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Comment by nlh | Hacker News Reader

This is probably an insanely pessimistic view, but my first instinct after reading this is that there's got to be some absolute misery juuuuuuust below the surface of this place.

Having seen and dealt with lots of HOAs (and seen how incalculably awful they can be), I've got to imagine that life in The Villages is probably pretty good if you play along with all the rules, trim your hedges just so, and keep paying those dues and growing old quickly and quietly. But if you're the kind of person who wants to change something, or is unhappy about something, or wants to improve something, or wants to do something even a tiny bit outside the boundaries, life gets rough pretty quickly. "I'm sorry, the board has decided you cannot do that." ... "I'm sorry, this decision is final." ... "I'm sorry, you must comply."

In short: The Villages is probably pretty nice if you're a follower, and pretty nice if you're an owner, and probably pretty awful for anyone else.

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During the Boom, I worked on some Del Webb communities after the brand was purchased by Pulte. There are two major segments to which retirement communities are marketed:

+ Retired to Play

+ Retired to Save

From a community perspective, this means that you have people who are wealthy purchasing very modest houses right alongside blue collar retirees and talking grand children and exchanging lawn fertilizers over coffee and beers. And you have blue collar and corporate VP retirees playing golf together on Tuesday morning...and one of them may live in a 3000 square foot house and the other in 1150 and there's not a good bet as to which one owns which house.

Retirement communities aren't like typical homeowner associations. There's much more self selection of residents - people don't move to a place like the Villages because of a job or schools or generally without the knowledge that they are buying into a particular image of the 'retirement lifestyle'. To put it another way, the set of people for whom a community with lots of golf courses holds appeal does not strongly overlap the set of people who take great pride in non-conformance to the social norms of golf course communities.

Unlike a general golf course community however, there isn't so much moving there because it's 'right neighborhood'. People have sorted themselves out. They're not climbing the corporate ladder. They've been there and done that. That's not to say that there aren't insecure people, just that there tend to be a lot more people with a mature sense of identity on the balance.

I've seen HOAs that are both full of petty bureaucrats with unresolved anger issues, and ones that are out to make the community as widely accommodating as possible. No way to know without actually going and talking to folks.

That said, any community with the ability to push out people unwilling to abide by the communities standards will have a higher satisfaction rating with members of the community. Whether it is by incarcerating people who violate laws (general practice in most US cities), disallowing member to said people (common in private clubs), or killing and torturing their families (seems to be a technique used in less civilized places).

Some friends of mine have speculated what a retirement home for hackers would look like. Basically catering to folks who have strong opinions about "how" to live their lives. It isn't an easy question to answer.

I think it would be a retirement home for people that aren't hackers anymore. The idealized notion of a hacker is someone that is engaged with life and that sort of person, in my observation, doesn't end up in a retirement home.

On the contrary, the idealised hacker loves having someone else take care of the base needs, so they can keep working on their 'thing'. Nothing in a retirement village forces you off the computer or workbench, out of your home and onto the golf course. As long as what you're hacking does comply with keeping the place looking neat and tidy (most hacker hobbies aren't at odds with this), I don't see a conflict between the two.

> I've seen HOAs that are both full of petty bureaucrats with unresolved anger issues, and ones that are out to make the community as widely accommodating as possible. No way to know without actually going and talking to folks.

The real problem is that the association members could change overnight and there isn't really anything you can do to stop it.

The key element is a shared opinion about how other people 'should' behave. That's what makes golf courses a successful focal point for retirement communities in a way that say a shared interest in hunting probably can't.

You're right about a key element being a (broadly defined) set of common values. But hunting also includes a broadly defined set of common values: appreciation for the land and conservation, love of marksmanship, support for 2A rights, etc. Which is why, of course, hunting-based mostly-retirement communities like Brays Island exist:

http://www.braysisland.org/ "Recognized by enthusiasts as one of the premier locations for bird hunting in the southeast, Brays Island provides everything you need for a memorable and productive hunt. Of the island's 5,500 acres, 3,500 are untouched woods, marshes and fields set aside as nature preserves to guarantee your hunting enjoyment..."

