A shout-out to my neighborhood’s HOA: Eleven years ago this month, before moving into our new home in Clermont, FL. I followed the instructions of the Legends Home Association. I had to submit to them any plans to add a structure “of any kind” in our back yard.
The structure was a high-quality wood swing set for my then-six-year-old daughter Jasmine. We’d had it in our backyard in Wheeling, WV, and I was going to disassemble it, bring it here, and re-assemble it. Per their instructions, I sent a photo of the swingset and its measurements.
The Legends HOA replied that they would only approve the swing set IF I could make the structure six inches SHORTER. It was 10’6″, and they would only permit it to be 10 feet tall.
I wrote back that, since I am not an engineer, I needed their guidance on how to achieve this. If I somehow removed six inches off the bottom, it would render the sliding board unusable and I was concerned with stability. If I removed six inches off the top, the roof of the fort would need restructuring, and I wasn’t sure how to do that.
Here we are 11 years later, and they still have not responded with their helpful solution.
In the meantime, I’ve long since sold my home back in Wheeling (with the swing set as part of the deal), and my daughter has grown from six years old to 17 — where she is far more likely to need a car than a swing set.