I feel sick inside-fence budget buster!

[Swimalie]

You're kidding, right?

No one measures the length of their grass ~ unless it's knee high.

Not kidding at all. Our neighbor cuts his too low and then it burns in the summer. We keeps ours around 3 inches and ours is one of the best looking, according to a bunch of our neighbors, on the street. There is a line between my lawn and my neighbors and the lawn is from the burn due to my neighbor having his mower too short and causing his lawn to burn. Plus, the 3 inches are recommended by our lawn company.

 

[MightyMom]

I need to just fix it and not care about what people think.

That's right girl. I think you screwed up by taking the advice of the contractor.... but what's done is done. Now you have to just turn the fence around.... should be a fairly easy fix. Someone suggested just turning the boards.... and I expect it should really be that easy for the contractor to do if you can't do it yourself. Don't stress over it. Protecting your kids is your first priority... if your neighbors can't understand that.... well.... I would tell them where they can shove one of those boards.

 

[princessmorgan]

That's right girl. I think you screwed up by taking the advice of the contractor.... but what's done is done. Now you have to just turn the fence around.... should be a fairly easy fix. Someone suggested just turning the boards.... and I expect it should really be that easy for the contractor to do if you can't do it yourself. Don't stress over it. Protecting your kids is your first priority... if your neighbors can't understand that.... well.... I would tell them where they can shove one of those boards.

Part of me wants to start hanging signs on my fence everyday to tell the neighbors what I think of them and their fences. I wish the fix was as easy as turning the boards around, but our property is sloped, so the bottoms of the boards are angled and if we turn them around then they'll be angled the wrong way. Also we have a dip in the fence at the top all around that looks like a scallop and same thing, can't just turn the board. Oh well, you live and you learn I guess.

 

[tinkarooni]

I agree! And now with all the neighbors coming out of the woodworks to voice their opinion, I'm really glad I got this privacy fence. I just talked to the HOA president who said our fence is the neighborhood gossip. I guess I'm really naive about things, but I have no idea why this fence bothers other people in the neighborhood. It's just a pine privacy fence. We didn't paint it a funny color, we put a dip in it on the top, so it wouldn't look so prison like. We live right next to a walking path, so a lot of people and their dogs walk by, and I just wanted my kids to be safe. I need to just fix it and not care about what people think.

Wow OP your whole story takes me back. DH and I used to live in a planned unit development like yours and requested and recvd permission to build exactly your fence. Picket privacy fence, unpainted with the scallop in the top. Well we only lived there for a short time and we kind of got the feeling maybe the neighbors didn't like us. This one old guy on the one side of us kept using our yard for his dump. One night we were eating dinner and we watched him walk a coffee can into our back yard and throw it over the hill. I went right outside and retrieved it, it was full of greasy rags, took it over to his garage and gave it back to him and told him not to throw his trash in our yard anymore. After that he must have been complaining about us to the neighbors, so the day our fence goes in we created quite a stir....all the neighbors were in the street pointing at our fence and getting quite angry. All they needed were torches and it had all the makings of an angry mob. DH and I looked out through the curtains, peeking and couldn't figure out what all the fuss was about. The fence.....all this fuss about a fence. Mine even had the pretty side out. I just don't get people.

 

[princessmorgan]

Wow OP your whole story takes me back. DH and I used to live in a planned unit development like yours and requested and recvd permission to build exactly your fence. Picket privacy fence, unpainted with the scallop in the top. Well we only lived there for a short time and we kind of got the feeling maybe the neighbors didn't like us. This one old guy on the one side of us kept using our yard for his dump. One night we were eating dinner and we watched him walk a coffee can into our back yard and throw it over the hill. I went right outside and retrieved it, it was full of greasy rags, took it over to his garage and gave it back to him and told him not to throw his trash in our yard anymore. After that he must have been complaining about us to the neighbors, so the day our fence goes in we created quite a stir....all the neighbors were in the street pointing at our fence and getting quite angry. All they needed were torches and it had all the makings of an angry mob. DH and I looked out through the curtains, peeking and couldn't figure out what all the fuss was about. The fence.....all this fuss about a fence. Mine even had the pretty side out. I just don't get people.

I can definitely feel your pain!

Well I just sucked it up, fixed the fence, and honestly it doesn't look as bad as I thought with the double sided boards. You can hardly tell. They just finished it and I'm just happy it's over with. I think the HOA pres is happy, too, and hopefully the neighbors can just deal with it now. They can now see a pretty side of the fence. Now I'm going to make some Toy Story Alien cupcakes for my kids and myself!

