Our HOA sucks. They are pretty flippant about some of the covenants, while strongly enforcing others. They now allow people who can't sell their homes to rent them out, and this burns me up. I understand that in their mind, renting would be better for home values than a foreclosure, but I just worry about the quality of tenants. I mean you're probably looking at 1600 per month or more rent, but still, if you don't own it, you're not going to take proper care of the property.

2/4/2014 9:20:22 PM

well, you're one of those people, huh?

I was a roommate in a rented house once... most of the neighbors found out we were renters, and boy did they hate us and make it known.

2/5/2014 8:45:37 AM

No one was allowed to rent their houses two years within buying them but I don't see a problem with renting it out if someone decides to move later.

2/5/2014 11:55:31 AM

I'm one of those people because thus far, those renters have broken just about every covenant possible. Not that I really care that much for the covenants, I think most of them are silly. I just don't like the way they enforce some, but not other covenants.

I think if I ever decide to sell our house, buyers will have more of an issue with being beside renters than being beside a foreclosure.

2/5/2014 12:41:34 PM

I don't know. We got ours as a short sale and now the neighbors are trying to sell theirs. I think they might have a hard time because what we paid is going to ruin the comps. This place was destroyed by renters and the price reflected that, but that info isn't included in the sale data. Renting it out will eventually lead to it being destroyed and foreclosing or a short sale if the owners don't stay on top of the place.

2/5/2014 12:53:36 PM

Quote :

"I just don't like the way they enforce some, but not other covenants."

Have you called to complain?

2/5/2014 1:02:16 PM

Quote :

"I've just realized that the amount that goes toward the principal on my mortgage goes up and down each month. Is that normal? I called the bank and the woman told me it's because there are different number of days each month, but I don't think that's right. This mortgage is a fixed rate traditional mortgage. All my other mortgages, the amount that goes toward the principal goes up every month."

This sounds like a strange way to amortize a mortgage. Normally each month is treated as 1/12 of a year and the interest is accrued accordingly. In this case, your principal portion of your payment will always increase (as the principal is paid down, less interest will accrue each month). If that are treating each month as (# days in month/# days in year) it would be possible for the principal portion to decrease in certain months, but the standard formulas for calculating amortization would not apply and calculating the correct fixed payment to produce a 0 balance at the end of the term would be very convoluted and unnecessarily complicated.

Look at your records from when you applied for the mortgage. Federal law requires the lender to provide an amortization schedule (which lists every monthly payment, its contribution to principal and interest, and the balance on the loan at the end of each month) for fixed rate loans. Your monthly statements should match this exactly (the only deviation would be contributions to your escrow). This won't change unless your mortgage is delinquent (you are currently behind on your payments).

If you have made all your payments on time and your statements do not match your amortization schedule to the penny, then they are violating your mortgage contract.

2/5/2014 3:19:42 PM

Quote :

"Have you called to complain? "

Unfortunately, in most HOAs, this makes it worse.

I think good HOAs are in the minority.

2/5/2014 3:21:48 PM

Lame. I called about the grass getting super high around a foreclosed home and it was taken care of within the week.

[Edited on February 5, 2014 at 3:37 PM. Reason : ]

2/5/2014 3:37:11 PM

I do not have an HOA and am totally OK with that. My neighborhood was developed in the 1950s when people werent as anal.

2/5/2014 3:49:12 PM

Quote :

"Lame. I called about the grass getting super high around a foreclosed home and it was taken care of within the week. "

Glad you read my post correctly. You, sir, are in the minority.

2/5/2014 3:55:27 PM

about the only good thing about HOAs is owning a rental house within one...Built in landlords to keep the tenants in line.

2/5/2014 4:26:28 PM

I loathe hoas. I think the only place they belong is for town houses and condos. Other wise they're just a vehicle for nosy stay at home broads with a wine and vicodin habit to make peoples lives miserable.

2/5/2014 7:36:22 PM

And again, this is why I specifically did not want an HOA when I bought my house

2/6/2014 11:23:32 AM

fo sho. my neighborhood has covenants about building fences and shit like that, but no HOA. judging from the variance house-to-house, not much is enforced.

i get to keep my money and not deal with HOA bs.

