My house, my rules.

But also my garden, my rules.

While the HOA can provide guidelines and instructions about what should and should not be planted in my garden, it doesn’t give them the right to change and destroy it without my permission.

In this story, that is exactly what the HOA did not do. They didn’t ask for permission before letting a gardening team knock down her plants and garden.

And worse, they’re charging her for the landscaping service that basically removed their plants.

AITA for refusing to pay my HOA that hired a landscaping crew on my house without my permission?

The lady that’s the head of my HOA has always disliked our garden.

We hire people that mow our lawn weekly, and everything is clean.

But my mom liked to plant things (like tomatoes, cabbages, and mint) in the garden that don’t quite fit well with the so-called aesthetic of the neighborhood, where everyone has black mulch.

The family went out of the country.

My mom doesn’t speak English, and before the pandemic, when we were out of the country, we didn’t receive the letters that the HOA sent about our garden.

It ended up with them hiring a landscaping crew that killed all of our tomatoes, and put mulch there instead.

I checked the mail, and realized it was us who didn’t receive their letters, so we paid the company.

After their trip, they stayed in their home, and the mother continued to plant mints.

We’ve been in the US ever since.

While my mom gave up on tomatoes and cabbages, we still have a strain of mint that we planted, and it grew in our garden.

In fact, plenty of people in the neighborhood come and pick some of our mints (after asking, of course).

I personally think it looks pretty since it’s just green, and I didn’t think they’d have a problem with that.

They did.

Despite being available and having their contact information with them, HOA hired a landscaping crew without their permission.

The HOA lady has my phone number, and she has my email address (she had emailed that address before), and my mom had given her the contact of one of her friends, so he’d be able to translate for her if the HOA lady needed anything.

She never contacted any of us.

Instead, one day, a landscaping crew just came in without our permission, and again, pulled out all our mint. And now, we got a bill for two thousand dollars.

Tensions arise between the family and the HOA lady.

When I emailed her about it, she told me that she thought we weren’t home, which is BS because our lights are literally on every day, and our car goes in and out of the driveway daily.

I’ve even said “hello” to her when passing by.

She didn’t even make one attempt to contact us, and she thought that since we paid the first landscaper, we agree that she can hire people to do our garden.

AITA if I refuse to pay her?

Now, that was tough. Let’s see what the comments say.

HOA = abuse. Do you agree?

Exactly! How about the plants they took out without the family’s approval?

$2000 for removing the mint plants???

To solve this once and for all, taking her to court might be the wisest decision.

Is he ready to lawyer up?

If the HOA didn’t bother to tell the homeowner, then the homeowner shouldn’t bother to pay for it as well.

This is absolutely insanity.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a woman who tracked down a contractor who tried to vanish without a trace.