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Hello everyone and Welcome to another
episode of Selling Greenville your
favorite real estate podcast here in the
lovely Greenville area of South Carolina
I am your host as always Stan McCune
realtor right here in the Greenville
area and you can find all of my contact
information in the show notes if you
need to reach me for any of your real
estate needs please also remember to
support the show by hitting the
Subscribe Buton button leaving a FST
star rating and leaving a short little
reviewI have I I'm short and sweet
on that little introbecause this is
the day that I am recording a litania
podcast because I'm about to enter a
very crazy month where we're going to
have a lot of people staying with us and
we're going to havepotentially be
moving to another house and just a lot
of stuff going on soI am here in
August recordingseveral podcasts for
basically the next month all in one
sitting and so yesthat might result
in this one being short and sweet I have
no ideabutbut here we go we're
going to Jump Right In I want to do a
podcast about HOAs because this has been
a topic of discussionwith a lot of
clients lately and and something that
has directly impacted me I mentioned
thatthat I'm in the process of
movinghopefully by the time this
podcast releases I will be very much in
the throws of moving
and a big reason for that is that
we're currently in an HOA community and
we have decided that we'd like to not be
in an HOA CommunityI I have talked
to a bunch of other people and and I've
always had a large contingent of clients
that want to avoid
HOAs but some people like them some
people hate themand and it's worth
discussing what do people like and what
do people not like about themand and
so we'll just kind of start there what
do people like about HOAs homeowners
associationsfirst off people
like and and I'm not saying that
Everyone likes them I'm just saying that
these are the things if people like an
HOA these are the things about it that
they likereally by and large the
number one thing that people like about
HOAs is the the primary thing that if
people are in an HOA Community the
reason why they would want to be is that
HOAs can provide amenities that would be
too expensive for the individual to have
to build or to add to their house the
most common one obviouslypools you
it's very expensive to build a nice pool
at your house if you have it in a
community a community pool that's
something you know you can pay a few
hundred bucks a year then that gives you
the ability to enjoy that pool in your
neighborhood another common one
playgrounds it's expensive to build a
nice playground in your backyard a
nature HOAa subdivision by means of
their HOA might be able to build a nice
playground some HOAs have common areas
hiking trailslakes or ponds all
sorts of things like that all of these
amenities are the types of things that
people are willing toendure and pay
for an HOA in order to haveone thing
that a lot of people in HOAs like is
control over their neighbors
particularly when it comes tothe
exterior
the the exterior of a home and how
the yard is used sofor instance
making sure that your neighbors keeps up
with their yard that's a a big aspect of
most HOA communitiesbeing able to
control what type of structure someone
adds like for instanceif someone you
know wants to put an ugly Shack in the
back of their yard or wants to put up an
ugly fence or their fence deteriorates
or they want to you know have an RV
somewhere on their lot all of these
thingscan be controlled by the
HOAI should also mention another
control thing is the types of animals
most HOAs don't allow for certain smelly
or noisy animals outside of cats or dogs
and you know basic indoor you know fish
birds that type of stuffbut but even
Birds they will specifically Outlaw
poultry as as a possibility most HOAs do
another another thing that people
will like about HOAs isin certain
HOAs there are lower maintenance factors
so an HOA you might pay into it and they
might take care of the entire
neighborhood's yard carein town
homes and condos HOAs usually take care
of all of the exterior maintenance of a
homein retirement communities
they might even have you know on call
nurses or on-site nurses or you know
people that cook forfor the
residents I mean all sorts of of
different things that an HOA can provide
value for depending on the type of
communityand in high-end communities
a lot of people don't realize this but
the high the very high-end communities
in the Greenville area tend to have very
expensive HOAs that that will cover
things likegolf memberships and
Country Club memberships andexterior
maintenance yard maintenance all sorts
of different things like that so these
are are some of the things that are can
be attractive to people for HOA
communities but what do people not like
about HOAswhat what are the
complaints that I typically hear about
people saying I want to get out of an
HOA because of this well here are the
complaints that I typically hearone
is obviously and probably perhaps the
highest out of all of them is that it's
just an additional cost that you have no
control overand and you know know
typically HOAs don't go up too
dramatically but sometimes they do and
sometimes there are what we call special
assessments that have to be donemy
parents are are in a not in Greenville
but in a different part of South
Carolina are in acondo right now
that has
elevators and the elevators are failing
and as a result they're having to do a
special assessment where they're having
to pay thousands of dollars extra in
addition to their already expensive HOA
in order to fix the elevatorsin my
community at one point there was some
kind of a special assessment where I'm
currently
livingas of me recording this
podcast that subject to changebut
there was some kind of a special
assessment for I think the the the
Retention Ponds had issues and needed to
have a bunch of work done on them
sometimes pools if poolsneed a lot
of work there might need to be a special
assessment toto fix a pool to
replace the lineretc etc so these
types of thingsthese types of things
happen and that's you have no control of
that the the HOA they have complete
authority over whether they are going to
increasethe HOA duesdo a special
assessment Etc and and it does there
there might be some HOAs that say that
