What did you work on Today; Home Edition

[mbryson]

I should have taken a "before" picture but believe it or not, it looks a little better now


Magic bolt box to separate/sort and some junk to get rid of to go.

 

[Tonkaman]

I installed a new toilet in our main level bathroom and a screen door on our front door Saturday.

I’ve had the screen door for a while, so it was nice to get it out of the garage. We are loving leaving the door open and letting in fresh air.. especially because we can use the house fan to cool the house quicker now, as the front yard is shaded early. The back yard would still be sucking hot air for a couple more hours.

I’ve been wanting a new toilet for a long time, and this one was starting to cycle often and show wax at the bottom.. so it was a great time to change it all. We quickly found that we liked it waaaaay more than the old toilets upstairs, and we would all wait in line for the new one instead of going to the old toilets. First world problems for sure.
So today I decided to change the other two upstairs. Didn’t go awesome. Broken flanges, rotted wood, uneven flooring. 5 hours and additional trip to Home Depot later, it’s finally done.
Mind you, I’ve installed many toilets. Like many many. So none of that was new to me. I’ve experienced each of the issues I had today multiple times. No biggie.
I’ll bet half of the toilets I’ve installed have been this same brand/model.

But this was a first for me:

View attachment 165654

The wrong seat came in the box with the toilet. Now I get to call and get the right one sent over. 🤦🏼‍♂️
Maybe I can talk then into a discount on the next toilet I have to buy 🤷🏼‍♂️

Elaina is going to be so disappointed to find out that you didn’t join the ToTo fan club with us 😉

 

[jeeper]

Elaina is going to be so disappointed to find out that you didn’t join the ToTo fan club with us 😉

I tried.. but I couldn’t get a new mortgage loan in time.

But for reals.. it was a discussion. 😍 #someday

 

[N-Smooth]

I rented a mini-ex to plant 6 pretty large trees since our concrete is finally done. I took exactly 0 pics of that but when I was done and took the mini-ex over to spot on our HOA property that is “native plant landscaping” aka weeds and cleared it. we want to plant some raspberry bushes there and just hope they spread like wildfire. We (us and a couple neighbor homies) are also considering getting some beehive action going but we’ll see. Just trying to do cool stuff with the property around us and not take heat for it.

I was surprised by how well the blade cleared stuff, especially for a 1.7ton machine. I know the tracks help a ton though.

 

[nnnnnate]

What benefit do you get from the HOA?

 

[N-Smooth]

What benefit do you get from the HOA?

You mean generally or for doing stuff that we probably shouldn’t that doesn’t hurt anyone?

 

[nnnnnate]

I assume you're paying a monthly fee to be a part of the HOA. I'm just wondering what benefits they are providing you and your neighbors. Is there a pool? Clubhouse? Something else?

 

[STAG]

personally, any HOA neighborhood is a deal breaker to me.

I don’t agree with their rules.

But Nate is also a lot more curb-appeal compliant of a neighbor than I.

 

[nnnnnate]

personally, any HOA neighborhood is a deal breaker to me.

I don’t agree with their rules.

But Nate is also a lot more curb-appeal compliant of a neighbor than I.

That's why I'm wondering about the benefits.

 

[N-Smooth]

I assume you're paying a monthly fee to be a part of the HOA. I'm just wondering what benefits they are providing you and your neighbors. Is there a pool? Clubhouse? Something else?

Pool, hot tub, clubhouse and a metric sh*t-ton of open space (literal acres) that benefit us the most since we only have neighbors on one side. The landscapers don’t always do an awesome job of managing it and we’re doing our own pest control for the gophers (which I enjoy) but I don’t even care- it’s awesome here. Also, it’s only $85/month right now.

I also generally care about curb appeal and people keeping their stuff nice, like Chance said. I subscribe to the idea of if you don’t want to follow the rules, don’t move into a neighborhood with an HOA. It’s pretty simple.

 

[nnnnnate]

Do the HOA rules govern all aspects or the yard or just the front- street viewable spaces?

My backyard neighbor is pissing me off with the parking lot in his backyard. I just wonder if that's something that would typically be covered.

 

[mbryson]

Do the HOA rules govern all aspects or the yard or just the front- street viewable spaces?

My backyard neighbor is pissing me off with the parking lot in his backyard. I just wonder if that's something that would typically be covered.

When we were looking at a place to build/buy, some HOA had rather loose requirements and others were pretty restrictive. I think it varies. Ultimately we decided on NO HOA as we felt adding another layer of 'government' would push me over the edge at some point

Some folks like the HOA, we are not one of those. Our married kids have had two homes now in an HOA. They have mixed things to say about them. As mentioned above, it seems like a lot of newer developments have HOA. We decided not have one

 

[nnnnnate]

I didn't intend to make this a big thing about HOA's. I was just curious to know what Nate's benefits were.

