The concept of an HOA is like if someone took a suburb and made it far far worse. Every homeowner’s association is run by petty rules which are enforced by even pettier hall monitors who have nothing to do but go around and measure people’s grass. That said, you don’t have to live in one. That may be why this post on r/AmItheA–hole by u/ohohbo is so contentious. On the one hand, they’re getting around the ridiculous rules of their HOA. On the other hand, why are they living there?
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“AITA for owning 3 dogs, against my HOA’s 2 dog rule?” they asked. Their story is pretty short and sweet, so here it is in full:
My parents moved to a retirement neighborhood, so I moved into their neighborhood after my job required me to move to their state.
We have 3 dogs however, 2 of them look almost the same so we would never walk all 3 at once. It worked for 2 years. Well my busybody neighbor has been telling everyone we have 3 dogs and bitching about it on nextdoor.
The HOA asked to investigate. One of my dogs was at the vet so I said go ahead, they walked through the house and the neighbor was outside. She later walked up to me all ugh saying “did the HOA find your dog?”
I said no they didn’t, mind your own business bitch. She then went on to nextdoor to complain again, but the rest of the neighborhood is calling her crazy
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Okay, interesting. So, I’ll just address the biggest issue, which is that this person is absolutely lying and making some older women seem “crazy” to everyone in her neighborhood. Maybe she sucks, but that’s still a pretty big offense, especially when you are technically in the wrong. The HOA is where the OP lives and they are breaking the rules.
But as someone who hates the rules, you gotta appreciate the workaround here. The story was shared on Twitter, and there were a lot of people who tore into the OP for doing what is technically and perhaps morally wrong:
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Others find the whole thing hilarious:
And a whole bunch of people took the opportunity to point out the racist history of HOAs in the U.S.:
I would feel differently if we learned that there was some sort of horrible issue here, like they were, idk, eating the neighbors’ cats or something. But we haven’t been given that info and I’ve dealt with HOAs enough to know that they’ll harass people even without justification.
— Aaron Mischler
(@rhysrenouille) August 24, 2021
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Fun fact abt HOAs:
They were started in L.A. County around the time the Supreme Court ruled that housing covenants preventing Black families from gaining access to better single-family homes were illegal.
They literally exist to prevent the upward mobility of Black folx.
pic.twitter.com/IivFscWDBS
— Mx. Faylita Hicks (@FaylitaHicks) August 24, 2021
There were also a few stories from people’s HOAs about how much they sucked:
HOA here is threatening to charge us, the renters, for not cleaning off some mildew on the chimney, which was here when we moved in. $1K for something that could be done in less than a half hour by anybody who has a tall enough ladder… JUST GIVE US A FUCKING LADDER! *coughahem*
— Gufty Bovilex is a
malcontent dorkface baker (@GuftyB) August 23, 2021
they’re awful. we rented in one once and they got mad that we had non-seasonal decorations up outside
(we had giant spiders up year round for 2 years before someone got mad about it. we complied by dressing the spiders up for each “seasonal” holiday)
— Fen (they/them) @FFXIV Catboy Adventures! (@manicgremlin) August 23, 2021
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Once again, you don’t have to live in an HOA. It would be great if they stopped existing period, but until that day, rent and buy in different neighborhoods. Have as many dogs as you want. Live and be happy and leave your elderly neighbors alone.
*First Published: August 25, 2021, 5:31 am
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