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HOA Orders TARDIS Removed From In Front of Parrish Home
An anonymous reader writes A Florida couple learned that they are much bigger fans of Doctor Who than their homeowner association, after receiving a notice to remove the TARDIS from their driveway. Leann Moder and her husband David were given 15 days to get rid of the big blue box. From the article: "It was built by Moder's father as a wedding set piece, and she and her husband, David, were married in front of it. 'My husband mentioned, "Do you want to do a Doctor Who themed wedding?"' Moder said. 'That could be fun.' Since then, their TARDIS has been used at sci-fi conventions and parties, and was even the focus of a Halloween haunt the Moders set up on their driveway in October." The HOA had no comment on their stance on sonic screwdrivers, or the Eye of Harmony.
The homeowners association demands that unless every single house has a TARDIS in their front yard, yours must go.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Leaving a TV prop replica sitting in your driveway is douchey. Store it in the garage, or your storage shed, or the back yard, or a storage facility. Nobody in your neighborhood likes Doctor Who so much that they want to come home to your driveway TARDIS every day. Stop being a douche.
Die by the sword. If you dislike the rules, don't go live in an HOA. Zero sympathy.
Looking at the photos it kinda looks like it is just left on the driveway. But that said I don't like the idea of being told that I have to remove it.
Would they have more luck if they placed it on a plinth and maybe had it decorated in with a cyberman?
Of course, a true Whovian will install some nice statues of weeping angels in the front yard!
bada boom
HOA rules: You can't have $(object X) sitting in your driveway.
$(object X) being a TARDIS neither makes me outraged, nor makes this news for nerds.
As a corporation, an H.O.A. is a defective product.
The purpose of a corporation is to protect an investor's personal assets from the debts and liabilities of the corporation.
For example, if you owned 1,000 shares of Enron, the only thing you had at risk were those shares. The creditors of Enron could not go after your house, your car, your bank account, etc.
But an H.O.A. corporation works exactly the opposite. The assets of an H.O.A. corporation are the obligations of the home owners to pay the uninsured debts and liablities of the H.O.A. corporation, secured by lien and foreclosure rights against an owner's property. If you own property under the jurisdiction of an H.O.A. corporation, everything you own is forever collateral to whatever debts and liabilities the H.O.A. corporation creates, even if your mortgage is paid and you own the house free-and-clear. Thus, any creditors of an H.O.A. corporation can go after your house, your car, your bank account, etc., to collect what your H.O.A. corporation owes.
See Why There’s No Protection for Members When Community Associations “Go Broke” (January 27 2010), and Bankruptcy Won't Work (July 17 2011).
FYI: The industry refers to H.O.A. corporations as "community associations", which is why the the 501(c)(6) trade and lobbying organization for the industry’s attorneys, property managers, and other vendors is called the Community Associations Institute ( C.A.I. ).
HOA to homeowners: ELIMINATE!
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
I'll take "Reasons why I'll never live in a house governed by an HOA", for $1000, Alex?
My understanding is that (under "normal" real estate conditions which we haven't seen for a while now), the break-even point between renting and buying is supposed to be after about 5 years. At that point, you should have made enough money back in tax deductions (it's nearly impossible to beat the standard deduction without a couple $10k in mortgage interest deductions) and appreciation to cover the closing costs, property taxes, etc. vs. renting a place for a similar monthly payment for 5 years.
After that point, the risk should start paying off, especially in the twilight years 25 years later when most of your mortgage payment is going to principal building your equity.
If I can pay for a house I would summarily refuse to be a member of a homeowners association. At the time of buying, I'd check and make sure there's no Home owner's association or if there was make sure the contract said I was somehow exempt or just not a member of the association and not subjects to its bylaws. Possibly having police or attorney presence.
Home ownership baffles me. Besides the fact that you own nothing, it's far more expensive than renting and much riskier.
But my name is on the title and if I sold it I'd have quite a large wad of cash (around $100k) left over after the loan balance was paid.
Not bad for only putting $25K down and paying what you would for the same floor space, maybe less. In another 10 years, all I will be paying is taxes and insurance while you still will be paying rent.
Oh, and one more thing... Remember that your rent really is paying somebody's mortgage anyway. The standing rule of thumb is that rent is 1% of a home's value (Single family residence, Apartments are cheaper to build and get MORE/square foot), so you are actually paying MORE for that place you call home and still own nothing at the end of the lease. Don't fool yourself.
