[hatzie]

My advice to anyone is to avoid buying property in an HOA altogether. IMHO They're a petty dictatorship put in place by developers that want to direct the use of and continue to collect rent from property they no longer own.

If properties in an HOA become more difficult to sell it'll kill them off.

I have two pieces of property spanning a road outside of town. No bloody zoning and no bloody HOA.

I can maintain my machinery in the driveway, barn, or garage or on the bloody lawn if I feel like it. I restrict this activity to the barn and garage for the most part but I don't have to. If the tractor, mower, baler, etc dies in the meadow I can fix it and continue mowing or baling without some officious jackwagon being able to tell me I have to get it flat-bedded to Haverhill for their brother in law to fix at $200/hr.

If I feel like replacing the roofs or the garage doors or barn doors or replace the siding or windows or re-surface the driveway, or plant trees, or plant firethorn and thornapple along the rear and sides of my property I don't have to ask some bloody wanker from an HOA, city, town, county, or state for permission and pay them a bribe to allow it.

I could let the bloody barn or garage or house fall down or all three if I wanted to. I could denude the property to the dirt by spraying herbicide on all of the grass, cut every tree and shrub to the ground right up to the property lines and push the buildings into a hole for a big ole weenie roast if I felt like it.
I wouldn't do that because it would cost me a bunch of property value and where would I put my stuff... but no bloody nanny can tell me I can't.

It's called freedom. You folks that live under petty dictators should try it out. It might grow on you.