Can someone explain why there are so many stories of bad HOAs in America? Don’t everyone in the HOA get to vote on who will be on the board and what rules there should be? Why do many of them seem to have strange and petty rules? What makes them able to issue fines for so small infractions? Where does the fine money go? Who sets up the HOA in the first place and what is the motivation to do so?
We got plenty of similar associations where I live (both for apartments and houses, though not so often for fully detached homes) and they usually work great. Basically you pay a monthly fee to your HOA that the board use to keep the plumbing and outside areas maintained, pay for tv/internet for everyone at a much reduced cost or maintain other common areas like laundry rooms, guest apartment, parking garage, workshop etc. There are of course some restrictions too you need to follow, but those are usually minor and common sense anyways (like you shouldn’t play very loud music too late in an apartment in the middle of the week) and that you don’t get to do whatever you want to the outside of your place.
(Another common rule is that you need HOA approval to sublet your apartment. This can be occasionally annoying to deal with, but is good because it prevents people from buying up apartments just to rent them out. And most of the time the HOA will approve you if you’re just moving away for a year or similar.)
Thanks! I will give it a watch.
It does seem to suck. I hope it can get better.
Edit: Right, so in summary there is no regulation at all on American HOAs and they are also easily taken over by private companies. Makes sense they are bad. Though it’s still astonishing that an organisation can be so unregulated that it can enforce more fines than the local government, without any oversight.