2/6/2014 1:15:21 PM

The ballast in my bedroom closet ceasing to work two months after I've moved in - mainly just annoying because the same thing happened before I left my prior home. I'm assuming it's the ballast since the light just stopped working without any prior warning and the brand new bulb I bought doesn't work at all.

I can handle basic tasks around the house, but I'm definitely no electrician so it takes me forever to do anything electric related.

[Edited on February 6, 2014 at 3:46 PM. Reason : ....]

2/6/2014 3:46:16 PM

Our street has mostly great, chill people. I attribute this to not having a HOA. It helps that the last owners were slackers, so everyone has low expectations of us.

2/6/2014 4:39:30 PM

HOAs are the wooooooooorst

2/6/2014 4:53:33 PM

Quote :

"I do not have an HOA and am totally OK with that. My neighborhood was developed in the 1950s when people werent as anal. "

I am basically in the same position and I couldn't be happier. We have a voluntary HOA which is like $35 a year and that goes towards things like maintenance on common areas that the city doesn't take care of and extra security. So glad I don't have to go get permission before doing work on my own house.

2/7/2014 11:13:18 AM

I tried to call them out on the whole rental covenant, but they would have none of it. I'm not gonna call and complain about anything my neighbors are doing that might break the covenants - to me that is none of my business, but its pretty much just the rental thing that gets me.

Plus we use cloth diapers, and the sun does wonders for stains. Since we can't have clothes lines, we put a rack outside on the deck when we need to...I'm just waiting on someone to try to call me out on that one.

2/7/2014 8:52:12 PM

How do we feel about dog shit? obviously when I walk my dog and it shits somewhere i clean it up, but if it shits in my yard, that's my business right? I took my dog out a few days ago first thing in the morning, and a crotchety old man-neighbor who i have seen for the past 6 years who has never spoken a word to me walked up to me and started cussing at me because i let my dog shit in a corner of my yard and didn't pick it up. i was pretty furious, told him it's my property and he needs to mind his own business... he stood there for a good 5 minutes throwing insults towards me and i kept my cook and told him politely to fuck off that I was on my own property... he eventually walked away, but i thought the whole thing was completely uncalled for. (he doesn't even live adjacent to me... like 7 houses down.)

i thought for a minute it would escalate to a level i didn't want it to... but he kept inching towards me, but luckily never crossed into my property. i didnt want to fight him (i never want to fight anyone... have nothing to prove) but thought he might push it to that level. ugh. (and i would not have started any sort of physical altercation, but i honestly believed he might be crazy enough to start one.

[Edited on February 7, 2014 at 9:55 PM. Reason : ]

2/7/2014 9:51:25 PM

Your property your problem. That's between you and your wife as to who is responsible for picking it up. That guy can go fuck himself. If you want to wait to pick it up, that perfectly fine.

That said, if you have like forty turd burgers sitting out in the yard and it looks unsightly...

2/7/2014 11:11:52 PM

nobody would see any dog poop unless they were looking for it while standing at my property line (or over it... not going to accuse anyone of trespassing at this point)

2/7/2014 11:49:20 PM

I do the same thing. I'll pick it up if it's not on my property and have the bag dispenser on the leash so they are always handy. If it's my yard I pick them up at least once a week, but there's no reason to bag every poop every time (unless it's creating a horrible stench).

2/7/2014 11:56:33 PM

Wow yea I do the same.

In my yard - our responsibility. Now if it is a neighbor's dog's poop, then I don't appreciate it so much, as we make sure to clean up when our dogs go in anyone else's yard.

2/8/2014 10:59:34 AM

Tell that dusty ol' fart to mind his own damn business.

And you fuckes are sick for not picking up dog crap in your own yard. Do you all never do anything in your yards? Play? Mow? Garden?

2/10/2014 9:15:13 AM

I don't worry about it with my own dog in my own yard. We do pick it up in anyone else's yard out of courtesy since we take her on walks frequently. She is a small dog though so it's not a big deal at all for us.

