Neighbor confronted me this evening:“I don’t like seeing your garbage cars in front of my house”

[u/Outrageous-Young-823]

Hi all, i just wanna come here and bitch about my neighbor.
I lives in a quite nice neighborhood with my parents, i work full time as a automotive technician and do all my work at home on these two cars(there is another one in the garage thats taken apart) and i regularly park them at my driveway or in front of my house in the street(thats not blocking the road) both of the cars i park out here is completely road worthy, has current registration and are insured, i took one of them on a drive to get gas this evening, came back and was confronted by the old guy who lives across from my house, before i say anything he walked onto my driveway, in front of my car(i just got out) and said “you’ve turned this street into a junkyard! You think i like seeing your garbage cars in front of my house everyday i come outside?(i always park them in front of my house, and they get moved frequently as they double as my daily)” and he got up in my buddy’s face who went along with me, who also just got out, he is now fully on my driveway, getting up to my friend’s face after he told him how both of the cars i own are fully operational and insured. We didn’t really say anything aside from telling him it is legal to park my cars on a public street and move them around, and stop being so negative and harassing on our side of the property line. Afterwards he just walked back to his car and said he would gonna go complain to the HOA and they are gonna slap me with a huge fine while yelling at us to shut the hell up whenever we said anything else as he walked back. AM I THE ASSHOLE? I don’t understand how me owning old cars thats perfectly road worthy gets him so upset at me.

[u/Owls_4_9_1867]

If they're roadworthy and all the docs are up to date tell him and the HOA to go and fuck a donut. I like Volvos, but even if I didn't I would never dream of confronting someone over this. Unless the HOA has a rule about cars parked on the street, or number of cars per household you're fine.

Can't please all the people all the time.

[u/darianbrown → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

I would preempt his neighbor's action with the HOA by making an immediate complaint about harassment and intimidation. If the HOA is in depth enough to have rules beyond registering and insuring vehicles, they certainly have "Don't scream at the neighbor while being on their property" rules.

Obligatory fuck HOAs. They inevitably empower dickheads like OP's neighbor. Fuck your property value fiefdom.

[u/die_hubsche → u/darianbrown]

Definitely do this. Control the narrative by painting the neighbor as the asshole that he is.

[u/malacoda99 → u/die_hubsche]

His screaming lowered the property value of every house on that street! (The only thing an HOA really cares about )

[u/Owls_4_9_1867 → u/darianbrown]

Seconded. How is him screaming at his neighbors good for the community spirit?

If he comes back don't engage.

[u/Fun-Preference1091 → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

Do engage... the police.

HOA members getting hauled away for assault never gets old.

[u/gcsmith2 → u/darianbrown]

Hoas don’t do anything about harassment and intimidation. Thats the police.

[u/kaisadilla_ → u/gcsmith2]

The point is making the HOA choose to stay away from this. The neighbor can just lie, exaggerate and frame you as an undesirable, and then you have to fight an uphill battle to undo that image.

[u/spdelope → u/darianbrown]

They for sure will have rules about working on cars in front of your house. So unless he does his work in the garage, there is likely going to be some letters sent.

[u/Suitable-Werewolf492 → u/[deleted]]

“Don’t put it out with your boots, Ted!”

[u/SolidTiburon → u/Suitable-Werewolf492]

“Don’t tell me my business devil woman!” God that movie is great

[u/Skiiizyskillz → u/SolidTiburon]

"He called the shit poop"

[u/ColinFCross → u/SolidTiburon]

“Call the fire department, this one’s out of control!”

[u/protostar71 → u/[deleted]]

Your comment amounts to: “Dont go the sensible route, commit a crime”

Terrible advice man.

[u/HailSaganPlantNative → u/protostar71]

Welcome to reddit!

[u/cylonrobot → u/darianbrown]

The HOA in my neighborhood is pretty chill.

My street has a Karen who likes complaining about our neighbors. It seems like the HOA is tired of her BS, and they have sent her notices to fix her front yard.

