HOA demands homeowners put trash out at 7 am sharp — the rule backfired so fast, the rule was withdrawn

An HOA board member of a community came up with a very bizarre rule. They insisted residents put their trash bins outside their home "no sooner or later" than 7 am. The HOA board member was quite strict about the 'new' rule; in fact, residents weren't even allowed to keep their trash bins outside the night before. Everyone followed the rule for nearly two weeks, until it backfired, causing bins to rot in the heat. A person who goes by u/mistyform on Reddit shared the story on February 23.

The HOA sent a strict email to all residents saying trash bins must be put out exactly at 7 am on pickup day. "They bolded it; someone clearly complained," the person assumed. However, they decided to follow the instructions even though they used to put their trash bin out the night before, like everyone else. The person would set an alarm for 6:55 am and do the needful at exactly 7 am, as instructed. However, the problem was that the truck would arrive anytime between 6:30 and 7 in the morning, so a few of the residents would miss pickup because of the rule. "Bins stayed full all week; smelled great in the heat," they recalled. Soon, the HOA board member realized the rule wasn't practical and eventually allowed residents to place trash bins out the night before or early morning. "Alarm is off now. Bin’s back out the night before like always," the person concluded.

People, of late, have become too skeptical about buying or renting houses in HOA-governed communities. However, a YouGov survey found that one in five Americans currently live in an HOA-governed community, and one in three have lived in one at some point. But that doesn't mean they are necessarily happy with that system. In fact, 38% of HOA residents think their HOA is "too restrictive." The same survey conducted in September 2023 also revealed that more than half (61%) of Americans would prefer living in a neighborhood without an HOA, and only 14% wouldn't mind one. Moreover, 49% of Americans who reported living in an HOA-governed neighborhood said they would prefer not to live in one. What's more surprising is that nearly half of the respondents (45%) believe that HOAs have a "negative effect" on the communities they govern.

Meanwhile, reacting to the Reddit story, u/edith_keelers_shoes commented, "What were they thinking? Anyone who had a job requiring them to leave the house at 6:45 am just had to accept that they'd be fined once a week and eventually have a lien put on their house for repeat violations?" Similarly, u/ledgerwar confessed, "As someone who leaves for work at 4:30 am, I would have responded with a giant f*** you." u/wentz4mvp wrote, "And this is why when searching for a house I always check for no HOA." u/asteriodzulu commented, "S***w having a smelly bin for a week… I would have been insistent that the HOA needs to arrange an extra pickup as per their instructions at no extra cost to the residents."

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