TERROR AT HOME
I have come to a conclusion. If the founding fathers of the United States of America could see how "English" we have become, they would think the Boston Tea Party was a dream.
Imagine, in the land of the free you get sued if you decided to paint your house pink because a board of 6 idiots do not like the color pink. Imagine that you have to maintain all areas of your property but subjected to the taste of 6 idiots who in no way contribute to the mortgage, taxes or insurance. It seems we have taken several steps backward.
For people who think this is a joke, there are several non-HOA properties in states like Colorado, Oregon and Wyoming to name a few. Look at those properties. There's a fantastic 5 acre property in Colorado Springs, beautifully maintained without an HOA and is selling for $1M, far more than my HOA property.
It is difficult to find a non-HOA property in Florida. People are not moving into HOAs because they want to. They have no choice when it comes to owning a home. But, why should you be held hostage to the will of the few when they in no way contribute to your home?
It is a myth that HOA improves property value. The housing crunch proves that. Homes in HOAs decline as rapidly in value as any other homes in any other part of Florida. When you have the time, just run a few addresses through the property appraisers website wherever you are.
Time for the Courts
Well, the HOA has decided to sue us to remove our strip of artificial turf that is less than 30% of yard coverage. Imagine, the HOA has homes with fake plants, stones over 50% of the area, even worse black top over 50% of the area, and they are choosing to sue us over less than 30% coverage within a xeriscape plan.
There is a playground installed in front of a homeowners home, but they don't even get a letter.
Before we started this in December 2004 we used to use 10 - 15,000 gallons of water every 30 days trying to keep grass green, plus fertilize, weedicide, mow (then down 10 antihistamine tablets as I have severe allergy to pollens). Now, we use on average 4000 gallons of water in a 30 days period for a household of 3 plus a dog and a snake.
No one said water conservation was going to be easy
I recently received a new copy (I lost my old one, or most likely it is in storage) of the Florida Friendly plant guide. I am allergic to over 60% of the plants listed in the guide. Oh joy!
While I would gladly take some of the plants, allergens and all, I believe I am down to my last refillable prescription of epi-pens. So alas, the a
rtificial grass will have to hang around.
On another subject, I recently found my friendly owls living in my neighbors tree. These owls started living in our dead mahogany after the hurricanes, along with a family of woodpeckers and some blue-crested bird I have yet to look up. The city demanded I cut the trees down even though I had cut then to safe height so the birds would have a home. The city couldn't have cared less about the birds. So imagine my joy when I found tha
t one of the baby owls had moved in next door. As for the woodpeckers, I heard them pecking at the houses in the morning and the blue birds have taken sanctuary in my backyard, sleeping on my park benches and chasing whatever insects they find in the pea-gravel.
The xeriscaping is coming on well in the backyard, I have lots of bees (no bee-hive sydrone here), birds and if last year is any indication, the butterflies will comeback! By teh way, this is the 6 x 24 spot the HOA thinks is absolutely horrid!
Pyrrhic Victory
I have contemplated whether to just removed my swat of artificial grass and replace it with 24" tall reed grass, white fountain grass and African Iris, all drought tolerant grassed. Of course, I will add a healthy dose of pea gravel.
In this case, the HOA wins/loses, I win/lose. How:
The HOA Win- We got the house to remove their artificial turf.
The HOA Loss - Under Article 720 of Florida Statues we cannot disapprove xeriscaping and this is another form of xeriscaping (just not the type that makes our dead grass look so bad)
My Win - I keep my xeriscape.
My Loss - 6 hours of putting in artificial turf (which I would just add to my backyard at any rates). But 6 hours is 6 hours.
I am not the type not to compromise. However, the association is. And according to John Stevenson the President of the Homeowners Association, the MSC (Maintenance & Standards Committee) was directed not to approve any xeriscaping request, even though the law clearly states they do not have that authority.
Which leads to the next round of talk, and completely removed any inclination I had to cease or otherwise compromise on my xeriscape plans. The MSC is not separate from the Board. The MSC is the board's pawn to do its bidding. At least 1 member of the MSC disagreed with the board for removing the artificial grass. She was silenced!!!
