of an HOA is.  It's pretty much, "I'll try to put up with it because I want to live in this school district," rather than, "I love HOAs since they look out for my own interest!"

I never said people "love HOAs," although some apparently do. (See below.)  I said that people view them as necessary since they willingly enter the agreement to live in one.

You can't separate HOAs' existence from how they are run.  Their intended purpose invites the nightmarish management.

What?  Of course you can. Plenty of HOAs are operated just fine.

Yes, the extreme cases are indeed outliers, but I have only met one or two people that appreciate their HOA (with the admission that they're not perfect) and lots of people that outright don't.  They may not be living in a complete nightmare, but they are living in an environment of constant discomfort.

Instead of anecdotal experiences, there are actually surveys about them.

https://www.insurancequotes.com/home/honest-about-hoas

Pretty much a majority either "loves them" or has a pretty neutral view about them.

Please read the sources you provide links to, for that source does not support the statement you made...or you do not understand how the survey results were presented.  They show generational divides, but not how large each generation was represented in the sample.  Therefore, your overall statement lumping apples and oranges together is inappropriate and inaccurate.

From the poll results, a slim majority does love them (57%) while 33% hate them and the rest 10% are neutral, so it's pretty far away from just "love" and "neutral" as you described.

I am surprised there aren't more unbiased polls out there on this issue.  It's too bad this one seems to be the only one that's easily Google-able...and only from "Insurance Quotes.com."

Typing the "Source" (survey of 649 homeowners) and hoa reveals this info...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/independentamericancommunities.com/2018/11/09/honest-survey-young-homeowners-hate-hoas/amp/

Yeah you're right. Your anecdotal experiences are much more accurate. [emoji849][emoji849][emoji849]

My using anecdotes has nothing to do with your inability to understand your own source of information.  You have to contend with what the data actually showed, rather than what you incorrectly thought it meant.

Oh you're on that line again?  Finally figured out what "majority"  means?

The survey showed your initial premise was flawed. And now you can't wriggle your way out of it so you're making stuff up.

That's not true, especially now with the deeper look at the methodology JeffandNicole provided.

You're just being argumentative at this point and not considering what your survey actually said and who by.  You seem to have quickly Googled it, posted it without really critically thinking about it (hence your "love it or neutral" statement that incorrectly summarized it) and then are ignoring the problems with it that have been pointed out to you.

You mean by the guy who doesn't understand what "majority" means?

Yeah, excuse me for not taking you seriously.

Nah, I don't think I will.

[wanderer2575]

I don't know if they're still there, but a number of the billboards along I-94 near Detroit Metro Airport were for automotive suppliers.  They were obviously directed toward designers and purchasers at the Big Three auto companies, not toward the thousands of ordinary motorists passing by daily.  I wonder if they actually generated any results; I thought it was strange that a company would take billboard space toward a very specific niche audience.

[1995hoo]

On the whole HOA issue, my observation over the years has been that people who have a beef with the concept of HOAs based on their own specific experience will usually be quite willing to discuss their own bad experiences, whereas people who claim to dislike HOAs generally don't tend to offer anything specific other than generally pointing to horror stories from some out-of-control HOAs (typically in Florida and Texas, which makes me wonder whether those states' legislatures and courts just abdicate their responsibilities). In other words, a lot of people dislike someone else's portrayal of an HOA, rather than anything specific.

Obviously, there's always the risk of someone getting out of control if the homeowners sleep on their rights and don't vote out problematic officers–but the same is true of any form of government.

My observation in our own neighborhood is that the people who have problems with the HOA are the people who deliberately set out to pick fights and cause problems. They tend to be antagonistic about various things and they come into discussions with their minds already made up and refuse to listen to any contrary viewpoints. A problem with that is that when this sort of person does have a good point to make, more often than not the person has already alienated everyone else through belligerence such that the valid point gets ignored. We got an architectural "violation" letter two years ago because we had our house partially painted and the job wasn't finished when the HOA inspector came through–we were also replacing windows and we understandably had the wood rot repair done first, then had the windows replaced, then had the painting done (idea being to avoid the need for touch-up painting if the window work caused paint chipping or the like). A simple e-mail to the HOA to tell them exactly that resolved the issue. No reason to go ballistic screaming at them about it. (They were unaware of the work because we didn't have to get prior approval for any of the work–we didn't change the paint color and because window replacement doesn't require approval in our neighborhood unless you change the window style, which we did not.)

