HOA demands trash be placed at the curb at precisely 7 AM, homeowners comply even though the truck comes at 6:30 AM, forcing HOA to change the rules when the neighborhood starts to stink: 'Bins stayed full all week. Smelled great in the heat'

• 
  via the blowup

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• “HOA said bins had to be out by 7 am, exactly.”

  “HOA sent an email reminding everyone that trash bins must be placed out no earlier and no later than 7 am on pickup day. They bolded it. Someone clearly complained. I usually put mine out the night before like everyone else, but ok.

  So I set an alarm for 6:55 am. Took the bin out at 7 on the dot. Same [thing] the next week. Same the week after. The problem is [that] the truck comes anywhere between 6:30 and 7. A few of us missed pickup because we were following the rule. Bins stayed full all week. Smelled great in the heat.

  Next HOA email says bins can be placed out 'The night before or early morning'.

  Alarm is off now. Bin’s back out the night before like always."

  -mistyform

• 
  via Egor Komarov

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• We've all been there, running after the garbage truck early in the morning, in nothing but a robe and slippers. It's probably the most aura shattering things that you can do. At least, owing to the early hours of the morning, there are very few people who will witness this humiliation ritual. Except, of course, for the garbage men themselves. You can't help but wonder how often the garbage men themselves probably witness this, and they probably get a good laugh out of it, and might even get a kick out of driving forward just a little bit further to force the trash can-toting pursuer to work for it. Definitely one of the perks of the job, along with all those sweet benefits they get. 

  After making this mistake a few times, though, you'll learn to save yourself the pain of dragging yourself out of bed all bleary-eyed, the cold realization dawning that it's now or never as you hear the truck passing your house to the neighbors. You almost manage to convince yourself that the trash can wait until next pickup before coming to your senses commiting to that jog down the street.  

• It's one of those weekly rituals that you grow accustomed to in your adult life, and almost find comforting in a way, a sign that another week has passed, and that order has been maintained. Plus, it's relieving to just be able to wheel all your trash out, only to pull the trash cans back in at the end of the day, and for it all to have miraculously appeared.

  Anyways, the point is that it's far easier to get your bins out the night before and have everything sorted rather than having to haul yourself out of bed and make that run down the street. It's just one of those cases where being organized and having all your ducks in a row saves you a lot of hardship in the longrun.

  That's what this homeowner was accustomed to doing: getting their bin out on the street the night before. That was until their HOA got involved and began insisting that all homeowners get their trash cans out to the street at precisely 7 AM on the dot. A rule that was unnecessarily pedantic, especially since the truck usually had already passed by around 30 minutes earlier. 

• 
  via Compagnons sigmund

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• 
  blackandwhitefield
  
  "Usually the township or whoever collects the trash posts times that trash should be curbed by. Would respond with that."
  
  
  StuckInTheUpsideDown
  
  "This is actually my litmus test for whether someone has an appropriate temperament to be on the HOA Board. "When should trash cans be placed by the curb?" Any response other than "Dunno, night before I guess" is immediately disqualifying.

  I don't know what it is with HOA Karens, but OMG they have many passionate opinions about trash cans. We all have them!"

• 
  via Jon Tyson

  _{The image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.}

• musthavesoundeffects
  
  I lived in a HOA that was pretty cool once. The president had been the same guy, Bill, since the development had started, about 15 years when I moved in. He was a retired wood/metal shop teacher on dis*bility and ran the HOA incredibly well. Common areas were well kept, yearly 4th of July party at the neighborhood park/clubhouse that was always great, and super mellow on the HOA violations, always working with people who were having a hard time keeping up with yard work and the like by organizing a volunteer group of neighbors to help out. I read the original CC&Rs when the HOA was first formed and the amendments, and he has systematically convinced the members to remove all the small nitpicky rules like paint colors, fence styles, etc.

  He told me there was only house that the HOA ever had to theaten with fines and it was because they had at big old sh*ty RV they kept parking in the street next to an intersection where you couldn’t see oncoming traffic. Great guy but he also probably gave it 20+ hours a week.

  He [passed] about a year after I moved in, and the VP convinced the members to get a management company to handle the HOA. Within a year everything had gone to sh** and our dues had almost doubled with less services, nobody volunteered anymore. I ended up selling and moving for work and never even looked at a house in an HOA after that. RIP Bill you were a unicorn and we didn’t deserve you.

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