"The Brays Island Gun Club is the premier site for the enjoyment of shooting sports. With the finest facilities for clay shooting, we offer numerous forms of target shooting, including skeet, trap, five-stand, plus a newly re-designed sporting clays course featuring a picturesque 15 stations..."

I'm not a hunter, but the inn looks quite pleasant. I'd go there for a visit if I were retired.

It looks lovely, but it's just another development of million dollar homes in the South Carolina Low Country. 325 houses on 5500 acres is not at the same scale as The Villages or a Sun City...The original Sun City is some 25000 residents. Neghboring Sun City West is about the same. Even the run of the mill Sun City Texas is slated for a 7500 home build out.

> support for 2A rights

Maybe that's true, but do you know this or are you speculating? I'm asking because I'm from Norway - a country with one of the highest percentages of gun ownership in the world - almost exclusively hunting rifles and shotguns -, yet where most people would be absolutely horrified if anyone tried to push through a "US style" liberalisation of gun laws. We have very strict gun laws, both in terms of licensing, what type of weapons are allowed, and storage.

Maybe hunting is much more tied to a specific sub-culture in the US than it is internationally, I guess.

Gun Ownership as an expression of the Second Amendment culture in the US is different from hunting culture as you expect. There's an overlap of course, but there are distinct differences between people who primarily own guns as an end in itself and those who primarily own guns as a means of hunting. The NRA has developed political clout by appealing to both groups of gun owners.

>Maybe that's true, but do you know this or are you speculating?

I spent a few years covering 2A topics for CBS News.com (this is before I left to found Recent.io). This is true in my experience. As <brudgers> says, you can be interested in shooting sports without being interested in hunting, but I've found that both groups of people tend to be broadly pro-2A.

Note this may not have been true a generation or so ago. But since then, we've seen a ratchet effect where anti-gun politicians have tried to impose more and more restrictions. One effect has been to turn the NRA into the potent political force it is today. This coincided with the rise of the anti-gun left, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who in this clip seems to say she wanted to ban all guns (or all rifles?) but didn't have enough votes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rA6oX6eWWs Barack Obama, or his aide, filled out a questionnaire in 1996 saying he supported a state law banning the "manufacture, sale, and possession of handguns": http://www.politico.com/static/PPM41_obamaquestionaire1newes... http://www.politico.com/static/PPM41_obamaquestionaire2.html San Francisco tried to ban possession of all handguns: http://mccullagh.org/sf/handgun-ban/ And so on.

This has been done in the name of cracking down on gun crimes. But the same weapon that can drop a 250-lb deer can also drop a 180-lb man, and even casual gun owners have become politically active and aware in a way they were not a generation ago (when politicians on the left were not as anti-gun as they are today). Also some of the recent wave of anti-gun legislation sweeps in weapons used for hunting purposes, which helps to explain this support for 2A rights.

Here's an ad for a gun-based community as imagined by Negativeland: Sycamore.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhaAOjy5ow4

Retirement home for hackers better include many gaming parties, hackathons, game jams, local tech conferences, ... Actually that sounds pretty awesome. How many years until there are enough retiring hackers for that to be possible.

It's 98% white, and nobody under 19 is permitted to live there without an exemption. I think it's fair to say that most people living there are actively opposed to change and diversity. HOAs are actually pretty popular in the south as a legal way of keeping the "wrong" types out -- people with large or multi-generational families, for instance.

Fair? That's far from fair. You basically just called them all racists.

Fair not as in it's the fair way to behave, but that it's a fairly accurate description of what's going on. The parent's not condoning the community's exclusionary practices.

It doesn't look like he called anyone a racist. Look, I'm a minority and a place like this doesn't interest me at all. Not now and certainly not as I get closer to retirement. After a certain point (say 85%) you reach a tipping point where even if you wanted a diverse community it will be impossible to create.