You are right about the risk factor, but unless you live in a hugely overpriced market where prices have gone nuts recently or you go all stupid and pay way too much to start, Real Estate is not a bad risk, at least owing a primary residence isn't. Now if you live in one of those places where people get into bidding wars on even the smallest house and there isn't a long term economic stability story to go with it, by all means rent. But in most places I know of, the bubble has already burst and the market correction is likely to be over by now.
So I'd not be patting myself on the back for renting.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
EPCOT has a British phone booth but no Police Box. They could really use it. Looks like Parrish is ~111 miles from Orlando.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
I once had a next door neighor that had 4 cars on blocks in his driveway.
A) This guy is cooler than any neighbor I've ever had in an HOA
B) This guy's car collection did not devalue my home one bit or make it harder for me to sell it (location baby).
HOAs are just an affront to your personal liberties and a money pit. Their enforced conformity preserves nothing and gives you nothing (except some light fascism).
They don't even enforce the useful (safety) rules.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Home ownership baffles me. Besides the fact that you own nothing, it's far more expensive than renting and much riskier.
You own your house more than you own your TV. And it's more expensive and riskier, despite appreciating better than inflation for every time period greater than the average home ownership since records began. My house bought 3 years ago appreciated more in that time than the average person makes in 10 years. The "risk" is in *not* buying.
Learn to love Alaska
> I would be pissed if some douche had this in his front yard, just like I'd be pissed if you had trash in your yard
> or broken down cars in front of your house. My home is an investment and I don't want you dragging that investment down,
> because you're a piece of shit. If you want that, put it in your back yard.
MY investment carries no obligation in regards to your investment and/or property! You got, what you paid for, extending exactly to the borders of your property. ;-)
With other words, shove your self-righteous garbage not into your backyard, but straight up your ass!
Yet, you choose to sound like an uptight douchecanoe by railing on about the 'investment' that your house is, like its some kind of piggy bank. If you want that, then go live in an HOA because that is what you apparently really want. Otherwise you wouldn't expect your neighbors to follow some arbitrary idea of what the 'rules' are. Investing in a house is about as dumb as investing in a car or a Rolex. It's already worth less than you think it should be before you are a week in.
If it's not broken, let's fix it till it is.
The country has become a mockery of a lot of things, but as for invading NK - were there any incentive to do so - there are at least two countries off the top of my head who would also be sending soldiers: South Korea and Japan.
Now if some unforeseen event happens so that attacking NK would be warranted, you could probably add a couple more Asian countries to the list, plus Australia and the majority of the EU, to the coalition. Hmm, where have I heard that phrase before, "coalition forces"...
The HOA in my neighborhood hasn't socialized shit. They haven't even built the park that was supposed to be built 10 years ago. The closest thing we have to a park is the drainage ditch behind the neighborhood, which if you bicycle down, you can access both the garbage dump and a state prison. They definitely made sure to clear out all of the trees from the supposed park site to build more houses on, though.
Home ownership in a HOA area is kind of like owning the Doctor's TARDIS, you are stuck with the outside looking one way but you can do just about anything you want on the inside.
My Hello World is 512 bytes. But it's also a valid Fat12 boot sector, Fat12 file reader, and Pmode routine.
So this is what it's like to live in the Land of the Free. Fortunately we don't have that kind of problem here in the Third World.
Don't fornicate. Seriously, just don't do it.
There was one at the top of my street when I was a kid.
Ditto for cities.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
China would want in too - they would probably claim their forces are going in on humanitarian missions, but everyone would know their real function is to ensure that whoever gets to run the land after is some pro-China puppet, and not a pro-Western puppet.
Put some tiny wheels under it and call it a hauler.
Disclosure: I am a realtor, mostly on the sell side 96% of the time, not representing the buyer. 4% representing the buyer. So I will speak from the selling side. And a big Doctor Who fan from the 80's
HOA's, condo's, and Co-op's are a form of corporations (non-profit) that run the land you are on and issue a set of rules you need to abide by.
When you buy into any of the above, you are required to abide by those rules. When I do a transaction I am required to present to you the rules of the association, sometimes in excess of 200 pages. And you have 3 days to execute a confirmation that you read these rules, otherwise I will put it back on the market. It's a take or leave situation, I think most people don't read the rules.
Most of the rules are common sense, for example, allocation of parking, pet policy's, exterior paint colors, lawn height (which in a condo is the association responsibility not the condo owner usually), cannot hang wet towels on the balcony rail to dry and a ton more. Some of the more interesting rules are
A) How bad of criminal are you... ( Violent crime of murder not permitted, but a Bernie Maddof welcome)
B) You cannot buy the property on credit, must be a cash transaction close
C) Limit on how many occupants in the unit
A common rule I tell people when they are presented with my property is, you are buying conformity, a lifestyle and sometimes peace of mind.