that there needs to be you
know that they in their bylaws people
have to vote on these things there there
are there can be those types of things
but a lot of HOAs
the board has complete autonomy to do
these things without a votespeaking
of boards another complaint that I
commonly get is that boards are either
too LAX or too controllingand
oftentimes boththere'll be two lacks
on the things that are important to
certain people and then two controlling
on other thingsand that can be very
very frustratingin my current
neighborhood the the board tends to be
tends to be very controlling about
what people do with their front yards
they made me cut down my my front tree
recently because it was deadand I
was going to get it cut down eventually
because I saw that it was deadbut
they put me on an expedited timeline to
do thatbut then you know they're not
as strict on some other things that I
would prefer for them to be stricter on
and so this is the the this Dynamic that
you getthat's very very common hear
this over and over again pretty much
every HOA Community is like this
boards tend to to continue the the board
topic they tend to be dominated by one
or two personalities it doesn't matter
how big the board is and I have been
I've served now on multiple HOA boards
and this always happens there's always
one or two personalities that end up
controllingwhat the board does it's
kind of like you know I've never served
on a jury before but it's kind of what I
imagine happening in juries where
there's like one or two people people
that kind of convince everyone to one
side or the other that is a frequent
dynamic inwith HOA boards and you
know it tends to be people that just
have nothing better to do for whatever
reason they're retired or whatever they
just have nothing better to do and and
this becomes their baby they want to
it's a way for them to to have something
to do but also you know sometimes they
could be power hungry they they want to
at the end of the day have this power
and be able toto control their
community and that's something that that
commonly happensand and that can be
a problem they can then you know
convince people to join the board that
they know are just going to be Yes Men
or yes womenand then it ends up that
that the board in perpetuity is just
cowt to this one individualand that
can be a very toxic Dynamic another
thing I I frequently hear people say
they don't like about HOA HOAs is that
rules intended to make the neighborhood
look good can be so broad that they
prevent things that they shouldn't so
for instance rules May prevent a brand
new small RV from being parked in a
driveway while also allowing a truck of
basically the same size that's like
basically falling apart to be parked in
the driveway like that doesn't make
sense but they have to make blanket
rules right they if they don't want RVs
in in the neighborhoodthey obviously
can't Outlawyou know trucks from
being parked in their own driveway but
they'll make these blanket rules that no
RVs can be parked because they're trying
to avoid RVs being an eyesore or
whatever the case may be so even if it's
a small pristine RV it's still not going
to be allowed in a neighborhood that has
outlawed RVs whereas someonewith a
junky truck just sitting there just
rusting awaycan be allowed to do
that and unfortunatelythe idea of
ifying the neighborhoodby making
some of these rules it it can end up not
having the impact that they're intended
to haveadditionally I've heard from
a lot of people as you know homesteading
and mini farms have become more popular
they they've really exploded since Co
most HOAs as I've already said they
limit the types of animals that you can
have and so people aren't aren't able to
have Poulter they're AR not able to have
pigs they're not able to have horses not
able to have cowsand and so that has
become a a problem for people that are
looking to do more home setting looking
to be more sustainable with their with
their Lifestylesand additionally
most of the HOA communities and and this
is obviously more on the cheaper end of
the spectrbut they tend to be more
cookie cutter neighborhoods and that's
not directly related to them being in an
HOA but but often times those two things
are kind of tied at the hip to a certain
extent and so in the end the vast
majority people I talked to are not big
fans of HOAs most people given the
option to be in an HOA Community or not
in an HOA Community would rather not be
the only time I hear people that
really want to be in an HOA Community is
typically when there is a pool that's
typically the only reasonnow
obviously if you're in a condor or town
homewhich a lot of people are
getting pushed to because you know they
don't have enough money to afford a
single family detached house anymore
you're going to have an HOA like there
is no way to avoid it in a condo or a
town home with very few exceptions I
there's probably 1 to 2% of condos or
town homes that are not in an HOA
community in Greenville Countybut
almost certainly if that is what you're
going to end up in you're going to end
up paying for an HOA as welland even
thenthere are some communities you
know let's say that you're not let's say
you do find a good house that's not in
an HOA
you and you want to be you want to
have access to a community pool there
are some communities that allow outside
membership to their pools meaning that
you could live in a Nona subdivision and
still have access to a nearby pool so
it doesn't necessarily mean if you
just because you the the only way to get
to a community pool isn't necessarily by
means of an HOA is kind of what I'm
sayingbut at the end of the day can
you actually avoid an HOA like is this
even practical so I ran some numbers you
guys know that I like to run numbers
and again I'm recording this in August I
ran this data on August 17thand then
it's I'm releasing this podcast a lot
later than thatbut this should be
pretty pretty indicative of what the
market is regardless of of when I'm
recording this or broadcasting itso
I looked at total sales the past 12
months as of August 17thand this was
in Greenville MLS so this includes the
majority of the
upstate and I came up with
14,196 total sales of those
14,196 total sales
54.8% of them were in
HOAsand
45.82 per of them were not in HOAs
there's probably a little bit of of
incorrect there's there's a of error
