denverdoc said:
I bought the property in a time of draught, things did not really improve water wise, but bans on new landscaping were lifted. What I found disturbing is the plan I submitted before the HOA to Xeroscape, tastefully of course with drought tolerant native grass etc kept getting nixed. Eventually the governor at the time, Bill Owens, interceded and said HOA's couldn't tell you what to grow. By then I had been arrested twice, but no apology was forthcoming!
How do you get arrested for HOA violations? Aren't those civil matters, not criminal? I thought all the enforcement of those was financial...fines, liens on the house, etc. I only put up with HOA rules because I'm renting, and I figure no matter where you rent, you have to abide by someone else's rules, and if they seem to get too oppressive, it's easy to find another place to rent. I would never buy a house in one of those anal-retentive communities. Even if 99% of the neighbors are reasonable and really just wanted a nice house in a quiet neighborhood, all it takes is that 1% nutcase who thinks everyone should mow their lawns to his/her standards, should never have a car parked in the driveway, must have white instead of natural wood picket fences, etc., to make the whole community miserable.
When I look at neighborhoods, if they look too "perfect," I won't buy there. I know it's the opposite of what most people look for, but I'd rather have neighbors with slightly overgrown lawns than have to worry that if I go away for a week and a half in the summer, I'm going to return to fines for my grass being 1" too tall. Of course if someone has let the entire lawn grow 2' tall, that is another issue, but if it's just "shaggy" or if it's just a patch of weeds in the back yard in an area that's hard to mow, who cares? I'm actually disappointed that the HOA around here started hiring someone to mow all the property around the houses (it's part of the development, but nobody owns it). When I moved in, what I loved about the view was all the wildflowers growing on the mountainsides surrounding the houses, and now they're mowing them down and making it all boring lawns.
I grew up in a heavily wooded neighborhood...we didn't need fences for privacy, because there were thick enough trees in the backyards to make it difficult to see the houses behind you. As such, nobody had much of a lawn, because it was too shady. The only people who had nice lawns were the ones who cut down all those nice shade trees, and stood out like a sore thumb. But, everyone also knew all the neighbors, because we didn't need fences, so it was rare for someone to have one (only if they had an in-ground pool that required fencing around it and usually they only put around enough fences to secure the pool area and not the entire back yard), and there was leaf raking in the fall that brought everyone out to see each other in the yards, snow shoveling in the winter, and everyone could just be outside in spring and summer (with all those shade trees, you didn't have to hide inside in air-conditioning...few of us even ran air-conditioners except during the high humidity days of August), so people were outside and saw each other all the time. People with those perfectly "manicured" lawns can't even enjoy them...there's no shade and the sun beats down and their only time outside is to mow the lawn and then hurry back inside for a shower to clean off and cool off. And, when they are outside, they have those 6 ft privacy fences, so you can't see the neighbors. So, yeah, those are neighborhoods I would avoid.
