What is a single family home?

According to county law, a single family home cannot have more than 5 unrelated residents. Our subdivision covenants say we have single family homes.

Our association board has gone after people in the past for violating covenants. They make a big deal about getting peole to take down fences or to stop having craft sales from their driveways.

A neighbor with a 1600 square foot home has 9 cars parked in front of his home. He has parking spaces marked with reflective tape. He has a girlfriend, young children, and maybe teenagers. He also has 7 girls living in his home, girls who drive and are in late teens or twenties. He says they are his daughters friends. Apaprently our board thinks it makes it okay since he says they are friends. They are not willing to do anything about it.

Previous boards have gone after people who just had a lot of company. There is a home that is 7000 square feet and that owner tried to get zoning for a duplex. The board fought it and made sure when he rented long term to someone that he never set foot in that home or it wolid violate covenants.
Now they are ignoring an obvious situation and opening the door to future violations. There are two homes in the neighborhood that are grandfathered in by the county for weekly rentals and the neighbors act like this is destroying the neighborhood, but letting this other situation go by.

I do not know if I have the standing to notify the county about this, as the board is doing nothing. Is it acceptable to have about 15 unrelated peole in a house if they say they are friends or if they say they are only there for a few months. Does this change the county law?

I'd notify the county. When it's allowed once...it'll happen again....and your neighborhood will eventually not be the one you bought into.

Ahem, first thought that came to my dirty little mind is that he is running an escort service. I would notify the county and maybe give a heads up to the police. I usually advocate live and let live but this sounds very fishy to me. I hope I am very, very wrong in my hunch.

It sounds like the people that used to live across the street from us. We called their house, "the boarding house." The final straw was when of their "guests" parked an old beat up pickup directly in front of our house - backwards, and put a for sale sign on it and left it there. After they would have one of their "parties" the court would be littered with beer bottles and other trash. We used to pick it all up the next morning and throw it in their yard while they were still asleep.

On top of everything else, they were running some kind of air conditioning business from their house and 18 wheelers would pull into our court to unload, several times a week. - That's what I finally reported them for, and they sold the house and moved within a short time after that.

The new people that live there are much better, but they often park a beat up old van in front of our house, when the curb and driveway in front of their house are completely empty. I don't understand this at all. When they have plenty of room, why should I have to look at their beat up old van all evening? That annoys me far more than it should!

If your neighbor is a renter, Federal Laws prohibite discrimination in renting to "Protected Classes"- those are Age, Sex, Race, Color, Religion, Familial Status, National Origin. Physical or Mental disability.

If your coventants are contrary to federal laws against discrimination then unfortunately, they probably can not be enforced.

If your county laws are contrary to federal laws- who knows-

rlb

the neighbor owns the house, he is not allowed to rent part of it out, that is what the law says about single family homes. In what way would he be discriminated against? Covenants say that the neighborhood is single family homes, I don't understand how that would violate federal law. Perhaps you are assuming that they are minorities, they are not.

Yes Rose Pink, the same idea has crossed the neighbors minds.

We have issues in our area that include many people living in single family dwellings that are new and are claiming to be "related". Probably not the same thing going on but still too many people, cars etc in a dwelling and the dwelling not being used for the intended purpose creating neighborhood dis-harmony.

Many counties have a sqft bedroom space or # of bedrooms required per occupany rule for fire/hazzard clause written into code. It supercedes relationships and subdivision covenants. You may want to research whether your county has such a code.

I would call the local authorities and check to see how many people are allowed to live in a single family dwelling. When we lived in Bradenton, FL they had a rule that a certain # of people were allowed to occupy a dwelling depending on the # of bedrooms, baths, etc. I'm sure your area must have some similar rule.

The part that would bother me the most is marking off parking spaces on a public street. If it happened in front of my home there would be a problem. Do you have friends with a beater or two they wouldn't mind parking in those spaces long term?

I just finished a lengthy term as President of my neighborhood's homeowner's association.

