Unexpected Covenants

Never, ever, would I again live with covenants & restrictions (CC&R's).

And I was president of HOA...

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Only she who attempts the absurd can achieve the impossible

Covenants and Deed Restrictions do not equal HOA. We have Deed Restrictions on our place (as do adjacent parcels). There is a restriction on swine which doesn't bother us because we don't raise them. There is a restriction on running a junk yard, etc.

How many people who are complaining about deed restrictions would complain if all the land within 5 miles of their place had a restriction on running a CAFO?

I wouldn't live in a place with an HOA but as far as Deed Restrictions I'll look at the nature of each one and decide whether I can live with it or not or if it might even work to my benefit.

Mike

If you even consider this lot make sure that the contract is contingent on approval of the covenants. I am sure he probably just covered the ones that were most apparent to him. You also need to find out how they can be changed. In some neighborhoods it only takes a 51% vote...in others it can take 100%. With anything less than 100% they can force someone to do things differently.

The worst covenant I saw when looking at houses was the yard had to be neat and trim...the problem was who gets to define neat and trim. Saw another place 10 acre lots and they said you could only have horses.

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Give Blood it saves lives.

yea, HOA's - neighborhood Gestapos. There was a time in the not so distant past when if you had a problem with your neighbor, you *gasp* talked to your neighbor! Now you can call somebody else to come deal with it while you hide behind the "covenant agreement". Even in a court of law you have the right to face your accuser! But not in the HOA. Also, there was a time when you would consider your neighbor and his feelings before you painted your house because you wanted to be neighborly!

We got "turned in" to the HOA the one (and only, belive me!) time we lived in a neighborhood with one because our grass was too high. Lawn mower was broken and dh was laid off. Couldn't afford to fix it or replace it. Couldn't afford food for pete's sake! They were demading that we mow it (and it wasn't that high) or else we were going to have to pay their guy $150.00 to do it - 1/4 acre lot mind you! Remember when you knew your neighbors and they were interested being neighbors? Would have been a time when somebody would have asked us about the grass if they were concerned. If they knew somebody was laid off and spending every waking min. of the day looking for work, they would have maybe even helped you out by mowing themselves. But not if you have an HOA. You can hide, you don't have to relate to anybody. You can just complain. That is the real tragedy of the HOA. There is a peice of paper and an HOA manager that stands between neihbors letting them abdicate the oppoprtunity to be neighbors. They get to stand back and judge each other and make anonymous complaints and be all about themselves.

I would never live where there is an HOA again because of what it says about the neighbors, namely that they don't want to be neighbors, and that their only interest in you is to keep you in line so that you don't impact their property value! Rather live somewhere where if somebody has a problem with me, they have the courage to speak up to my face and the kindness to ask questions to determine if there might be a good reason for the temporary lapse of neighborliness on my part!

My advice, don't do it! Even if you can make it work. Some guy with binoculars will be watching to see what you do with that house of yours, and some guy with a ruler will be measuring your grass! You'll walk your road for years waving at the neighbors who might wave back but probably won't and you won't even know their names because they are not interested in having neighbors, they are just interested in making sure the guy-in-the-next-house is controllable to a degree. Sad. I'd rather be a hermit.


Cindyc.

Again, there is nothing in the OP to sugest that there is or will be a Homeowner's Association.

People on this board complain constantly about the things other people do with the land those other people own. They put up McMansions, they build to a higher standard than traditional in the neighborhood and cause property values and therefore taxes to rise, they have dogs that bark, etc, etc.

People who purchase property in a development with a HOA are adults entering into a voluntary contractual arrangement. Don't whine about requirements you agreed to.

I think most of us understand the difference between an HOA and covenants. I've owned a home with restrictions and at the time didn't even know what "HOA" stood for. I don't think anyone was saying they're the same--except they can both be major pains.
And not everyone has a choice, when I lived in AZ there were no homes available (that I could afford or knew about) that weren't part of an association. Unless you are a desert dog, and I am not, you won't survive the country in Tucson. Again, I couldn't afford it anyway, that land is way over-priced. So I will complain.

Someone put a gun to your head and required you to live in Tuscon?