 

[Swimalie]

I can definitely feel your pain!

Well I just sucked it up, fixed the fence, and honestly it doesn't look as bad as I thought with the double sided boards. You can hardly tell. They just finished it and I'm just happy it's over with. I think the HOA pres is happy, too, and hopefully the neighbors can just deal with it now. They can now see a pretty side of the fence. Now I'm going to make some Toy Story Alien cupcakes for my kids and myself!

I'm glad its fixed.

 

[plummer925]

I can definitely feel your pain!

Well I just sucked it up, fixed the fence, and honestly it doesn't look as bad as I thought with the double sided boards. You can hardly tell. They just finished it and I'm just happy it's over with. I think the HOA pres is happy, too, and hopefully the neighbors can just deal with it now. They can now see a pretty side of the fence. Now I'm going to make some Toy Story Alien cupcakes for my kids and myself!

Glad you fixed it...enjoy the cupcakes!!

I know that *I* have learned a lesson from this...to never live in an Association. I live in the country and can do somewhat what I please (I do live in a historic area, so I do need permission from the town for some things). I think if I had gone through the drama you just had to go through I would have fixed the fence, then hung a "for sale" sign on it and moved out of there (NOT saying you should do that at all...I just have no patience for things like that...)

 

[luvsJack]

Glad you fixed it...enjoy the cupcakes!!

I know that *I* have learned a lesson from this...to never live in an Association. I live in the country and can do somewhat what I please (I do live in a historic area, so I do need permission from the town for some things). I think if I had gone through the drama you just had to go through I would have fixed the fence, then hung a "for sale" sign on it and moved out of there (NOT saying you should do that at all...I just have no patience for things like that...)

That's us and why I wouldn't live anywhere else!! It is crazy the drama people have to go through just to take care of who and what is theirs!!

Glad you got it fixed, OP. One less thing to stress about.

 

[BellePrincessBelle]

Sorry - but everyone knows that the "pretty" side of the fence has to face the street and/or neighbors.

Many places have this rule. There are quite a few suburbs that enforce this.

Not true. The town I had lived in had that code my current town does not & my nice side faces in to me. I didn't put the fence up the previous owner did but I verified with the town that it was ok before I bought the house.

 

[bettymae1121]

My goodness, where do you all live that this is enforced? I can see a development, but just a random house in a city/town can be told what to do? I pay my city taxes, I keep my property nice, and I am a good neighbor. If I want to pay $6000 for a fence and have the nice side face in so I can see it, I will. And nobody around here can tell me otherwise.

Not all, of course, but many towns/cities/counties have such rules on the books. Mine does. In addition to having the nice side of the fence facing out, you aren't allowed to have fire pits (or any fires not used for cooking, a baraque grill is fine, a bonfire is not), you aren't allowed to have more than a certain number of pets (can't remember the numbers, but I do remember seeing that) you have to have your grass under a certain height, and I'm sure there's more. If you violate an ordinence you will be fined, if you don't correct the problem after a certain number of days, they'll keep fining you daily until it's fixed. I have no idea what happens if you refuse to pay the fine and/or fix it but I'm sure it's not good, whatever it is.

 

[dzorn]

What is the "right" way to cut your grass?

Maggie

In our case it would be at all. She never mowed the entire year last year.

Denise in MI

 

[r&kmommy]

My town is hundreds of years old (my house is 100 years old), and you need to get a varience from the town to build a fence, and the pretty side needs to face the street, and you can't have a fence if you live on a corner lot, because part of it would be considered frontage, and you can't have a front fence. You also need a permit to cut down a tree on your property, and pay for that permit.

We need a permit to build a NEW fence, but not to replace one; same thing for a pool (we replaced our pool last summer and didn't need a permit). We DO have to get a permit to cut down a tree over 6 feet tall.

As for the communist/facist definition, thanks for the clarification... I can't believe I've been using the wrong term all these years!

 

[r&kmommy]

..... In addition to having the nice side of the fence facing out, you aren't allowed to have fire pits (or any fires not used for cooking, a baraque grill is fine, a bonfire is not), you aren't allowed to have more than a certain number of pets (can't remember the numbers, but I do remember seeing that) you have to have your grass under a certain height, and I'm sure there's more. If you violate an ordinence you will be fined, if you don't correct the problem after a certain number of days, they'll keep fining you daily until it's fixed. I have no idea what happens if you refuse to pay the fine and/or fix it but I'm sure it's not good, whatever it is.

