Sell your house to zillow ?

That was our situation when we moved in. Road was not built to state standards and it was up to us to maintain. We were very fortunate when a law was passed that state would take over the road if every single property owner agreed to it. That would have been impossible except the road was still under control of the developer. By a narrow vote most of us agreed to turn the road over to the state and the developer approved so we got it done. Now all the remnants of our HOA takes care of snow removal which is only partially reimbursed by the state. Might cost me $100/year. Friends development that could not turn road over has dues of $475/year. Their road is a mess and about all they can pay for is pot hole repair and maybe repaving a couple of hundred yards.

When we bought the house there were also deed restrictions on the property beyond county restrictions that keeps our development tidy.

That is a different problem. Sometimes you have to squint to determine the gender of people in the checkout at the store. They may be confused about it themselves.

You have to give them the Crocodile Dundee test, grab them between the legs.

You go first.

My goat barn is covered by and HOA as is much of new housing in Florida. There are, however plenty that are not. Like everywhere else, some are nice, others, not so much.

There are some overly restrictive but most just keep the riff-raff under control. The key is to elect sensible people to the board.

Oh, one of those places... It's getting more difficult these days.

About the only way to find a non-HOA is to build an "on your lot" house in an old neighborhood or buy an old house. The lots in our neighborhood sell at a premium because we don't have an HOA. There also seems to be a trend of buying an existing "preFIRM" house, tearing it down and building a new one. I suspect that is what will happen to this one after I die.

My property is two lousy acres, not the Ponderosa.

Cindy Hamilton

Most people live on less than 1/4th to 1/8th of that and they might not actually control anything outside the envelope of their home if they are in an HOA/Condo. If they rent they don't own anything. (about a third of Americans)

Sucks to be them. When I bought my house, it was pretty much exactly at the median price for this county. (Oh, dear Lord. I don't want to cause a stampede of people wanting to live near here. Good thing this is Usenet, which is dying by inches.) Let's hear it for flyover country.

I see the new (heh, almost 20 years old now) subdivision across the street has an HOA. I watched them build those houses, and they must creak like the dickens after being open for a solid winter after the framing went up.

OTOH, about 100,000 people are willing to pay through the nose to live inside the city limits of Ann Arbor. Both in the purchase price of their house and in higher property taxes than the surrounding townships. For a lot less yard, and quite good chances of being in a historic district.

Yep. I remember those days.

Cindy Hamilton

otoh, they might be within walking distance of Trader Joes... and Zingermans, Zingermans, or even Zingermans...

Trader Joe's is out toward the edge of town; plenty of suburban-type neighborhoods around it, though. Zingerman's is walkable, but Zingerman's and Zingerman's are out by the airport south of town and out by the freeway west of town, respectively. I go to Zingerman's[2] frequently, since it's relatively close to my office, and buy bread.

The two Whole Paychecks are positioned similarly to Trader Joe's: not in the city center, but fairly close to some neighborhoods. One of them has terrible parking (the zoning board has decided new strip malls should not have enough parking spaces, to encourage people to walk, bike, or take the bus); the other one has decent parking, so that's the one I go to when I want to get ripped off.

Cindy Hamilton

Gotta tell you a Zingerman's [2] story:

My LSW and I used to pass through Ann Arbor and, of course, knew about the original Zingerman's location.

We moved here a few years ago and still went there occassionally, but the traffic and parking and road construction... made it a mess.

One day I came out of Costco and saw a sign across the street that said "Zingerman's". Huh?, I thought. Probably a corporate offive or somesuch, but I took a look.

And found the next best thing to Nirvana.

I mentioned this to a friend of ours who used to live in A2 and asked if he knew about it.

His reply: "Now you're Townies!"

Yes, I've been going to Zingerman's[2] since before Costco was there. Or, in fact, since before Zingerman's[3] existed.

I adore the deli, but there's no parking and it's always crowded, giving that authentic New York City experience, so I rarely go there.

Have you been to the new Knight's Southside? Small, but a decent selection of quality meats.

After work today I'll be at the bakehouse, picking up a loaf of bread.

Cindy Hamilton

I remember renting, vaguely. I did rent for a summer when I moved here while I was deciding where to buy but it was a beach house on Sanibel. Not to shabby and a far cry from the nasty apartments I lived in when I got out of the CG and started my career. That lasted about 3 years. I was on the road a lot anyway so it wasn't as bad as it could be. The neighbors were confused and thought I was an FBI agent so nobody screwed with my apartment or my Corvette. IBM does have a B and an I in it, I had short hair and I wore a suit. The shotgun I carried and the silhouette target on the wall inside the door tended to reinforce the FBI story ;-)

On Sun, 22 Aug 2021 11:52:44 -0700 (PDT), snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com posted for all of us to digest...

If it's lousy why not move? ;-)

I've passed it, but never had the time to go inside. One of these days...

I'll likely be there Th/Fr, picking up some challah.

(They keep offering to slice it! Uggggggh)

I'm glad they're baking bialys again, even if it's only one day/month. (It used to be every Tuesday. Now just the first one).