Who enforces the covenants? Do all the other properties in the area live up to the covenants? How many other of these 'lots' have been sold? How long has this acreage been on the market? Where is it located in relationship wtih the other parcels? Isn't it usually, it is up to the neighbors to see that the covenants are kept.....or in other words....if no one complains, no one does anything about it when it is covenants? If you built a nice 1600 sq ft house...would anyone really care? If you keep your place neat and tidy is anyone really going to care? Most covenants are just to keep the property value up in an area. I understand them and agree with them to a point. If you don't - don't buy there.

"A covenant is generally defined as an agreement between two or more persons entered into by deed, whereby one of the parties promises the performance or nonperformance of certain acts or that a given state of things does or does not exist. Covenants may arise by implication of law, or from the conduct of the parties. They may be divided into two classes, personal covenants and restrictive covenants running with the land.

Restrictions may arise by (1) express covenants or (2) by implication (from the language of the deed, or (3) from the conduct of the parties.

Reestrictive covenants, as the expression is generally understood, are covenants running with the land. They are sometines called "negative" covenants. They may be created in a number of ways. First, the limitation on the use of the land may be explicitly set forth in the deed instrument. Second the restrictions may be in a separate written instrument recorded or determinted from a printed plan of the proposed development of the property. Third, restrictive covenants may be brought into existence by estopple through oral representations alone. Thus where an owner sells part of a subdivision tract under representations that his entire plan is restricted to t6he same extent, he thereby restricts use of remaining portion of his land to that extent: Burgess v. Putnam".

Questions and Answers on Real Estate by Robert W. Semenow

A HOA - Home Owners Association - enforces the CC&R's of a subdivision after a certain percentage is sold.

A restriction is a restrictive covenant.

More than you ever wanted to know But now you know.

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Only she who attempts the absurd can achieve the impossible

You'd think, huh? Honestly, if you don't have the compassion to realize that people don't always have a choice in life then you've had it way too easy.

My problem is about people who move in into a rural neighborhood and start whining and complaining about how people have a couple of junk cars or their houses are run down or the animals smell too much. While I think that if one moves into an area with covenants or an HOA they should have done more research I don't think that some city priss should have the right to complain about their neighbor's junk pile or a run down mobile home. Works both ways, if you don't like the junk or animals don't move there. Seen it happen in the area where I live. Seems like certain people want a little piece of the country but they want to have all the rules of living in the city. Well I think they should just stay in the city if they love restrictions so much instead of moving into rural areas and then crying and whining at town hall meetings two months after they move that someone doesn't keep their lawn mowed at exactly 2 inches or some other equally ridiculous complaint.

I got a real problem with people telling me what do with my land, unless I am putting in a big fat coal power plant or dumping toxins into the ground water I don't think other people have the right to tell me how to use my land when I pay the mortgage and the property taxes. When I hear about other people whining about run down houses and junk I often think to myself, if it really bothers them so much why don't they offer to put in their own time and money into their neighbor's place or offer to clean it up. Bottom line is those type of people are lazy and selfish and need to get a life. If they had one they wouldn't have the time to complain about other people.

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I work with a guy , he lives in a larger house alone he had it built and had to choose from a few house plans were he had it built he choose tri level and just told them not to worry about framing walls in the lower half , he turned it into a wood working shop
so he had the 1800 sq foot house but lives in 1 bedroom the kitchen and living room wich are the top level of the tri level maybe 800 sq feet

just an idea you don't have to heat the hole house

I always wondered exactly what that meant....

Lots of good information and things to think about and questions to ask, guys. This was a very preliminary conversation and I will follow up on all of those suggestions. The seller also mentioned that the old man that originally parceled off the property is nearby, so if things got serious I would probably try to arrange a meeting with him just to be extra sure there would be no conflict between the things I wanted to do, and the things he had hoped to see the land used for. I believe it might also be a good step to establishing a good neighbor.

When I voiced my concerns over the minimum house size, the seller did have a good point: Since I am looking at this land as an investment, first, for the time period I'm in school near there (Up to 8 years) it would make sense to build a nice 3-bedroom house since that's what the young families and newlyweds coming into the area are mostly looking for.

I don't mind that idea, but at the same time if I'm looking at this piece as an essentially temporary homestead, I don't want to invest a ton of money in the super sturdy, last forever outbuildings. I'd rather put up those metal shed type deals that I could easily sell or move when I moved, since chances are the young family with 2.1 kids isn't going to be interested in the small-scale ag projects I am.

