Federal Bureaucrats Got Nothin' on H.O.A. Tyrants

These folks are the real gatekeepers...

I have owned a few homes over the years, luckily, only one subject to the despotism of this ruling class. However, it’s easy to find horror stories because their population is insidious—aided by a disproportionate amount of power, which they often wield while masking their glee. I will share a few of these nightmares but end on a positive note. There is truly a way to co-exist.

Let’s get this out upfront; I believe we need homeowners associations. Other than the rules within a family structure, your neighborhood becomes the first level of public administration. Most of the people in a condominium project or home subdivision need to agree on some basic rules of civility. And they usually do.

- Don’t be crazy noisy at night. Any parent, grandparent, or babysitter knows how difficult it is to even get a kid to their bedroom, let alone to sleep. Do them a solid and keep the noise down.

- Clean up after yourself. Perceptive parents teach this trait very early as the window of behavioral change tends to close the more they clean up messes to avoid a confrontation, or worse yet, crying. Bag your trash the way the overlord wants you to. Sometimes it seems a wee bit onerous, but this is the lowest level of discipline meted out. Pick a worthy mountain to die on—and it’s not Mount Trashmore.

- Vehicles parked without wheels or missing fenders, and non-operable washing machines on the front porch aren’t going to cut it in neighborhoods where folks struggled to afford the home to begin with. They sure as hell don’t want the value of their investment to plunge because you are waiting for a scratcher ticket to bear fruit.

If the vast majority of residents agree on a half dozen pretty sensible rules, why do so many share their H.O.A. misadventures over the fence, at cocktail parties, and around campfires? The devil is in the details. And details are the fuel for autocratic rule.

My college friends and I hiked the Grand Canyon for spring break decades ago now. On the ride back to Ann Arbor we approached a tollbooth with long lines, due to the fact it would be 20 years until Quick Pay, Fast Trac, or license plate readers would be invented. For my friend in the Econoline van, who had recently finished a six-pack of Coor’s beer, it was a great opportunity to head down the hill from the toll gates and pee behind the building. Even today that does not sound so weird to me. Europeans do it when traveling in the United States. A beer-drunk male college student has the same bladder challenges as a pregnant woman.

Our van crept slowly to the booth, and we were now in the cattle chute holding out our cash. The toll operator had spied our friend sneaking down to the back of the building. He had to have used binoculars! Our vehicle was a hundred yards out when he disembarked the van. The tollman would not accept our money until his harangue was complete and we swore allegiance to his rules. I did a quick “face audit” of the van’s passengers and found no level of buy-in. Young Baby Boomers, although they were anti-war and routinely violated local drug laws, were fairly respectful of authority figures. Yet, believing a youth should pee their pants in the company of friends instead of using the back of the building, was a bridge too far.

The agent saw our friend come from behind the building pulling up his zipper, left his post, and sprinted down the hill. It was pretty easy to raise the gate. A good 30 or 40 cars behind us drove straight through as the hot pursuit for the serial peer ensued. We opened the side door while driving to a point that our onboard engineer had calculated our friend would reach before the gatekeeper. Even drunk, most 20-year-olds will outrun a middle-aged person with a belly. He did. He ran along the side of the van until we snatched him and closed the door. The conversation that followed was not how big a dick the toll man had been. Rather, we were dumbfounded by how earnestly he was protecting the tiny bit of authority vested in him.

Although this anecdote is not about H.O.A. functionaries, it reflects a trait found in all levels of a bureaucracy. Never give an inch of your power away. If someone parks a car 2 inches off the driveway, make damn sure they get an email warning before they go to bed. And God help the poor resident who mistakenly mixes his trash and recyclables! Should be a felony—or public caning at least. Using the advice your daughter gave you, “If you don’t know, throw,” won’t fly with this crowd.

I have a friend in Fort Lauderdale, who after purchasing a condo, ran for a spot on the H.O.A. He won and a short time later became the president, although most residents just call him “The Mayor.” He took a different path with his leadership. Although he had no long-standing grievances with previous H.O.A. czars, he decided to walk in the residents’ sandals before devising a method of governance where all parties felt listened to. This fostered trust which led to “buy-in,” the single strongest asset a community can achieve. He agreed with them when a rule seemed overbearing and tread lightly in its enforcement. It brought him a favorable response on a more important rule that required their adherence. Able to focus his attention on the mountain worth dying on, his foxhole is brimming with residents who have his back.