Move to New Hampshire! Live Free or Die is our state motto

I can look out my bathroom window upstairs, see into 8 surrounding yard and 4 of them have fire pits LOL! Pits are as common as pools and sheds around here

It's so interesting to read about different peoples' experiences and rules and such!

OP - SO glad your ordeal is over! Have a cupcake for us!

 

[distherapy]

I think if I had gone through the drama you just had to go through I would have fixed the fence, then hung a "for sale" sign on it and moved out of there

Just had to laugh because you couldn't do THAT in my neighborhood! No signs allowed (no political signs, no "for sale" signs, nothing!)! It's an old neighborhood (~100 years) but it's MUCH better than our previous neighborhood in Virginia - the HOA there took a homeowner all the way to the Supreme Court. The guy lost and had to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for the neighborhood's legal fees...

 

[emma'smom]

Well...just to take a different point of view. Our HOA limits fences and I am glad.

We have a beautiful set of backyards behind us...it's like a sweeping golf course dotted with play sets that all the kids in the neighborhood love to run up and down. The views add a lot to the value of the homes. Everyone keeps their grass cut and their yards picked up. If anyone were to put up a fence, it would take away from the charm for everyone (and make houses harder to sell in the future).


A neighbor up on the corner put up a fence that violates the HOA rules and it is very ugly-- an eysore. It's a 6 foot, two-toned vinyl fence. Why have a yard, if you want to live surrounded by plastic?

 

[bettymae1121]

Just had to laugh because you couldn't do THAT in my neighborhood! No signs allowed (no political signs, no "for sale" signs, nothing!)! It's an old neighborhood (~100 years) but it's MUCH better than our previous neighborhood in Virginia - the HOA there took a homeowner all the way to the Supreme Court. The guy lost and had to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for the neighborhood's legal fees...

What on EARTH were they fighting over?

 

[HunnyPots]

Well...just to take a different point of view. Our HOA limits fences and I am glad.

We have a beautiful set of backyards behind us...it's like a sweeping golf course dotted with play sets that all the kids in the neighborhood love to run up and down. The views add a lot to the value of the homes. Everyone keeps their grass cut and their yards picked up. If anyone were to put up a fence, it would take away from the charm for everyone (and make houses harder to sell in the future).


A neighbor up on the corner put up a fence that violates the HOA rules and it is very ugly-- an eysore. It's a 6 foot, two-toned vinyl fence. Why have a yard, if you want to live surrounded by plastic?

Personally, I can't imagine living without a fenced backyard. OK, maybe not two-toned vinyl, but I want the option of spending time in my backyard without the entire neighborhood being invited to watch. I agree with the old saying, "good fences make good neighbors"!

Glad it works for you, but I would never even consider buying in a neighborhood like yours.

 

[LilyWDW]

Why have a yard, if you want to live surrounded by plastic?

Because I have two yellow labs and would be devastated if something happened to them without a fenced yard?

Because I don't want other peoples animals and children to trespass on my property and then be sued when they injure themselves?

Because I want to limit the number of wild animals getting into my yard?

There are many reasons to have a fenced in yard. These are only 3 that pertain to me.

 

[distherapy]

What on EARTH were they fighting over?

A flagpole. It was sad, actually, because the homeowner kept saying they wouldn't let him fly an American flag and it was his patriotic right. Which, of course, it certainly is and we were all allowed to fly American flags, but we weren't allowed to install commercial flagpoles with giant flags (not quite car dealer size, but close...).

from an article about it - "The last big flag flap in the Richmond area – Richard Oulton versus the Wyndham subdivision - ground on from 1999 to 2003 and went all the way to the Supreme Court, which refused to hear the case.

In the end, combat veteran Oulton got a tongue lashing from the judge in the case, who came within a whisker of tossing the former Navy medical corpsman in jail.

"It's about nothing more than about you complying with the covenants that you agreed to," Henrico County Circuit Judge L.A. Harris Jr. said in 2003. "The saddest thing about this entire case . . . is that you somewhat made a mockery of the people and the system you claim to honor."
"

HOAs are required to provide their covenants when you buy a home in the neighborhood. We can sign the documents and buy the house, but we have to abide by the covenants.