"Soliloquy" wrote in message
4...


I work with a guy that is the president of a Home Owners Association.
Talk about an asshole. A woman in his area approached him to get
permission to have a yard sale. Of course he vacillated, and she grew
angry. He reassured her that her request would be considered by the
council.

Of course, her request was denied. All those cars parking in front of
other people's property would not be fair to the other people.

Fair, fair, fair. boy have I tired of this word.

This guy seems severely traumatized by the fact that these
neighborhood
associations no longer have the ability to regulate satellite antennas
39.37" or smaller in diameter.

We have trouble with our interloping neighbor even though we don't
live
in an area covered by these prohibitions. The neighbor is the vice
president of the city council in the small borough that we live in
near
Pittsburgh. We first moved here, she expressed a desire for us to cut
down (for safety reasons of course LOL), every freakin tree on our
property. She made sure to tell us that the leaves on our property
were
"our responsibility" to rake up. (hell, I didn't put them there, the
trees should have to rake them up). We had the diseased trees removed
at
a considerable cost, and had the others trimmed.

Trees! Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em! Mr. T moved into
one of our most exclusive suburbs back in the 80s. Like many new
homeowners, he wanted to do some landscaping. In Mr. T's case,
landscaping meant shaving everything outside his mansion down to a
stubble. Mr. T announced his landscaping decision with a wailing
chainsaw. The startled neighbors reacted as strongly as if T had been
firing a poorly aimed automatic weapon. Amusing court battles between
the Newly Wealthy Thespian and the Inheritors of the Robber Barons
ensued. Oh, if only the oil refiners, the meat packers and the
industrialists who built the North Shore suburbs had the foresight to
see that an environmental vandal might show up right there in their
midst!! And all of this happened without CC&Rs. Just as well. I'd
pity the fool who'd try to write up Mr. T to a Homeowner's Association.



You think that she would have had a geriatric orgasm. Noooo, she found
more things to harp about. My son had bought a 1967 Chevy that we
parked
at the top of our driveway, even though the car was not licensed, as
it
needed work before it was roadworthy. We were away for the weekend
when
the local police drove onto our property and tagged our car as
abandoned,
we had a week to get the car licensed. Enter Classic car plates. We
had
to get regular plates for our car, then subsequently applied and were
issued classic car plates. The car was legal, they couldn't tow it,
and
there it sat as before her interloping started.

But she never quits. We wanted to erect a privacy fence, but in this
relatively dilapidated neighborhood, believe it or not, there is an
ordinance against them. We had to resort to a shadow box fence. Prior
to
this, we had the property surveyed, and the front of our property
includes a small part of what the neighbors assumed were theirs.
Apparently the loss of a small part of their property was too much to
bear, as the survey spike was removed and moved closer to our
property.

Imagine this woman in charge of a homeowners association? I'd rather
live in the country in West Virginia (I like West Virginia, very
pretty
country) with a refrigerator on the front porch and a small junk yard
in
my front yard than to live in a neighborhood covered by a covenant.
Years ago in a telecommunications magazine, I read an article in which
an
amateur had crafted an antenna, essentially a pole with a narrow
skirt,
and placed it in the yard. He told the neighbors that it was a
birdfeeder, and that the design was to preclude squirrels from
climbing
it. The only problem was that other neighbors began to ask if he could
help them construct similar birdfeeders. Well, at least theirs won't
require a buried wire running to them.

I have no doubt that most Homeowner's Associations are run by decent and
reasonable folk. I'm sure that's true of most small public governments,
as well. But what happens when things go bad? Given the sorry state of
human nature, it will, sooner or later. There's small time control
freaks in private and public life. But we have a better chance with
them if we don't sign away our rights.

Frank Dresser


http://www.arrl.org/FandES/field/reg...trictions.html

"Stinger" wrote in message
. ..
Homeowners associations are a good thing! They are basically an agreement
that you and your neighbors will follow some clearly defined rules for the
specific purpose of maintining optimum property values for everyone. In
other words, you won't have to worry about buying an expensive house and
having your next-door neighbor decide to use his yard to store a dozen
wrecked automobiles while he builds a hot-rod or runs a car-repair
business.
Common sense should tell anyone that their rights end when they start to
infringe on anyone else's, but sometimes you need it in writing. ;^)


Don't need a homeowner's association to prevent those kinds of violations.
Cities have ordinances against them. If someone violates the ordinance you
can file a complaint.

Receiving antennas are easily concealed. If you can find mine from the
street, you were born on Krypton. I think this is an overly-hyped
problem.