No issues at all for us at our house though. We have just under .4 acres. We do mow of course but don't do hardly anything else in our yard (which is why I wish we had a smaller yard). Between mowing and weather it automagically disappears regularly, especially in the summer. No issues ever tracking it in the house or anything.

2/10/2014 11:21:54 AM

I don't worry about picking up after my dog either if he's in my yard, but my dog prefers going to the woods where nobody can see him.

wdprice3 be like:


in his yard


[Edited on February 10, 2014 at 1:44 PM. Reason : .]

2/10/2014 1:41:13 PM

I pretty much stop picking up poop between last mow of the fall and first mow of the spring. After that it's a weekly chore that gets done before each mow.

It's too damn cold in the winter, and nobody's outside walking on the lawn anyway.

2/10/2014 2:33:28 PM

This foster dog is good about only pooping in one or two spots in the yard, so I can do weekly pickup and never step in it. It's almost enough to make me want to keep him.

2/10/2014 2:35:25 PM

^^^haha

I trained mine to go in the woods, yehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

2/11/2014 9:51:17 AM

Quote :

"And you fuckes are sick for not picking up dog crap in your own yard. Do you all never do anything in your yards? Play? Mow? Garden?"

there is only one certain section of my yard i let the dog shit in.

2/11/2014 11:00:08 AM

shoveling snow

2/11/2014 4:43:23 PM

No snow here. Wanted to go to the store before it started, but I think the cold killed my car battery. The jumper is buried behind a bunch of crap, so I'm going to make the SO deal with it (or at least dig out the jumper thing that's supposed to be in my car anyway). Sucks because the car takes deep cycle batteries that aren't cheap.

2/11/2014 6:05:48 PM

Spent most of the weekend cleaning up the garage and it looks much better.
Now my house is a mess and I have a huge pile of junk in my spare bedroom that needs to get donated or sold. I'm not sure if I cleaned up or just moved stuff around.

[Edited on February 17, 2014 at 3:32 PM. Reason : l]

2/17/2014 3:31:37 PM

It's so frustrating having to sell all the crap you don't need, and at the same time needing to buy new crap. Trying to figure out what chair mats to get to protect the new wood flooring we are putting in the office, and get rid of some crap so there is less to move around while doing floors.

2/17/2014 3:58:43 PM

Yeah, I think I'm going to have to take the tax deduction for donating most of this stuff. I'll try to sell a few things though.

I'll probably try to sell the 1000' roll of coax, Thule roof racks with bike trays, extra set of Thule bike trays, and maybe some of the old circular saws, drills, etc if anyone is looking for that type of stuff.

I don't need any new crap though, so I've got that going for me.

[Edited on February 17, 2014 at 4:46 PM. Reason : l]

2/17/2014 4:46:30 PM

can anyone recommend a hydroseeder that services raleigh, and when's the best time to have it done?

tree shade + fallen leaves neglect has turned my yard into dirt

2/18/2014 8:57:17 AM

^ a few years back, I tried to find one to seed my backyard which had been stripped of all of it's topsoil by the builder, and they threw down some seed and straw in mid june. of course nothing grew except weeds and straw.

What I found was that the companies that did hydroseeding didn't really have an interest in residential lawns. Maybe that's changed now (this was 6 years ago). I ended up renting a slit-seeder from true value, and had pretty damn good results.

before:


after(2 years later):

2/18/2014 9:20:01 AM

Need to fix a moisture issue:

Back porch is a paver patio, uncovered for the most part. Directly underneath the back door, there is cedar siding that was placed for a foot or two. The sand and pavers were placed in direct contact with that siding.

Needless to say, I have rotted siding and am pulling out the patio (at least the top foot or two) and need to do it right.

What is the correct way to do a paver patio that comes up all the way to the side of the house? Do I just put some metal sheeting up against the side of the house extending down overlaying the foundation wall, and then trim over that? Do the sheeting and not add trim at all? What about the areas where there is no door, and its just siding that is rotting ... I do need to somehow get the sheeting up under the existing siding so that the rain runs down the siding and then over the sheeting?

