HOA board members don’t always think through the rules they make very well.

Sometimes the only way to get them to understand why the rules are a problem is to comply.

What would you do if you lived in a neighborhood with an HOA, and the HOA set a limit on the number of cars you could park in your driveway, but you had more cars than that? Would you park somewhere else, or would you fight the HOA?

In this story, one homeowner is faced with this situation and decides to comply knowing that will be just the trick to change the HOA rule for good.

Let’s read the whole story.

My HOA will learn that I absolutely live by the letter of the law.

My HOA recently changed the rules limiting the amount of vehicles allowed in my driveway.

I collect cars (all of which run, drive, and are registered and insured) and my household also has 4 licensed drivers.

When I moved in, the rules stated “only 1 class c vehicle allowed per driveway,” well that was fine by me, since class c vehicles don’t exist.

Class C vehicles were not defined in the HOA rules either.

I assume whoever wrote that rule assumed since they had a class c license, standard cars and trucks must be class C.

This person has a lot of vehicles!

So I moved in, and after stuffing 2 cars, 4 motorcycles and my camper in my garage, I placed 5 vehicles in my driveway.

The letters came.

I was quickly able to deflate them after asking them for the legal definition of a class C vehicle.

No fines paid.

Eventually, the HOA decided to change the rules.

Fast forward about a year, and the HOA proposed a rule change. Now stating ” 3 vehicles per driveway maximum,” Since 3 is more than one, and people lack critical thinking skills, it was passed with over 85% support.

Fine. 3 vehicles it is.

I did some digging and found the streets in my HOA were turned over to the city (an effort to avoid having to foot the maintenance bill I’m sure) and as such, the HOA had no authority to stop people from parking on a public street.

So I moved 2 vehicles the my very narrow street. One in front of my house, and one directly across the street in front of my neighbors house.

This is really inconvenient for the neighbors.

Now, the only vehicles that could safely drive past my home were motorcycles and the one guy with a smart car.

It was glorious.

My street is a main artery into and out of the neighborhood. Lots of uturns and backtracking for folks to get home or to work.

They must have a really big driveway!

They are the ones who did the rest of the work for me.

Complaints and calls to the HOA president resulted in another rule change vote.

Now my driveway is open to any amount of legally registered vehicles.

It fits 9…. I need more cars 🙂

I’m a little bit overwhelmed by the number of vehicles this person owns and how annoying it had to be for the neighbors when the cars were parked in the street.

It’s better for everyone that the HOA changes the rules.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story.

This is surprising.

I can’t really picture it very well either.

This is a weird rule!

This person offers a tip.

HOAs do make some insane rules.

Getting the neighbors to complain seems to be the trick to defeating an HOA.

If you enjoyed that story, read this one about a mom who was forced to bring her three kids with her to apply for government benefits, but ended up getting the job of her dreams.