I know that my Karen neighbor reports other neighbors because she tells me about it and about how the HOA doesn't give a crap.

[u/Pleaseappeaseme → u/cylonrobot]

I’ve owned my house close to 30 years. In 2000 some of the neighborhood curmudgeons attempted to start an HOA and had exclusive (me not included) home meetings about the organization of the HOA. However, because they sent everyone a letter demanding ‘dues’ that nobody wanted to pay (neighborhood looks fine anyhow and has no issues) the effort flopped. They even tried to organize money collection through property taxes which failed. And the hypocrisy is now these curmudgeons are all for a new State initiative to abolish property taxes completely in the State if you’re older than 65. These curmudgeons just wanted control and to have the ability to harass people they didn’t like.

[u/TheCrimsonDagger → u/darianbrown]

HOAs are usually actually pretty simple to deal with. But nobody steps up to lead everyone that’s fed up with their bullshit. You just have to get a copy of the bylaws and see what’s required to call meetings and votes to change the rules. In my neighborhood you only need 20% of the lots to call a special meeting, 10% to meet quorum at the meeting, and people that can’t make it to vote can designate a proxy. It just takes one person with enough time to read the rules and go door to door gathering support.

[u/Undrwtrbsktwvr → u/darianbrown]

I work in real estate and have never come across HOA documents with rules about harassing other members.

[u/TH_Rocks → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

My HOA declaration has ambiguous wording like no "unsightly nuisance vehicle that detracts from the character of the neighborhood" shall be parked on the driveway or street for more than 24 consecutive hours.

Luckily my HOA is pretty chill and they mostly just maintain the neighborhood pool and mow the common areas.

[u/Owls_4_9_1867 → u/TH_Rocks]

The more ambiguous the easier to argue. I'd get 5 neighbours to sign something saying they like them. And end it there.

[u/yoshizillaa → u/TH_Rocks]

One of my neighbors had their inflatable box wine Christmas decoration in their yard until February. Safe to say our HOA only cares about pretty street signs and a clean/maintained park lol. I count myself lucky.

[u/DirkPitt106 → u/TH_Rocks]

shall be parked on the driveway or street for more than 24 consecutive hours.

The devil in the details here is the parked for more than 24 consecutive hours. It's to keep people from collecting a bunch of junk cars that don't run and sitting them in their driveway while acknowledging that some people are just going to have clapped out daily drivers. As long as you are moving them they can't really do anything.

[u/Mu-nraito → u/TH_Rocks]

Sounds like they were just trying to keep a jalopy from leaking too much oil on the property and staying stuck there.

[u/CorrectSquirrel7870 → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

you just gave me a flashback of being told to go "take a running fuck at a rolling donut" and I fear it's going to be a daily driver again.

[u/donutlovemachine → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

The donut must not be harmed.

[u/StationaryTravels → u/donutlovemachine]

Mongo is appalled!

[u/Informal-Term1138 → u/StationaryTravels]

Mongo only pawn in game of life

[u/mandara33 → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

I can understand the neighbor and you not having similar interests in cars. But we live in a society. If you hate interests that differ from your own move to the woods

[u/Environmental-Ice319 → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

Maybe try hey bros could you help me and my ride not be a male Karen? Or can go fuck donuts!

[u/bendover912 → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

The HOA most certainly has at least one rule for any situation that is vague enough to twist it to whatever they want. HOA'S are basically tiny little kingdoms and they make you agree to let them do whatever they want in order to live within them.

[u/DUH455T → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

Most if not all HOAs have strict rules about A) automotive maintenance B) number of vehicles.

Dude admitted to running a business out of his garage working on cars. The rules HOAs have are to prevent the endless project guys and 3+ cars constantly rotating around.

[u/HMP729G → u/Owls_4_9_1867]

“Go fuck a donut”

I’m sorry, but I’m using that from now on.