[Ned Weasel]

I've done art, and I've done advertising.

Advertising isn't art.

https://www.artsy.net/artist-series/andy-warhol-advertisements

That's art, not advertising. Warhol made some neat looking stuff, but I don't think any of it actually sold anything.

Look, if art and advertising are the same thing, why is it that I'm competent enough at art to get paid a reasonable sum to do it, but I'm so abysmal at advertising that I've lost vast sums of money doing it?

Here are the differences between the two, that I've learned from experience:

Art
- A form of expression. One normally creates art for the sake of creating art.
- You cannot succeed or fail at art, as it is subjective. Even if a piece has severe technical flaws someone may love it all the same.
- Art is generally open to interpretation. The artist may intend meaning X but the audience perceives meaning Y. This is generally considered to be okay or even desirable. In fact, the most badly-received art is when it overtly tries to get you to feel a certain way but can't actually pull it off (e.g. a stand-up comedian who isn't funny, a tearjerker movie that isn't actually sad).

Advertising
- A means to an end. That is, advertising is created for one purpose only–to increase income of the organization creating it.
- You sure as hell can fail at advertising. If your ad spend exceeds the increase in sales, the advertising campaign has objectively failed.
- Advertising is generally shooting for the narrowest interpretation possible. At a base level, if you intend to communicate "2 for $5" and the customer interprets "5 for $2" you have a problem. Even outside of the specific case like that, most of advertising is actually applied psychology. You want to get the customer feeling nostalgic so they buy your old-style toaster, you want them to feel anxious about their family's safety so they buy an alarm system, you want them to feel like they'll make a difference in the world if they buy your shoes made from recycled ocean plastic.

Now, some elements of an advertisement can be art. I don't think it would be correct to say that the logo design work of Paul Rand isn't art. But the sum of what ends up on a billboard? Very distinct from art.

This is a rather late response from me, but I disagree for the simple reason that many things can fall into two or more categories, even when those categories were once considered distinct from each other.

Road and street.  City and countryside.  Indoors and outdoors.  Car and truck.  Advertising and art.

Here are some good examples relevant to the topic: https://theempire.com/best-billboard-ads/ .  They don't have to change your mind, but they do support my philosophy that anything in life can be art.

[Rothman]

My observation in our own neighborhood is that the people who have problems with the HOA are the people who deliberately set out to pick fights and cause problems. They tend to be antagonistic about various things and they come into discussions with their minds already made up and refuse to listen to any contrary viewpoints. A problem with that is that when this sort of person does have a good point to make, more often than not the person has already alienated everyone else through belligerence such that the valid point gets ignored. We got an architectural "violation" letter two years ago because we had our house partially painted and the job wasn't finished when the HOA inspector came through–we were also replacing windows and we understandably had the wood rot repair done first, then had the windows replaced, then had the painting done (idea being to avoid the need for touch-up painting if the window work caused paint chipping or the like). A simple e-mail to the HOA to tell them exactly that resolved the issue. No reason to go ballistic screaming at them about it. (They were unaware of the work because we didn't have to get prior approval for any of the work–we didn't change the paint color and because window replacement doesn't require approval in our neighborhood unless you change the window style, which we did not.)

Ugh.  Just sounds like an extra level of red tape I'd rather not deal with.  Is having a house sit around half-painted for a few days really detrimental enough to a neighborhood to necessitate paying an inspector to notice when it happens?

[1995hoo]

My observation in our own neighborhood is that the people who have problems with the HOA are the people who deliberately set out to pick fights and cause problems. They tend to be antagonistic about various things and they come into discussions with their minds already made up and refuse to listen to any contrary viewpoints. A problem with that is that when this sort of person does have a good point to make, more often than not the person has already alienated everyone else through belligerence such that the valid point gets ignored. We got an architectural "violation" letter two years ago because we had our house partially painted and the job wasn't finished when the HOA inspector came through–we were also replacing windows and we understandably had the wood rot repair done first, then had the windows replaced, then had the painting done (idea being to avoid the need for touch-up painting if the window work caused paint chipping or the like). A simple e-mail to the HOA to tell them exactly that resolved the issue. No reason to go ballistic screaming at them about it. (They were unaware of the work because we didn't have to get prior approval for any of the work–we didn't change the paint color and because window replacement doesn't require approval in our neighborhood unless you change the window style, which we did not.)

