Most people would rather not live in an HOA neighborhood.

That said, buying a house is hard enough without even more restriction, so many people end up under their purview anyway.

This couple ran into a HOA lady who had it out for them, but they let their paint color do the revenge-talking in the end.

Check it out.

It’s the Great Pumpkin, Vindictive HOA President

We’ll call my neighbors Liz and Dave.

They were nice folks who ran afoul of the homeowner’s association (HOA) when the busybody president, who lived next door to them (we’ll call her Joan), got it in her rotted turnip for a brain that Liz and Dave had taken in an illegal renter.

Renting out rooms was strictly against HOA policy. They had not rented out a room.

Liz’s elderly mother had moved in with them after breaking her hip and being unable to live alone anymore.

This was an issue for a nosy HOA president.

Joan sent them a very threatening letter about their “unlawful renter” and how fines would accrue if the “unlawful renter” didn’t vacate immediately.

It was accompanied with a copy of that part of the bylaws and pictures of Liz’s elderly mother taken through windows of their house.

Creep alert!

They wrote back that there was no renter and explained the situation.

Joan did not believe that “story” and had the HOA lawyer start sending them certified letters about their continued violations with ever increasing insane fines.

They ended up having to prove they were related at a public meeting.

This went over poorly.

Liz and Dave got their own lawyer to fire back a cease and desist letter.

After many increasingly aggressive back and forths, it all culminated in an association meeting where Liz, Dave and Liz’s mother came in with ID and birth certificates, and basically made Joan look like the pimple on the backside of humanity she was.

They won, but Joan was furious, and swore she’d get them for something. Joan maintained until the day I left for college (last I knew of her) that Liz and Dave had forged those driver’s licenses and birth certificates to keep their unlawful renter.

Then, they needed to paint their house.

Cut to the following fall. Liz and Dave needed to repaint the house after making some siding repairs post-hurricane.

They carefully checked the bylaws for approved paint colors and picked out a fairly bland shade of something between brown and tan.

They gave the painters the color info listed in the bylaws to the painters and painting happened.

Less than a week after their house was painted, they got another certified letter from the HOA lawyer stating their house was the wrong color.

They fired back evidence they ordered exactly what was in the bylaws.

Well, after many back and forths it turned out the approved color and the swatches on file with the board no longer matched because the manufacturer had changed the colors in their line slightly due to some kind of formula change.

Their house was a few shades darker than it should have been.

See, the bylaws listed the manufacturer color info “for convenience” but the shades actually had to match the official swatches you could have theoretically borrowed from the board and gotten color matched.

Nobody ever did that, but Joan was out for blood after the “unlawful renter” and forced them to have to repaint.

Don’t worry, they get her in the end.

Liz and Dave were taking no chances on the second try.

They got the swatch set from the HOA. For some reason it made no distinction between approved accent colors (most houses in the neighborhood had brightly colored doors) or house colors.

They decided that if they had to paint their house a second time, Joan, the dog that caught the car, could live next to the most garish option they had. It was pumpkin orange.

The painters asked multiple times if they were sure.

They were very sure.

You couldn’t see the orange from inside, but you sure could from next door!

Joan made many attempts to object to this, but it was within the letter of the HOA rules, and the house stayed orange until long after I moved away.

I’m glad it has a happy ending.

Let’s find out what Reddit thinks.

Some people just love power.

Let people enjoy their lives!

To each their own!

And maybe call the police.

Normal people celebrate color!

Mind your business.

Or you might have to live next to the Great Pumpkin House.

If you liked that post, check this one about a guy who got revenge on his condo by making his own Christmas light rules.