What a little insight will do!
I got a call from my good attorney friend who hit the nail on the head. The bottom line she says is since I xeriscaped in 2004, and have only improved the style since, then there is no violation of any articles of covenant. What do you know??
The bottom line was xeriscaping is a learning technique and though there are many books and guides about plants and incorporating them into the landscape there are many aspects of nature and 'normal' life not taken into consideration.
The Evolution of the Yard
We bought this house in April of 2004. By August, we had gotten the first letter that there were too many weeds in the yard. We sent them a letter stating we had bought the house that had been empty for well over 6 months with no maintenance with weeds in the yard. There were tons of stuff to be done including yard maintenance, but first we had to make the house itself livable.
In December 2004, we removed all the dead weeds and grass and created the photo on the right. It was marble stones, red mulch and bark. All plants were drought tolerant, no water necessary.
After the hurricanes of 2005. We ended up with the second photo. Our huge mahogany trees were completely destroyed and one could not seperate mulch from leaves.
To keep our water-free status, we created a nuature section at the front with two large oleander plants, and a doggy run from outdoor carpet. That lasted from February of 2005 to December of 2007. Mind you, this time the only letter we had from the HOA is for the weeds coming through thr cracks of our walk way, for weeds on the end of our carpet run at the water meter and for the brown grass on the opposite side of the driveway. Never a comment about our outdoor carpet, because, it was quite obvious it was carpet and did not compete with their yard looks.
Keith Hubble one of the member of the committee made a point of noting to me in October when he signed my driveway reconstruction that the board was discussing the weed situation at my yard along with other yards. He stressed how we had to maintain great yards to keep up the neighborhood. My response was, you are correct, unfortunately, money does not grow on trees and for people like us, we had to wait for a whole year to save to install artificial grass which we plan on doing by year's end. So we installed the artificial grass. We finished the installation (doing it ourselves) in late December 2008. Now we have neighbors who want to artificial turf as grasses are browning quickly, they like the idea of no maintenance and the dogs love it.
So after being in place for nearly two months now, the HOA has a problem. There are no stipulations in the HOA docs that specifically prohibits the use of artificial or alternate landscaping. There are no laws in the city, state, county or on a national level that bans or prohibits the use of artificial turf. What this boils down to is a personal issue.
Now we are no longer the house that has weeds, we have found a way to look good, up property value while maintaining our will not to waste water watering the lawns!
It will be a fight, we have no intentions of removing our artificial grass. As circumstances change so must we. Broward County just recently posted a $500,000.00 shortage from water collection. This means our water bills are going to see an increase to make up this windfall. We watered for about a month back in 2004 it cost it $123.00 that month for water. After that, we quit watering, and our bill has never passed $70.00.
Grass is NOT Grass is NOT Grass
I recently got a call from the President of my HOA, informing me that they have an overwhelming vote disapproving my use of artificial grass as opposed to real grass as my turf of choice.
I pointed out the hypocrisy of their response stating that they were the ones that requested I do something about my yard since it was covered in dead grass and weeds. I have countless letters, and even 1 association member showing up at my door to inform me that water restrictions is no reason not to water my lawn. Of course, on that day my response was, it wasn't only water restrictions, it was the whole idea of paying for water to run down the drain that I found quite offensive.
When I asked the pointed question as to 'so would it have been an issue if I planted real grass, water daily (thereby wasting water), I was told that was not the issue. But that is precisely the issue! In fact, that is the heart of the issue.
Florida has had record low rainfalls, Lake Ockechobee is at a record low. Summer started in mid January with temperatures of 90+ degrees (and don't forget last summer when we were chalking 100+ on a daily basis). You would think that someone who installs astro turf, set up rain barrels to water vegetables is a little bit ahead of the think, instead, no - WE MUST CONFORM!
But, I expect little else from the HOA, these were the people that rewarded 'Best of Homes' to the house that watered daily (even under water restrictions). Obviously they have no regards for the environment. Change is coming...perhaps sooner than later, but being a block to change will not help!
