The origin of?

Question:Does anyone know the origin, platform and model of what has now become the "Homeowners Associations"?
and, how it has been able to grow into the entity that it is now?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Does anyone know the origin, platform and model of what has now become the "Homeowners Associations"?
and, how it has been able to grow into the entity that it is now?

Norfolk, Virginia -
Sometimes, history can be painful to look at. When we see with stark clarity the brutality, hypocrises and inhumanity, we want to wince and turn away. Occasionally, we see moments of greatness and kindness, and we rejoice in them.

However, as the present is profoundly shaped by the past, we need to look at it, warts and all - if for no other reason, than to help us better see the present. In the midst of a historical situation, the participants may not always see their present with the clarity that future generations may be able to. Self-denial, self-delusion, the tyranny of the present, all may shield a participant from the full reality of what they are doing. What will Americans think 200 years from now (if there are any!) about the explosive growth of homeowner associations in the latter part of 20th. century, and the early years of the 21st.? History may provide us some clues.

Take Thomas Jefferson, for example, the 3rd. president of the United States (1801-1809). Nobody spoke with the same eloquence about human rights as he did. He wrote about the universal rights of man, that we are all endowed with the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Yet, as we know, he possessed over 100 slaves when he wrote those stirring words. Since 1998, we have known that DNA testing has shown that he had children by one of those slaves.

He wrote about the inherent right to private property - that nobody has a right to take another's property, yet he simultaneously advocated and engineered that the lands of the Native Americans west of the Appallachians be taken from them. At one point, he even spoke about exterminating the Native Americans. He was in favor of a law allowing Native Americans to buy on credit, so that if the debt was not paid, their land could be taken as compensation.

Of course, there are no more lands to be taken from Native Americans any more, but the quest for taking - or theft - has not thereby withered on the vine. It lives on vigorously in new and different forms.

Homeowner associations represent one of the newer manifestations of this quest. The essence of them is control in order to take money - and in certain circumstances - the property itself. They do this by taking away many of the traditional rights of homeowners - and property is defined legally as a bundle of rights. Once upon a time, a homeowner could plant his own flowers in his garden. Now he cannot. Once upon a time, a homeowner could leave his garage door open for as long as he wanted. Now, the aesthetics police will give him a ticket.

From a narrow perspective, these examples may seem small and inconsequential. But when one considers the overarching backdrop to them, the picture is very different. They come as the result of a confluence of incestuous forces whose common denominator is money - or at some point, your property.

Developers realized that you could make more money by mass producing housing on empty land in suburbs. Cities and counties realized that they could raise taxes from these by not raising taxes - but by calling them fees. Developers were required to put in the roads and lighting and schools, and the homeowners had to pay the fees for these - aka assessments. Of course, they still had to pay the same taxes as those homeowners who did not live in homeowner associations.

Developers now realized that they had to set up each homeowner association as a mini-government, and lo and behold - the lawyers appeared on the scene to lend a helping - and often - grasping hand. They now saw a steady stream of income. To augment this, they relied on the old principle that complexity is cash, and began to lobby - and make donations to - their favorite lawmakers. The latter - realizing that they too could get a steady stream of campaign contributions from the these well-heeled lawyers, gladly complied and gave the lawyers such plums as non-judicial foreclosure.

Insurance companies joined the party by having legislatures mandate that all homeowner associations carry insurance. New industries such as management and gardening companies sprang into life - all drawing from the life blood of the homeowner - who, by this point, looked like a patient on a hospital bed with multiple needles plugged into him, draining every available resource.

The circumstances may change, but the central paradigm remains the same - command and control. The land of the Native Americans was physically taken from them. Today, the land may be physically in the name of the homeowner, but he is bereft of the superstructure that has traditionally been part of the ownership of land. He is owner in name only. Everything else is effectively owned by others. Of course, in some cases, the "others" take his property also in foreclosure - but this is the icing on the cake for them. The day-to-day bread and butter is the total control that they exercise over the homeowner, because that brings the lawyers, managers etc. their daily bread.

The fundamental cast of mind that allowed people in Jefferson's day to take the land of the Native Americans, also operates today in homeowner associations. The latter are constructed to be asset delivery devices to lawyers, managers, politicians - upon which they can effortlessly draw.

In the midst of all these entangling webs is the homeowner. Unable to buy elsewhere because one of the coalition partners - the cities and counties - have now mandated that most new housing be in homeowner associations, he feels very unfree in the land of the free.

And if he goes to court, he is likely to be treated as a Native American would have been if he had protested the taking of his land in court. Much of the judiciary is part of the grand coalition that keeps the good times rolling for its members.

Until one recognizes the extent and scope of the problem, one can be blinded by the neatly mowed lawns and stereotyped flower beds. A gated community may afford one some measure of protection against hostile outside forces - but it does nothing to protect you from the hostile forces within - and you have no way out.

One of the central challenges facing the U.S. today is whether it has the intestinal fortitude to obliterate the corporate control that strangles so much of its life - whether in the area of homeowner associations, mass-produced food, mass-produced entertainment (even the jokes are manufactured in corporate suites!), pervasive mind control in the media and much more.

The vitality of a nation depends on its ability to meet these challenges. That ability depends on understanding what is truly going on. Otherwise, the long shadow of history will turn into a night, from which there is no dawn.

Could you add a little more info to your question ? thanks

Could you possibly explain why you posted this in philosophy? Homeowner association goes all the way back to the cave, is modeled on the clan and exists only because of capitalism.Marx rolls in his grave....