Ugh.  Just sounds like an extra level of red tape I'd rather not deal with.  Is having a house sit around half-painted for a few days really detrimental enough to a neighborhood to necessitate paying an inspector to notice when it happens?

Ehhh, it was more than a few days. More like two months because the windows were delayed in shipment (not surprisingly in 2020, right?). Our neighborhood only has a once-a-year inspection program. I think they may sometimes take note of very egregious things that pop up at other times, but I've never gotten anything of that sort.

[triplemultiplex]

Without HOA's how else can we witness two groups of Karens arguing over grass and paint?

[Rothman]

My observation in our own neighborhood is that the people who have problems with the HOA are the people who deliberately set out to pick fights and cause problems. They tend to be antagonistic about various things and they come into discussions with their minds already made up and refuse to listen to any contrary viewpoints. A problem with that is that when this sort of person does have a good point to make, more often than not the person has already alienated everyone else through belligerence such that the valid point gets ignored. We got an architectural "violation" letter two years ago because we had our house partially painted and the job wasn't finished when the HOA inspector came through–we were also replacing windows and we understandably had the wood rot repair done first, then had the windows replaced, then had the painting done (idea being to avoid the need for touch-up painting if the window work caused paint chipping or the like). A simple e-mail to the HOA to tell them exactly that resolved the issue. No reason to go ballistic screaming at them about it. (They were unaware of the work because we didn't have to get prior approval for any of the work–we didn't change the paint color and because window replacement doesn't require approval in our neighborhood unless you change the window style, which we did not.)

Ugh.  Just sounds like an extra level of red tape I'd rather not deal with.  Is having a house sit around half-painted for a few days really detrimental enough to a neighborhood to necessitate paying an inspector to notice when it happens?

Ehhh, it was more than a few days. More like two months because the windows were delayed in shipment (not surprisingly in 2020, right?). Our neighborhood only has a once-a-year inspection program. I think they may sometimes take note of very egregious things that pop up at other times, but I've never gotten anything of that sort.

Two months...the horror...

HOA members: "I'm never going to recover financially from this."

[SEWIGuy]

My observation in our own neighborhood is that the people who have problems with the HOA are the people who deliberately set out to pick fights and cause problems. They tend to be antagonistic about various things and they come into discussions with their minds already made up and refuse to listen to any contrary viewpoints. A problem with that is that when this sort of person does have a good point to make, more often than not the person has already alienated everyone else through belligerence such that the valid point gets ignored. We got an architectural "violation" letter two years ago because we had our house partially painted and the job wasn't finished when the HOA inspector came through–we were also replacing windows and we understandably had the wood rot repair done first, then had the windows replaced, then had the painting done (idea being to avoid the need for touch-up painting if the window work caused paint chipping or the like). A simple e-mail to the HOA to tell them exactly that resolved the issue. No reason to go ballistic screaming at them about it. (They were unaware of the work because we didn't have to get prior approval for any of the work–we didn't change the paint color and because window replacement doesn't require approval in our neighborhood unless you change the window style, which we did not.)

Ugh.  Just sounds like an extra level of red tape I'd rather not deal with.  Is having a house sit around half-painted for a few days really detrimental enough to a neighborhood to necessitate paying an inspector to notice when it happens?

Ehhh, it was more than a few days. More like two months because the windows were delayed in shipment (not surprisingly in 2020, right?). Our neighborhood only has a once-a-year inspection program. I think they may sometimes take note of very egregious things that pop up at other times, but I've never gotten anything of that sort.

Two months...the horror...

HOA members: "I'm never going to recover financially from this."

Again, no one makes you, or anyone else, live in an HOA. It's a voluntary contract.

