Stefan Viljoen wrote:
> Amazing! So in the US this is done too? I'm assuming though you live in some
> kind of gated community, not on a public, municipal plot?

Correct.

The way it works is, the builder buys a big plot of land. (400+ houses here, 
for example.) They attach rules to a deed saying how the property that isn't 
private is managed - like, everyone pays the same amount per household for 
maintenance of the street lights, who counts votes to see who runs the 
business bits, how investment of payments are handled before they're spent, 
when the fees get to go up, etc. Then when you buy the house, it's part of 
the deed to the house that you follow those rules. This lets the builder 
spend several years building and selling the houses without the fear that by 
the time he finishes building the last 100 houses the first 100 houses 
hasn't turned the neighborhood into a slum.

The government passes laws saying what kinds of rules you're allowed to 
enforce. You're not allowed to prohibit satellite dishes, you can't control 
how many people live in any given house, votes and memberships have to be 
done in particular ways, stuff like that.

But we have the same sort of rules you get from any local government. You 
have to ask if you want to paint your house a color that's not already in 
the neighborhood. You have to have at least a certain number of trees out 
front. You don't get to park overnight in the street without reason X or Y 
or Z. You can't park commercial vehicles in the street unless they're 
working for you at the time (so, no parking your own wood chipper in the 
street). Holiday decorations have to come down within a couple weeks of the 
holiday being over. Stuff like that. All intended to make the neighborhood 
look nicer, all pretty easy to follow if you intended to follow them when 
you bought the property. You can do anything you want with the inside of the 
house.

Other neighborhoods have different, stricter and messier rules. But you know 
that when you buy the house, so don't buy the house if you don't like those 
rules.

Of course there's all kinds of other building codes you have to follow too, 
from the actual government(s). You can't put wiring in the walls whose 
insulation turns into toxic fumes during a fire. You have to have an 
electric socket that shuts off when you get electrocuted if you install one 
near a sink or tub. Stuff like that. Some municipalities also control how 
you can put up fences, whether you have to have a sidewalk, and things like 
that, altho I expect that's enforced much less because nobody in the 
government really cares unless a neighbor complains. (For example, my 
parents have been in their house 50+ years. Nobody cares if the fence they 
have is the right type or is too close to the border of their property.)

Welcome to civilization. :-)

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

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