Reply #2: HOAs are one of the reasons I cling to my high crime

[Warpy]

inner city neighborhood. Oh, I don't mind having some two bit Napoleon tell me I can't paint my house orange with yellow trim. I don't much care what color it is on the outside. I also don't mind proscriptions against cars on blocks, appliances in the front yard, and van seats as porch furniture. Some things are just plain tacky.

However, when they start making stupid rules about lawn grass and shrubbery and whether or not you can string a clothesline out back when the dryer breaks down, they've lost me. Killing political speech is just another indignity in the name of property values, one that is most likely unconstitutional.

If the present real estate meltdown has any positive outcome, it has to be killing off the HOA as people are forced to turn their required patch of lawn grass into vegetable garden and their back yards into places to wash and dry clothing.