[jeffandnicole]

Again, no one makes you, or anyone else, live in an HOA. It's a voluntary contract.

Nearly everything anyone does is voluntary.  It's a fairly poor argument for allowing something to occur, and many laws have been passed to prevent or combat against certain "voluntary" behavior.

[Rothman]

Again, no one makes you, or anyone else, live in an HOA. It's a voluntary contract.

Nearly everything anyone does is voluntary.  It's a fairly poor argument for allowing something to occur, and many laws have been passed to prevent or combat against certain "voluntary" behavior.

It's also not a great argument when arguing the benefits of the HOA: "Well, you're pointing out how it can be miserable, but people should appreciate...the misery...which they don't have to choose to be in..."

[1995hoo]

My observation in our own neighborhood is that the people who have problems with the HOA are the people who deliberately set out to pick fights and cause problems. They tend to be antagonistic about various things and they come into discussions with their minds already made up and refuse to listen to any contrary viewpoints. A problem with that is that when this sort of person does have a good point to make, more often than not the person has already alienated everyone else through belligerence such that the valid point gets ignored. We got an architectural "violation" letter two years ago because we had our house partially painted and the job wasn't finished when the HOA inspector came through–we were also replacing windows and we understandably had the wood rot repair done first, then had the windows replaced, then had the painting done (idea being to avoid the need for touch-up painting if the window work caused paint chipping or the like). A simple e-mail to the HOA to tell them exactly that resolved the issue. No reason to go ballistic screaming at them about it. (They were unaware of the work because we didn't have to get prior approval for any of the work–we didn't change the paint color and because window replacement doesn't require approval in our neighborhood unless you change the window style, which we did not.)

Ugh.  Just sounds like an extra level of red tape I'd rather not deal with.  Is having a house sit around half-painted for a few days really detrimental enough to a neighborhood to necessitate paying an inspector to notice when it happens?

Ehhh, it was more than a few days. More like two months because the windows were delayed in shipment (not surprisingly in 2020, right?). Our neighborhood only has a once-a-year inspection program. I think they may sometimes take note of very egregious things that pop up at other times, but I've never gotten anything of that sort.

Two months...the horror...

HOA members: "I'm never going to recover financially from this."

Again, no one makes you, or anyone else, live in an HOA. It's a voluntary contract.

I think he's underscoring my point. He doesn't have any real problem with them, he has a problem with his perception of them.

Put differently, he first said a few days' delay in painting is not a problem (I agree with that, and certainly we all understand why bad weather, for example, can delay exterior painting). He then said two months' delay is fine. So where do you draw the line at what sort of delay is OK and what sort of delay is not, and what principle do you employ to draw that distinction and to say that anything shorter than that is inherently unreasonable? The answer is surely going to be along the lines of "ain't nobody going to tell me I have paint my house regardless of how much of a shithole it appears to be," although Rothman will surely put it in more educated terms than that (I'm envisioning a certain forum member from West Virginia when I type that hypothetical comment).

Setting all that aside, and trying to get the thread back on the topic of billboards, I wonder if the HOA stuff should be split to the off-topic board. It really doesn't have anything to do with billboards other than, perhaps, in the extremely tangential sense of a hypothetical HOA banning certain kinds of signs. (There was an infamous case of an out-of-control HOA here in Fairfax County that went after a homeowner over a claimed "violation" involving a political yard sign. It wound up being litigated up to the Virginia Supreme Court and the homeowner won–the HOA had acted in violation of its own bylaws. The HOA wound up insolvent. I don't think too many people felt much sympathy for them. But it's a classic example of why homeowners who don't vote in HOA elections and the like are foolish. If you're entitled to vote and you don't, you lose standing to have any valid complaint about the people who were elected.)

[J N Winkler]

As with much else in life, HOAs versus non-HOA neighborhoods are a tradeoff.  I'm happy to live in a subdivision of the latter type, especially given the relatively weak protection against abuses in this state, but I know people who are happy there is a body governed by contract that keeps their neighbors from doing things (such as having weeds for a lawn) that they think pull down their own property values.

[SEWIGuy]

Again, no one makes you, or anyone else, live in an HOA. It's a voluntary contract.