Broadcasting antennas are another animal, though. For instance, nobody
wants to live next to some clown running a bunch of linear amps through a
CB
"base station." It will literally be "seen" on well-shielded cable
television connections, and is a nuisance. I think that's a lot of what
the
"external antenna" rules are meant to curb.

-- Stinger


Again such CB operation is illegal and they can be just as big or bigger a
nuisance with a mobile operation. Some of these guys have multikilowatt
amps in their vehicles.

Such association rules force the LEGALLY LICENSED operator to use low height
indoor and hidden antennas. Theses types of antennas are far more prone to
generate interference than something well up on a tower.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE

"Stinger" wrote in message
.. .
Sit on a cactus or something, Wes? You seem a little edgy.

Nobody is forced to buy into a neighborhood with covenants. One can do
exactly what you have done and buy some distance from your neighbors.
That's great if it works out for you.

However, my case is obviously different from yours. The home where I now
live is not the home I will own when I retire. I won't need nearly as
many
bedrooms, etc., and it will be out on an acreage I own (that's currently a
little farther than I care to commute to my job). Living in a good
neighborhood with covenants makes sense for me right now, because I do
want
to protect the hefty investment I've made in my home, specifically because
I
do intend to sell it someday.


There are often good communities without covenants, where your property
values do increase and the sale of a home is relatively easy. This lets you
"have your cake and eat it too". You could put up that antenna now and take
it down when it is time to sell.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE

"Stinger" wrote in message
. ..
Frank,

I don't feel bad that I can't let my yard get waist high, park junk cars
on
the lawn, or paint my roof purple. Rather, I feel good knowing my
neighbor
won't.


As I said before, cities and communities have ordinances against these
things (except the purple roof). Except in decaying neighborhoods, such
city ordinances are enforced.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE

We've strayed pretty far from radio, so this will be my last post on this
subject. I hardly want to be in the position of defending ALL homeowner's
associations.

I think the key to being happy with a homeowner's association is to have
clear, concise, SPECIFIC covenants that aren't subject to liberal
interpretations and that cannot be amended by the board without 100%
approval from every single property owner. The ones in my neighborhood
follow that model and are just that -- simple, and basically just
commonsense good-neighbor policies.

There is a neighborhood in our town that did not follow that key, and they
do indeed have problems. A bunch of retired busybodies managed to get
control of the board, and have become a pain in the neck for working
families or people trying to build new homes. I would never have built
there. Their problem is that the development was originally designed to be
a resort / weekend home development, but retirees have moved in and want to
pretend that it's a high-end property.

Meanwhile, our neighborhood is great, and is in high demand.

Again, the point I am making is that neighborhood covenants are not ALL
bad -- just some of them. (But these are the examples I'm seeing time and
again on this thread, mostly from people that don't live in covenated
neighborhoods anyway).

Frankly, I think that anyone that doesn't have their attorney help them
review neighborhood covenants before they purchase property deserves exactly
what they get. I'll bet most of these people don't have a Will, either,
which is an similarly foolish situation.

-- Stinger

wrote in message ...
Stinger, HOA are mostly comprised of residents that never have had a
job where they supervised other humans and now is their chance to tell
someone what to do. I do agree that no one want's a junk yard in their
neighborhood. But I don't agree that the guy next door can/should be
able to tell you what you are permitted to do on property you pay the
mortgage, taxes and up keep on. He/she or they can frankly go to hell.
The plan I (for DOC) "BOUGHT" a home in even has restrictions of 18'
satellite dishes, part of the antenna restriction clause. Since the
latest FCC decision the HOA can kiss that part good by. And yes,
receiving antennas can be hidden quite well. Some of us are licensed ham
and enjoy our hobby as you do. Just because we move into a new home in a
new area why should we give up the hobby we so enjoy? We shouldn't have
too. Not all hams have gigantic towers and beams, some of use are
satisfied to use a piece of wire to TRANSMIT on. I have and will
continue to do so when I move. HOA's bring out the evils in good people,
we have to get sneaky and stealthy to enjoy life as we have for many
years.

I know, I've heard this before. It was our choice to purchase in a plan
with restrictions, show me a plan or find me a plot (1/2 acre) of land
where there there are no restrictions in the U.S.A.. If the politicians
arn't telling you what to do it's some nosey neighbor.

Ya'll have a positive day.