[Edited on February 18, 2014 at 5:17 PM. Reason : .]

[Edited on February 18, 2014 at 5:18 PM. Reason : yeah yeah yeah, its called flashing]

2/18/2014 5:15:44 PM

During the snow storm last week, a tree fell on the house that I own and am renting out until I get enough equity to sell it. The property management company told me about it today. Gee, thanks guys!

2/19/2014 1:14:00 AM

I"m posting this here instead of classifieds since people are buying places and need furniture, or possibly looking for different furniture in their current places, but if any of you are looking for a quality couch, I have a 3 year old Thomasville fabric 3-seat sofa.

I'm the original owner, no pets, no smoking, no stains, and it's been covered with a thick cotton blanket the entire time I've owned it, and Scotchguarded.

I'm getting a new couch, and while I would like to hold on to this one, I could make the case for getting rid of this one to free up some space in my current place. It's basically this one:

http://www.thomasville.com/Furniture/Living-Room-Furniture/Upholstery-Leather/i301359-Highlife-3-Seat-Sofa.aspx

The color is Bantam Cream.

I had the springs fully replaced under warranty about two months ago due to them acknowledging that they had a bad batch of original springs (which reset the factory warranty on them), and they're about to completely replace the seat cushions, also under warranty. So it will essentially be almost a full factory refurb.



It's currently in DC, but I'm probably going to have my parents take it home to Raleigh with them and store it in their attic the next time they're up. Would happily let it go for $1000. I originally paid $1600 for it.

[Edited on February 19, 2014 at 1:31 PM. Reason : .]

2/19/2014 1:12:13 PM

You want $1000 for a couch that can't even survive 3 years of use?

2/20/2014 10:33:04 PM

Fuck HOAs. I bought a house in a neighborhood built in the 1940s, and don't need drama with people over dogs, chickens, or gardens. I'll do what I want on my property, and I'll ignore whatever people are doing on theirs.

2/20/2014 11:20:33 PM

^ which is all fine and dandy until the guy beside you decides to paint his house bright purple, never mow the grass, and put lawn gnomes all over his yard.

2/21/2014 12:35:29 AM

our HOA is considering levying an additional across the board fee because they want to take out some sort of sewage lifting pump that serves about 10 houses out of 100s, and directly connect them to the city sewage lines. the one time fee would be well over 100 bucks (of course they aren't telling us what it will be) AND our normal hoa dues will go up permanently.

Things about this that piss me off:
1. Current pump has malfunctioned because one of the houses has been abusing the system and dumping untold amounts of shit and chemicals down his toilet.
2. If the houses the pump serves could have been hooked up to the sewer system directly in the first place, why in gods name did they build this expensive pump to service so few homes?
3. A well managed HOA would have an emergency fund to cover such things that it could repay over several years by shaving other budget items.
4. This same HOA spent literally 10s of thousands of dollars on new pool umbrellas last year. pool umbrellas.

2/21/2014 7:44:55 AM

Do you not get a vote? Our HOA wanted to levy a $120 assessment to install new mailboxes, and we all voted it down and it didn't pass.

I say make it like a $20 assesssment for everyone, and let the homeowners directly impacted bear the brunt of the costs. They're probably also dumping "flushable" wipes down the tubes too.

2/21/2014 7:50:26 AM

lol HOAs. People always bitch and bitch about HOAs yet they continue to buy in communities that have HOAs.

I live in a non HOA community and none of my neighbors have bright pink houses, over grown lawns or a yard filled with broken down cars.

2/21/2014 8:02:26 AM

because almost every neighborhood built in the last 30 years is required to and has an HOA? It's not always as simple as, "find a neighborhood without an HOA"

2/21/2014 8:36:45 AM

Quote :

"You want $1000 for a couch that can't even survive 3 years of use?"

Cute.

But no. The springs were a factory defect. The seat cushions, I'm having replaced under warranty just because I can. They don't need it. But it was available to me, so why wouldn't I have them restuffed?

2/21/2014 8:37:12 AM