here because some Realtors will enter
things incorrectly but I think that
those are are roughly
accurate now what's interesting so so
okay before I go furtherso 10% more
of the houses in the upstate basically
I guess closer to 9% 54 versus 45% 9%
more of of the homes in the upstate are
in HOA communities than not in HOA
communities over half of the homes well
over half the homes are in HOA
neighborhoods so it's not easy to avoid
them now what are the price points at
which we we tend to see HOAs versus
versus non-as well the price point that
has the least amount ofof homes that
are outside of of HOAsis the below
$200,000 price point of the below
$200,000 price point 80% of them were
not in HOA and that was basically this
actually makes a lot of sensebecause
I didn't filter out mobile homes or
things like that those are going to be
primarily in rural areas is what is what
we're looking at there so you get out
into rural areas obviously it's not
going to be HOAs those are typically
where the cheapest houses are to be
found is when you're kind of in the
middle of nowhere in the between 200,000
and $350,000 price point it mirrors the
metadata so it's almost exactly the same
55.1 n% % of homes between $200 and
$350,000were in HOAs versus 44.8 2%
were not in HOAs now if if we look at
the not in HOA ones and then also look
at where they are geographically the
vast majority of those were also in more
rural areas so again if you're looking
to avoid an HOA you're almost certainly
going to be in a rural part of the
upstateonly about 1,500 probably a
little bit less than 1500 of the non
HOA 200 200,000 to $350,000 properties
only a little less than 1,500 of those
existed were not in HOAsso and
the entire Market of the between 200 to
350,000 price point was7,240
so I actually I didn't come prepared to
do this math but that comes out to
roughly
20% ofof properties that are between
200,000 and
350,000 are in the more Suburban parts
of Greenville and also are not in HOAs
so it's really it's really hard
unless you're willing to live out in the
country to get a house that is not in in
an HOAand you might think well what
about above the $350,000 price point no
it actually gets worsethe numbers
thenbecome 68.3 2% of all properties
above $350,000 that sold the past year
were in an HOA and only
31.6% were not in HOAs andand if you
run this number up into the millions
these percents hold because the the a
lot of the very expensive communities in
Greenville have extremely restrictive
HOAs and they they do that for a reason
they want to keep the communities
exclusive and the only way they can do
that is by controlling people and the
only way they can control them is by
means of an HOAso Greenville has a
lot of HOAs and I mean if if you pull
out thesebelow $200,000 properties
that consist of 20
2,290 of the
14,196 total properties that I analyzed
here you know all these percentsthat
that 54% that I was talking about before
that then you know goes up way higher
that it would be probably in the 60s I
didn't do that number but I'm guessing
that you would have you know in the
above
$200,000 price point you're pretty much
looking at60 to 65% of homes are in
HOAs versus not in
HOAs sowhat are my conclusions from
this well as I've already said the
upsate is very heavy with HOAs
particularly in the in the urban and
Suburban areas if you're trying to avoid
an HOA and and you still want to live
close to civilization good lucknow
there are some options you know you
might not be able to get near like
downtown Greenville but there are some
rural areas that are near downtown
Travelers Rest near downtown Easley near
downtown Simpsonville where you can
perhaps avoid an HOA and still be close
to civilization
but you're you're going to really
have a hard time trying to be close to
downtown Greenville and also trying to
avoid an HOA it's just it's really hard
to findfrom my experience there is a
sizable Market of people specifically
looking to avoid H they will not live in
an HOA for the reasons that I already
outlined and so this means there is more
additional competition for Nona houses
and
communities and as a result of that most
of my cents looking to avoid HOAs
they they find themselves in a very
competitive situation going up against a
lot of other very aggressive people also
looking to avoid HOAsand this
oftentimes means as well that they have
to make sacrifices on the types of homes
that they're looking for in order to
avoid an HOA because there's just not as
many options out theremost commonly
the non-hoa homes need updating have
weird for plans are olderEtc and
again they're typically in rural areas
as wellnow if you're if you own a
home that's not in an HOA
congratulations that is a value ad for
most people that is a value adnow
appraisers will not necessarily factor
that in as a value ad but the market
will because there are these people that
are specifically looking to avoid HOAs
so that is something that in the eyes of
the market if not the eyes of appraisers
that is something that does add value to
a homeso
that those are my general conclusions on
on HOAsgenerally speaking more
peoplewant to avoid an HOA then want
to have them but Builders are not
reflecting that developers are not
reflecting that in terms of what they're
building most of what has been built the
past 20 to 30 years in the upstate of
South Carolina has been in HOAs Pro
communities where they they have an HOA
and a board and bylaws and covenants and
restrictions and unfortunately it's
really hard to avoid that but if you're
looking to avoid that I do have some
great searches that I can set up in our
local MLS it's a lot easier to do in
there than it is to do on realor.com and
Zillow and and all these other websites
so please reach out to me my contact
information is in the show notes I can
set that search up for youand and
help you to see homes that are coming on
the market that aren't in HOA
communities I've done this for a bunch
of my clients in the past and we've
always been able to find them something
so reach out to me my contact
information is in the show notes if you
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appreciate that and I appreciate all of
you guys for listening I hope you have a
great rest of your week and we'll talk
again next time
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