One of the huge problems in HOA's is the Flagpole issue, ex-military wants one on the front lawn of their house, most, if not all HOA's did not permit this, but every year we see it as a lawsuit http://blog.chron.com/advocate... ( that's a Texas one)
It got so carried away here in Florida that the state had to chime in http://www.hoaleader.com/publi... ( summary is, you can within reason)
When the 9 /11 happened, people hung American flags on the railing, well after 3 months some condo association and HOA's were tired of this, asked the residences to remove them, Boy did that start a huge problem, it's considered un-American, while the truth is, following rules is a rather American thing, otherwise why would we need so many lawyers to interpret these rules.
So I don't understand what the big fuss is all about, the guy has a big blue box ( which I would love to own), it's rather different than what is normally seen, people complained, put it in the yard, end of problem. Or if the guy was smart, he should have asked his association about how to hold a wedding at his home, and they would have let him slide properly with all the form executed to do it. ( You need parking permits for gated communities when you hold huge parties, advise the association and they will set up a little shuttle cart for the bride and groom if needed, provide parking assistance ( by sending a note to the neighbors, see whom wants to offer up some driveway space, provides the cleaning service for all the exterior the next morning... )
if you see me, smile and say hello.
If I pay to be in an HOA, I wouldn't want to see that type of junk in front of a house in my neighborhood.
They might love it for all the world, but there's no guarantee that their neighbors would want to be seeing it, or even know what it is.
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
Well in the US most neighborhoods don't have a HOA anyways. They are a select few, and they setup mostly to keep the values of their homes, and insure a comfortable living environment. . . .
I disagree with the assertion (made by several posters, not just the above post) that HOAs are somehow unusual. It varies by locale, but in general any subdivision* created in the last 30 years has a HOA. The HOA is how the builder ensures that he can sell all the lots over the 10 year period he is building there, because the early owners aren't allowed to do anything that the builder thinks would detract from sales. Unfortunately, the HOA continues to exist after the builder is done and gone.
*Note that by "subdivision" I am referring to the case where a builder buys somebody's farm, and sells lots with homes built by that builder. Not the case where the farm owner subdivides his land and sells lots to private parties who then find their own builder to construct the home.
Yes, I live in a subdivision with an HOA. Although I've not had any problems with the HOA, I dislike it on principal. In particular the fact that every rule ends with "or other rules as may be given by the HOA board." As a result the current idiots on the board can essentially just make up any new rules that they want, without a general vote. And this covers everything from parking to what flowers you plant on your property. They could decide one day that they don't like roses, and demand that all roses be dug-up immediately.
Yes, I read the covenant when I purchased, but since the area which I live was all built up within the last 20 years, almost all property is HOA controlled in one way or another (except for buying a farm). It was a choice of buying a house with an HOA, buying one of the historic farm houses without an HOA -- typically with mold problems, buying farm land and privately building a house, or living in a rental. I didn't realize how much the existence of the HOA would irk me, or I probably would have gone with one of the moldy historic farm houses.
I understand the "you might affect my property value" arguments, but before I had to move for work, I lived for 15 years in a subdivision with no HOA (different state, older development). While I didn't always personally agree with my neighbors choices, none of them were atrocious. One neighbor put up a fence, but he asked me first. I didn't really want a fence there, but gave him my blessing anyway, since it was not an unreasonable request. Contrast to here where my neighbor put up a fence, after asking the HOA, but I had no input even though I am the one affected by it. I still would have said "go ahead," but I would have liked to have been consulted. Its just more "neighborly" somehow.
McFly777
- - -
"What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?" -Marilyn Pittman
I consider them unAmerican, at least. And btw, when I was looking for my current house, I told my agent that if there was an HOA, I wouldn't even look at it.
Had a friend whose carriage lamp on the front of her house, which was really *cheap* aluminum, died, she had it replaced with a better one... and the HOA demanded she replace that with another cheap one. And then there was the time that someone from the HOA got her given a ticket for dogshit in her back yard (the one with the 5'+ high fence around it, and it was a bit after a snowstorm, and it was all melting. (The judge tore up the complaint).
No, they all are run by tin-plated petty dictators, with delusions of godhood. Unfuck 'em (no fucks for any of 'em).
mark
...and there's junk cars and chicken coops. So you choose where you live, and live by the rules.