A neighborly feud is a tale as old as time.
A Reddit user took to the "r/f***HOA" subreddit to talk about their community's run-in with an HOA that tried to absorb their neighborhood.
The original poster, who moved in in 2019, explained that their neighborhood was built in the 1990s in a small development that never had an HOA. The 30 properties have backyards that lead to forest land and trails.
A new, much larger neighborhood was built about a decade later. In 2023, the original community members received welcome packets from the HOA. The major issue was that none of them had ever signed up to join, and they had no interest in doing so.
HOAs, or homeowners associations, often provide benefits like amenities, appearance monitoring, and dispute mediation to those who belong to the association. On the other hand, they can come with hefty fees, strict rules, and limitations to your autonomy as a homeowner.
The original neighborhood fought back. According to the OP, "[Unluckily] for them my nextdoor neighbor is one of the largest real estate attorneys in the state."
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They had a fence put up that restricted access to the forest and trails, allowing only the original community to use them. The original community did not have to join the HOA, and the new community now has to go around to access the trails, and the property prices have dropped.
Beyond questions of autonomy in joining an HOA, HOAs across the country have prevented or attempted to prevent homeowners from making cost-saving and environmentally friendly upgrades to their homes.
In North Carolina, homeowners entered into a four-year lawsuit to avoid a $50,000 fine from their HOA for installing solar panels. Another homeowner in Illinois was denied the right to install solar panels due to aesthetic concerns. In South Carolina, The Sun reported how an HOA threatened to remove a homeowner's rain garden designed to prevent flooding, even though the city had given them a grant to build it.
The Reddit post received a fair amount of engagement, garnering 11,000 upvotes and over 360 comments. Commenters were thrilled to see the HOA lose the battle. One wrote, "More and more of this needs to happen. Re-teach people that there are consequences for their actions."
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It is possible to work with an HOA to change the rules, and it may require starting a community-wide petition to request certain concessions. Meanwhile, joining the local organization's board provides a platform to encourage meaningful, planet-friendly changes.
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