I know this because I was a participant in my university's minority recruitment program. They reached that tipping point and didn't realize it. No matter how much money they threw at it the numbers went down every year. Minority (specifically, black, native american, islanders and hispanic) students would arrive freshman year and transfer sophomore year. While this is typical in the entire student body it was dramatically higher for minority students. When I asked some of the students why they transfer a typical answer was lack of restaurants, shops, activities, and community that cater to them.

A place doesn't have to be or do anything racist. After a while people self select and know where they aren't wanted or catered to.

It's interesting how having all universities become 40% (or whatever) minority is "diversity" but having very different universities where some are all white and some are mostly minority is not diversity. I would argue the latter constitutes more diversity.

What race did he say they were against?

If someone doesn't like following rules "just so", my guess is they would/could/should have invested their retirement money in a nice cabin in the woods or a penthouse in the urban jungle, depending on their particular non-conformist bent.

If trimming hedges, conforming to someone else's ideal of hedge-height, is not your cup of tea, then why would you want to waste your golden years playing the angry old man (or woman) in the first place? Life is too short, especially at that juncture, to be wasted on rule-rage.

I think most people who want to live in a planned-out corporate retirement community with 42 golf courses are not bold iconoclasts looking to stir the pot. I'd guess that most people who move there know that they are trading conformity for predictability and are probably happy with the decision.

When you move into a retirement village you expect a draconian HOA. It comes with the turf. And old folks make a de facto government out of it, because they have nothing better to do. But that's generally expected and most just deal with it.

I left a comment about this, but the misery is on its way in the form of an unmanageable wave of long term medical care that local services can't keep up with. Putting hundreds of thousands of elderly citizens in an area without sufficient medical or social services is a recipe for some really sub-par end-of-life care that I don't think many of these folks really understand

I've heard about HOAs, and I think you're probably right. There's no such thing over here, and if there was, people just wouldn't listen. I'm regularly amazed people in the US put up with them whenever I heard about them. What would happen if you ignored them? As long as you aren't renting, you can't be kicked out; do they just give a UN-style "Please stop or we will have to give you a disapproving note"?

  > What would happen if you ignored them? As long as you aren't renting, you can't be kicked out

Actually, it depends. If you don't pay your HOA fees, or HOA imposed fines, some contracts (you have to sign before buying the home in the HOA) say they can foreclose your property and sell it at auction for whatever -- I think it has to be at least the amount of the unpaid fees though.

I guess then my reaction is "what idiot would sign a contract like that?", but I guess desperation in most areas if there is a lack of other housing. After all, some people put up with living in London/San Francisco/New York/etc. where they will likely never own a home unless they win the lottery, so I guess if the need is high enough, people will put up with some truly terrible situations with where they live.

The reason people "put up" with HOAs is that nearly all HOAs are benevolent, passive organizations that do little more than keep the books and ensure common areas are adequately maintained. The most draconian most get is enforcement of landscaping standards and parking rules, which to me is 100% ok. I'm joining my HOA's board this summer, and the only thing I really intend to try and do that goes beyond that is to add a basketball court at one end of the swimming pool parking lot, and to repair some of the broken fencing along the greenways. The worst the current board infringed upon my rights was to deny my request to paint my front door red, using the justification that it doesn't go with the neighborhood's color palette. <banghead> They're right, but considering what some other neighbors have done with their doors (stick on faux stained glass anyone?), I was a bit miffed.

For all the horror stories you hear about HOAs, there are thousands of them that are not overbearing and do serve the general interest of the community without irritating the homeowners.

Myself, I find that overbearing and authoritarian. I definitely wouldn't live under their control (especially not if they have the power to make me homeless), but each to their own, I guess.

I have never heard of HOA having a foreclosure clause. Most apply a lien on your home so you cant sell until you reconcile with the HOA. Most times I have heard they will remove the lien just so you will leave.

If you dont obey the rules or pay them they will get a lien put on you mortgage and you will unable to sell the home.

Dont believe the fear mongering on the internet, most HOAs arent terribly bad (you only hear the horror stories). As long as you dont paint your house a crazy color or park a massive RV in the driveway they will not be too much of a bother. If anything they are usually just doing things to protect the community or make it more desirable, its just sometimes they screw a few residents over for the better of the community.