 

[STAG]

One of @N-Smooth ’s favorite thing to tell me is that I was “being a bad neighbor” when I let my curb appeal get too low 😂

I really need a house on 5+ acres. I don’t want to be a good neighbor, I don’t want to be a neighbor 😂

 

[N-Smooth]

Do the HOA rules govern all aspects or the yard or just the front- street viewable spaces?

My backyard neighbor is pissing me off with the parking lot in his backyard. I just wonder if that's something that would typically be covered.

I’d have to read the CC&R’s again for backyard stuff. I do know all accessory structures: sheds, gazebos, pergolas, shops, decks etc are supposed to go through design review by the HOA but I don’t know if anyone has done that. For me it just adds a layer of someone I can reach out to if we have an issue with what someone is doing because the city is slow to handle anything at all. That feels “bitchy” and invasive to some and that’s fine, they should just never move into a neighborhood with an HOA. Believe me, I will have complaints about them and already have some minor ones actually but that’s mainly because our dev isn’t done so it’s managed by a company in AZ and we’re just another one of their clients basically. Once it’s owned by our people it’ll be interesting.

A part of me wants to have 10 acres in the mountains and never answer to anyone but for this phase of my life I’m happy where I’m at and it suits me well.

 

[N-Smooth]

One of @N-Smooth ’s favorite thing to tell me is that I was “being a bad neighbor” when I let my curb appeal get too low 😂

I really need a house on 5+ acres. I don’t want to be a good neighbor, I don’t want to be a neighbor 😂

I think that was more your favorite than mine 🤣 but yeah I’m not about dead lawn, no landscaping and cars on jackstands in the driveway. That doesn’t mean you can’t be about that but as with everything, I’ll tell you what I think because we’re friends. For better or worse, muchacho

 

[Stephen]

I’d have to read the CC&R’s again for backyard stuff. I do know all accessory structures: sheds, gazebos, pergolas, shops, decks etc are supposed to go through design review by the HOA but I don’t know if anyone has done that. For me it just adds a layer of someone I can reach out to if we have an issue with what someone is doing because the city is slow to handle anything at all. That feels “bitchy” and invasive to some and that’s fine, they should just never move into a neighborhood with an HOA. Believe me, I will have complaints about them and already have some minor ones actually but that’s mainly because our dev isn’t done so it’s managed by a company in AZ and we’re just another one of their clients basically. Once it’s owned by our people it’ll be interesting.

A part of me wants to have 10 acres in the mountains and never answer to anyone but for this phase of my life I’m happy where I’m at and it suits me well.

HOAs are only as good/bad as the people on the board. I have some friends who got on their boards just so they could influence the rules to their liking.

The converse is my brother in SG. He just does what he wants and tells the HOA to bill him. His house is nice and well maintained, he just parks his boat on the curb in the summer, has cars parked in his driveway, and built a splash pad in his backyard without permission. He's been there 16 years and every year he gets fined. He happily pays it because it's cheaper than paying for storage for the boat and cars. The HOA hates him.

 

[Spork]

I'm living in a non-hoa area, every couple of years the city comes around and tells people their weeds are too long or they can't have something on the street. The house next to me hasn't has grass for almost 5 years. It sold last year and I had hopes the new neighbor would do something but it's just turned into a storage yard for his vehicles at this point. I think I counted five trucks and 2 trailers at one point on a 1/4 acre lot. Guess it is safer than him parking his trailer on the street and rolling down the road to take out the house on the corner garage door...

 

[N-Smooth]

HOAs are only as good/bad as the people on the board. I have some friends who got on their boards just so they could influence the rules to their liking.

The converse is my brother in SG. He just does what he wants and tells the HOA to bill him. His house is nice and well maintained, he just parks his boat on the curb in the summer, has cars parked in his driveway, and built a splash pad in his backyard without permission. He's been there 16 years and every year he gets fined. He happily pays it because it's cheaper than paying for storage for the boat and cars. The HOA hates him.

That’s for sure. We have a great pack of neighbors in the houses surrounding us and we all pretty much assume we’ll want or need to take our turns being involved when the HOA is handed over. Our development is going to be huge, like 850 units huge so there will be issues with aligning priorities throughout etc. I’m really hoping we can break it up into a bunch of sub-associations to make it easier.

 

[jeeper]

Hoa’s are the only thing worse than government.

But I still think most of Utah’s are better than the Hoa’s in Texas and Florida. There have been some crazy stories out there.