Stinger wrote:

Homeowners associations are a good thing! They are basically an
agreement
that you and your neighbors will follow some clearly defined rules for
the
specific purpose of maintining optimum property values for everyone. In
other words, you won't have to worry about buying an expensive house and
having your next-door neighbor decide to use his yard to store a dozen
wrecked automobiles while he builds a hot-rod or runs a car-repair
business.
Common sense should tell anyone that their rights end when they start to
infringe on anyone else's, but sometimes you need it in writing. ;^)

Receiving antennas are easily concealed. If you can find mine from the
street, you were born on Krypton. I think this is an overly-hyped
problem.

Broadcasting antennas are another animal, though. For instance, nobody
wants to live next to some clown running a bunch of linear amps through
a CB
"base station." It will literally be "seen" on well-shielded cable
television connections, and is a nuisance. I think that's a lot of what
the
"external antenna" rules are meant to curb.

-- Stinger

"Stinger" wrote in message
.. .
Different strokes for different folks, Frank.

In my view, I didn't give up anything when I built in a neighborhood with
restrictive covenants. Instead, I gained the peace-of-mind that the
neighborhood wouldn't decay. I gained "rights" as I agreed to covenants
that I would have followed anyway, because my neighbors will as well.


Many areas with restrictive covenants DO decay. The homes get old and out
of date. The shingles aren't replaced often enough and so on. The
covenants generally do not and cannot force a specific maintenance cyle on
people. I seen some very run down areas that had covenants. Yeah the grass
was mowed and there weren't any junk cars but the houses looked old and
tired.

Your "public sector versus private sector" infringement of rights
arguments
isn't simply valid in this case because it is voluntary. My rights are
just
fine, thank you.


While you have every right to sign away rights, the rest of it will continue
to consider it foolish.

However I do agree that there are plenty of cases where the public sector
(government) does infringe on the rights of private property owners. I am
vehemently against it. I believe it is unconstitutional for a city
government to use eminent domain laws to force an owner of private
property
to sell it (so the government can grant the land to a developer who will
build a shopping center) because the government will make more tax revenue
on a new shopping center. Yet this is happening time and again all over
the
United States. It' just plain wrong.


That is not the purpose of eminent domain laws. If the law has been abused
in such a manner, then the citizens affected should be filing a class action
suit.

Dee D. Flint, N8UZE

Any time i have asked people why they would live with such restrictions,
they always say that they don't want their neighbors having junk cars in
their front yard. I have never lived in a neighborhood with a homeowners
association. I have also never had the junk car problem. Generally, if you
don't live in a slum, you do't have much to worry about. In any case, most
towns have "eyesore laws" that cover this.
"Fred Garvin" wrote in message
...

I never understood why people put up with such bulls^&t.

"Stinger" wrote in message
...

[snip]


Frankly, I think that anyone that doesn't have their attorney help
them
review neighborhood covenants before they purchase property deserves
exactly
what they get. I'll bet most of these people don't have a Will,
either,
which is an similarly foolish situation.

-- Stinger


Richard Oulton is an attorney. And mo

http://www.ccfj.net/flyoldgloryOulton.html

Frank Dresser

When I lived in Austin, a ham on the air gave me an
excellent possible solution to the problem of
annoying home owner association self-appointed
gods.

He had lived in such a "anti-antenna" residence
at one time that didn't allow him to erect any outside
antennas. Therefore, he put a dipole up in his attic,
took ALL filtering out of line that he possibly could
and put the largest amplifier his money could buy
inline and began blasting away.

Of course he got knocks on the door, and people
beginning to complain, but they no longer had a legal
leg to stand on due to the FCC's requirements that
nearly all electrical gizmos and doo-dads "accept
any interference that results from other nearby
operating .... blah blah blah..."

The ham then told the home owners that this
was the result of having to move an antenna to the inside
of his attic to remove it from site, and gave them some
mumbo-jumbo jargon about why it causes more
interference than having it outside and high in the air
(referring to his antenna). Of course, he simply didn't
mention the huge planet-busting amplifier or the fact
that he removed all his filtering that he possibly could.

The home owners, believe it or not, made an exception
for him, after all the residential complaints about televisions,
telephones, baby monitors, answering machines and everything
else getting tore up constantly from RFI.

I recommend more hams doing this if thier home owner
gods become assholes as well.

Clint

Clint,
----clipped---

I recommend more hams doing this if thier home owner
gods become assholes as well.

Clint

I wouldn't. I'd recomend that if you can't abide by the
rules
that you said you would, then either don't sign the contract, or
move. All these little tales say more about the person's moral
fortitude than it does the HOA's policies...
'Doc