> As long as you dont paint your house a crazy color or park a massive RV in the driveway they will not be too much of a bother. If anything they are usually just doing things to protect the community or make it more desirable, its just sometimes they screw a few residents over for the better of the community.

How does stopping someone parking their vehicle on their private property or painting their own house any colour they choose "protecting the community?"

You say that "HOAs aren't as terrible [as the internet would have you believe]" but based on what you said next I'm starting to wonder if they in fact are, but your standards for what they should be allowed to do are far too lax.

The only things I'd want a HOA to do is deal with noise violations, illegal parking, and maybe issues from a property which directly impact people living either side (e.g. smells, health issues -- like trash piling up, noise, etc).

There were two parts I said. Protecting the community or make it more desirable, the latter is what the painting/RV issue would fall under. For some people the Stepford Wive's type of place is very desirable, for people like us probably not...HN doesnt seem like the cookie cutter crowd.

>The only things I'd want a HOA to do is deal with noise violations, illegal parking, and maybe issues from a property which directly impact people living either side (e.g. smells, health issues -- like trash piling up, noise, etc).

In my experience this is what kind of issues the HOA dealt with when I lived in a town home and a condo community (2 separate places). For example, where my parents live they have much more restrictions but now that the community is over a decade old they are relaxing some restrictions.

There are ways around this, buy your own property and build a house on it then join the closest tennis/pool membership you can find, most older neighborhoods allow outside residents to join.

To each his own my friend. HOAs are allowed to do this because the residents support it and often times encourage the practices. If this is a major problem dont move into an HOA neighborhood plain and simple. I dont live in one right now and my grass is very high :-). If someone has a problem with that they can see my middle finger.

>How does stopping someone parking their vehicle on their private property or painting their own house any colour they choose "protecting the community?"

I have to agree. That's a completely unnecessary and arbitrary restriction on personal freedom.

Exactly - I'd be fine with this kind of thing, but they need/should have some kind of legal restriction to that level.

Again you guys are only focusing on one point I made. They also make rules to govern the look and feel.

Have you ever lived in an apartment that had rules? Its the same concept. No one is forcing anyone to move into these communities there is plenty of land to build your own house.

>Have you ever lived in an apartment that had rules?

Yeah, don't make noise after 11pm. Not some completely arbitrary standards on how stuff must look.

It strikes me as odd that you are so against this topic yet you have never had to deal with these rules/associations.

I am also against slavery but I've never been a slave. Does that strike you as odd too?

You can form an opinion on something with available facts. First hand experience can help one form or inform their opinion, but lack of that doesn't discount anything.

If you want to play that card then the majority of people's opinions on most common discussion topics is invalid (e.g. sexism, homophobia, racism, etc). If you're a white male then just don't talk about this stuff because, according to your logic, without first hand experience their opinion is invalid.

Whoa now, dont compare HOAs to something like slavery.

Slavery, sexism, homophobia, gay etc. those are not choices. Living in an HOA is a choice that you or I have to make. If you dont like them dont live in them, why would you want to destroy something you have a choice about. Others like these places, if they didnt there wouldnt be HOAs.

that wasn't a comparison but an analogy and the meaning is quite clear: you can have strong opinion about topics without direct experience.

> Whoa now, dont compare HOAs to something like slavery.

As you well know, I did not.

I was making light of your asserting that you cannot have an opinion on a topic unless you experience it first hand. Slavery, murder, racism, sexism, etc are all areas where this kind of thinking is flawed.

> Living in an HOA is a choice that you or I have to make.

Nonsense. There are cities where HOAs make up almost all of the "nice" areas. Is it a choice when there is no viable alternative? Also HOAs always expand but then never go away, so in the future your choice will naturally shrink more and more.

> Others like these places, if they didnt there wouldnt be HOAs.

Maybe others didn't have a choice either?

When driving through the area, I've spoken with a few of the residents, and they seem to enjoy it from what they told me. You have to remember that they're all among their peers.

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