Nearly everything anyone does is voluntary.  It's a fairly poor argument for allowing something to occur, and many laws have been passed to prevent or combat against certain "voluntary" behavior.

I will put it another way - it is a contract that people willingly enter into.

It's also not a great argument when arguing the benefits of the HOA: "Well, you're pointing out how it can be miserable, but people should appreciate...the misery...which they don't have to choose to be in..."

1995hoo doesn't seem miserable in the least. He is rightly pointing out WHY people WILLINGLY choose to live in HOAs.

You have deemed them useless - therefore you don't have to live in one.  See how simple that is?

[US 89]

HOAs are also necessary if you live in a condo or townhome where you're sharing a building/lawn/driveway/whatever with someone else.

[Rothman]

HOAs are also necessary if you live in a condo or townhome where you're sharing a building/lawn/driveway/whatever with someone else.

Why?

[Scott5114]

I don't think that the typical "if you don't vote, you don't have any say to complain" is really a valid defense of HOAs run amok. That makes sense for federal and state officeholders, and even larger municipalities, because one can stay reasonably informed by consuming media coverage that summarizes the goings-on at those levels of government.  By buying into an HOA, you are adding yet another layer of politics where one has to understand the stakeholders, the candidates, their position on various issues that may be important to the voter, and having to do all of that without the benefit of media to provide at least a starting point to becoming an informed voter. The only real way to become informed is to attend meetings in person, which may be impossible in practice if they take place at a time when one has other commitments such as work, children's extracurriculars, etc. Even that may not be enough to get the full story if the HOA board has a habit of making decisions in back-channel meetings and the public meeting is merely a pro-forma rubber stamp; in such a case one basically has to befriend the members of the board to get the scoop on what's really going on. Getting involved in all of that is an undue burden that I personally would want to avoid, and I actually like politics.

Also, I think nobody has really addressed J.N. Winkler's point upthread that it is difficult to buy housing built after a certain date (and thus built to certain modern design standards which may be desirable) without being subject to HOA jurisdiction. This seems much like the arguments software companies use to defend abhorrent EULAs ("if you don't like that we harvest all of your data and sell it to anyone who enters our line of sight, just don't use our software–ask no questions about why a keyboard driver is collecting personal information to begin with"). It seems wrong to me that in some cities it may be impossible to buy housing that meets certain buyer requirements, such as compliance with modern energy efficiency standards, without also buying into an HOA as part of the deal.

Personally, I'd rather the entire concept of the HOA be abolished, and those functions that are actually necessary be taken on by organs of the actual municipal government, which are subject to somewhat greater scrutiny and are required to comply with things like open-records laws.

[thenetwork]

I can't say I've lived in an HOA or Covenant Community, but at a company I once worked with that sold replacement windows I was trying to sell some windows for a gentleman who lived in an HOA.

Apparently, some of his original windows in the front of the house were failing or broken.  HOA told him to get them fixed.  He wanted our nationally-known brand to replace the old windows, but the HOA did not approve, requiring him to replace brand for brand...except the old brand didn't exist anymore.

After going around and around with the HOA trying to explain the situation that the old company was DOA, we pretty much told them to piss off due to their stupidity and lack of logic.

That was the only time we had trouble with an HOA.

[webny99]

As with much else in life, HOAs versus non-HOA neighborhoods are a tradeoff.  I'm happy to live in a subdivision of the latter type, especially given the relatively weak protection against abuses in this state, but I know people who are happy there is a body governed by contract that keeps their neighbors from doing things (such as having weeds for a lawn) that they think pull down their own property values.

Speaking of weeds... lawn fertilization is kind of an "unspoken rule" in my (non-HOA) neighborhood. Almost everyone does it, or at least presumably does it, but there's one homeowner nearby who doesn't. Their yard inevitably fills up with dandelions every spring, and they inevitably blow into our yard when they go to seed. That, of course, makes it nearly impossible to keep our yard dandelion-free. It's mildly annoying, but I can't recall HOA's having ever come up in that context and we haven't done anything other than make a few suggestions mostly in jest ("let's put up a fence", "let's offer to fertilize for them", etc.)

[Rothman]

I've wondered why dandelions are so hated.