Start with your neighborhood association. Read your Association's By-Laws and neighborhood Covenants, Conditions & Restrictions (CC&R's.) They will be very specific about what is and isn't allowed in your neighborhood. Are there occupancy limits for each property? If you are right, and believe you have a cause to bring to the attention of your Homeowner's Association Board of Directors, you can attend the next scheduled Board meeting and require them to address the issue. (They may just as easily tell you there is no case. Then you can ask them - on the record - why that is so. Let them tell you what they have to say to account for themselves.) If they don't hold regular meetings, you should address your grievances in writing.

If you feel you're just one person, and haven't the ability to stand up for yourself to the HOA, then get a group of like-minded neighbors to stand with you. Certainly your other neighbors must feel the same as you. As homeowners, your Board is required by your By-Laws to hear your grievances. They are supposed to be working for the rest of you, not for themselves.

The HOA's By-Laws probably have a clause in them that states something to the effect of "equal and fair treatment for all residents" or some such. The issue is that your HOA cannot "selectively" enforce the rules of the Association. Every resident is supposed to be treated in exactly the same way. If the issue should ever come to court, all you (or any other homeowner) has to do is prove instances where your HOA selectively enforced rules, or allowed some things to happen for some residents while preventing it from happening for other residents, and you can literally dissolve the HOA out of existence. They must be fair and arbitrary, not selective or playing favorites.

Failing all of that, speak with your city's Zoning Board. If your neighborhood is intended as a single family residence, then the "my daughter's friends" issue holds no ground. The city can require the extras to vacate.

As for marking out parking spaces on public property - that screams CC&R violation. I'd take that up with your HOA board immediately, regardless of the rest of the issue. (Although it would seem a major argument in favor of your case against the neighbor.)

And finally, if the home is truly overcrowded, contact your local Fire Department and Health Department. They each have a lot of clout when it comes to keeping things under occupancy limits. Are there health and sanitation violations? What about safety? Noise? Enough fire extinguishers, emergency exits, and so forth? Seems there are lots of directions you could take this. At the very least, your local Police Department may want to hear about the public nuisance going on at that property. Are the cars' licenses and insurance current? Any outstanding warrants against residents? Any underage or illegal activity going on? The list is categoric, and goes on and on.

Good luck,
Dave

This is becoming a large problem throughout the US. Different cultures look at the family unit very differently, and include many family members in the same residence. In our neighborhood, we have a home that was purchased by hispanics. They park their cars over the sidewalks and into the street, six in a basically two car driveway. I think it is actually occupied by several different families on kind of a "rotating" basis, some return to Mexico and the next crew comes in. I don't have anything against hispanics, but there are many small children in the house. It's going to be very difficult to support the school systems when there are 8-10 children from different families living at the same address and attending school with only one property tax. I'm not sure what the answer is. I think there needs to be a stronger, enforceable definition of what constitutes a single family home. So, this was a good question for discussion, but maybe too social for the moderators of this board.

I have spent the last week discussing this with the President of the Board. She was under the impression that as long as you liv in your home you can have as many renters as you want in your home. She is new. This is not true.
Yesterday she called zoning for the county and put it in their hands. They have apparently added a few more renters to the mix.
Our subdivision does not have on street parking, it is prohibited. there are no shoulders on t he road and there are no streetlights. Plus it is very curvy. We almost hit a black car one evening parked in front of the house half on the road and half off. They have marked the parking slots in t he driveway. he has reflective tape with angled parking and 7 cars park that way. One car is in the 3 car garage and three cars are parked in t he grass. Now 3 cars park in the street in addition to all the others so we have 14 drivers int he house, plus young children. .
Also it is not a minority issue. Knowing my neighbors, if these people were minorities, they would have called zoning a few months ago.

Not too many cities allow parking on the grass and if there is no legal street parking then that should be enough to cause someone to take action. Parking on grass in one city I lived was a $300 fine per vehicle. Hope your problem gets resolved. (But then I now live out on 5 acres because I don't like rules)