It's kind an either/or situation, but I sure as heck don't want to build a too-big house AND a lot of super nice out buildings!

Hmm, perhaps I could track down a house that could easily be partitioned off to rent out a unit to some other college/grad student that had a horse or wanted to work on similar projects....and then when I sold could be converted back to single-family.

When I get the full copy of the covenants, I will post them.

If you have all of those other restrictions, chances are overwhelming that you have a single-family restriction as well.

Exactly.

While my DH and I were blessed with the opportunity to choose the state and area we live in with no family or job constraints, I fully recognize that that is not the norm.

Most people have children and extended families. Alot of people also have concerns about holding onto a job that isn't available anywhere else.

My DH and I chose our land in large part because of the fact that it is free of restrictions. We have hogs, live in a large mobilehome that is NOT on a "permanent foundation" (though in the 20 years it's been on the place it hasn't gone anywhere), and we seldom mow the grass. True bliss

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"Perhaps I'll have them string a clothesline from the hearse I am in, with my underwear waving in the breeze, as we drive to the cemetary. People worry about the dumbest things!"
by Wendy

Bear in mind that there also municipal, county, state, and even federal regulations that may be in place. Take SC for instance. While our property there is 'un-zoned', the entire state is supposed to follow IBC 2006. While most of that is building codes, there are sections in there about things such as junk cars and unkempt lawns. The law states, for example, that you cannot have an 'un-operable' vehicle on your property unless it is kept inside of a fully enclosed building. So if I buy an antique car to fix up, I have to keep it in the garage, even if I have 1,000 acres. Now, if they were to enforce that rule, they'd have to lock about about 75% of the folks in rural areas, since almost everyone seems to have a few 'un-operable motor vehicles' in their yard in SC LOL.

There's more coming, too. The latest building codes have upped the energy efficiency requirements considerably, and states are starting to require automatic sprinkler systems for new construction, and houses that are extensively remodeled. It's getting a lot harder and more expensive to go out to the country and try to homestead.

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"What one generation tolerates, the next generation embraces." -John Wesley

We are currently building a house on 40 acres with covenants and a HOA--very few houses in the area and most requirements are reasonable-I too think that if I own the land I should be able to do as I wish--but if this is the part of the country where we are going to live, most parcels of any size are subdivided ranches--very hard to find acreage that stands apart. We found out that many of the things allowed in the covenants are not allowed by the county--we can live in a camper, 5th wheel whatever for up to 6 months during construction according to the covenants---uh uh--according to the county you can't even pitch a tent on your land for a few nights let alone reside in an RV. According to county you can't even have that RV or whatever parked on your property unless you have a house there. Our covenants also expired a year or so ago and I doubt if they are really enforceable until legally updated--but really if we chose to build here-who wants nothing but trouble with your neighbors. So for now we ARE living in a 5th wheel trailer ON our property during construction, and our pop up camper is up for when the kids visit and heck if we want to pitch a tent out back in the trees for a night or two I imagine we will do that too. The restrictions rub me the wrong way but aside from house size and no pre fab units I think that most follow the county ordinance guidelines. Good luck.

Very true, I'll look into the regulations. I had in mind some kind of "room-mate" set-up with private entrances and maybe a small kitchenette on the other side that could be converted into a bathroom, bar area, or wash room when the dividing door was opened back up.

Essentially a "mother-in-law wing".

I would of course be checking into code for the county/state/muni as well as the individual covenants for the neighborhood.

Thank god I'm not thinking about staying where I currently live in AK. It's a small resort community that has it's own building codes in addition to what the Anchorage municipality has. (We're technically part of the Anchorage city-limits, even though it's a 45 minute commute to get to the city!)

I've been working with the Assembly here and have to sort out all the code violations and permissions for deviations and such. It's a nightmare. Girdwood Board of Supervisors is pretty much like a HOA that's been given official authority over the town budget by the greater city government. SO ridiculous!!!

Makes me think about when I moved here. I was told by a neighbor there were "rules" like you had to keep your grass mowed. THEN he pretty much abandons the property (4 lots total about 30-40 acres with nice house and outbuilding because of a despute with another neighbor. Result is HIS land sits with weeds over 5' tall. I don't think there is really anyone to enforce rules even if there were some.