ill never understand the concept of HOAs, or - quite frankly - people who have the money to buy a nice enough home AND pay all of those fees only to not actually have control over your home and subject yourself to that kind of busybody nonsense. a neutral HOA that just exists to maintain property value is fine, and a non-issue... unfortunately, the problem is, it seems as if very, very few of them exist in that capacity, else we wouldnt have SO MANY STORIES of HOAs and the people inhabiting them being the absolute worst. its kind of insane.
having said that, obviously if youre buying a house and its a part of an HOA, and you dont like HOAs, but you buy the house anyway and end up in an HOA, well then... thats on you.
and also, like, for that kind of money you can buy a small plot of land, have a house built to your specifications, and no shitty neighbors (or neighbors of any kind). its obvious im not the person whom that kind of living is advertised for, which is fine (not a family man, no interest in suburb community, not building a family-appropriate life, not trying to build equity to sell a place down the road), but on a fundamental level that kind of operation and living environment really bothers me. especially when it comes to the concept of the "lawn", which is one of the single most wasteful uses of earth that modern man has conceived of. like, plant a fucking garden and grow a small amount of crops you GOONS. my mother had a tiny ass garden in her tiny ass backyard that grew enough for her to eat pretty consistently without having to hit up the grocery store nearly as much as she might have otherwise.
