Plenty of people love homeowners associations for keeping neighborhoods tidy and packed with amenities. But HOAs also have a lot of say — too much, many argue — when it comes to otherwise private property, from whether certain flowers can be planted to which renovations you’re allowed to take on.
Here are 15 cases of homeowners confronting overzealous HOAs:
A Heart Attack Over Sod
Firefighters in Pasco County, Florida, gave an HOA horror story a happy ending last July after a man suffered a heart attack trying to lay sod at his home to avoid an association fine. “While he was having his heart attack, literally in and out of consciousness, he kept begging me to figure out the sod,” the man’s wife wrote on Facebook.
As firefighters took the man to a hospital, a brother-in-law took up the task, “planning on staying there by himself until midnight to get it finished.” But the firefighters came back to finish the job and make sure the grass didn’t go to waste. “We believe in helping the community whenever we are needed,” firefighters said in their own Facebook post.
