Tyrannical Homeowners' Association

"Moving on to your dating habits..."

Carl: What have I done to deserve all this b-hole coming out of your mouth?
Paul: It's everything, Carl! It's everything you've done, ever!
Carl: Everything? Even that time I helped Mrs. Bixby with her garden?
Paul: You buried her there!
Carl: It's what she would've wanted.
Paul: You buried her alive!
Carl: She wasn't keeping up with the weeding. As president of the homeowners' association, I had to take immediate action.

— Llamas with Hats 6

In real life, a homeowners' association is a small, neighborhood-level, pseudo-government organization that's in charge of making and enforcing local rules, mostly regarding things like noise levels and the general appearance of the property (likely with the stated goal of keeping local property values high). They also collect dues and maintain any communal property such as a playground. In fiction, however, they are the greatest villains known to man!

Wait, those busybodies are the worst villains? Of course. After all, who else takes a ruler to every single blade of grass in your lawn to make sure that none of them are taller than the 2.25 inches allowed by neighborhood ordinance 14b? Who else hits you with a noise complaint for sneezing after 10 pm? Who else sends ninjas to your house because you had the sheer audacity to paint it some color other than one of the 16 approved shades of beige?

And it gets worse if they don't like you. Few other authority figures lean harder into Selective Enforcement. If the members of the HOA like someone, then the rules might as well not exist. If they don't, though, they'll throw the book at you and write a sequel. And they won't just look in the visible places to find something to charge you with; they'll dig into everything, especially if it's none of their business.

This is mostly an American trope as true HOAs are incredibly rare outside of the United States. As such, examples from other countries are likely either Eagleland Osmosis, or some other organization filling a similar narrative role.

Homeowner's Associations actually do have a pretty dark history, many of the earliest ones being established with the express purpose of keeping non-white people from moving into a neighborhood. While that's currently illegal in most of the United States, the Internet is still chock full of HOA horror stories.

These are the people that keep the Cut-and-Paste Suburb cut-and-paste and run Stepford Suburbia. Obnoxious Entitled Housewives and/or Nosy Neighbors are often members of these. Other prospective members include the Obstructive Bureaucrat, the Grumpy Old Man, and, if you're particularly unlucky, your Sitcom Arch-Nemesis. Also compare Moral Guardians, who are often similarly portrayed as petty and self-righteous. See also the Cranky Landlord who has a similar attitude, but actually owns the building.

That being said, please avoid listing real-life examples, as they violate neighborhood ordinance 31f.

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Examples:

Comic Strips

• In Over the Hedge (the source material for the movie) the HOA has been known to pull out Torches and Pitchforks when someone breaks their rules.
• The Sunny Soliel Society in Mark Trail, led by Violet Bee, starts off as a combination of tyrannical and clueless, insisting on pretty flowers and perfect lawns, no matter how much Cherry Trail explains that those are the least environmentally friendly gardens ever. As Cherry and Violet get to know each other, Violet becomes less tyrannical, but no less clueless.

Film — Animated

• Over the Hedge shows that it isn't only the humans who have to deal with the horrors of the HOA. Gladys Sharp, the president of the Camelot Estates Home Owners Association, usually content herself with harassing residents because their grass is half an inch too long and otherwise insisting that everyone in the neighborhood meets her standard of perfection. However, when she discovers scavenging animals in the area, she hires an exterminator and explicitly demands he deal with the animals in the cruelest, most inhumane method possible, using an exterminator system that's illegal in every state but Texas.

Film — Live-Action

• Grow Your Own: An immigrant is fast-tracked by the government to an allotment, where others have waited more than ten years. The association is ruled by a chairman "Big John" with a rod of iron, and he tries to use their long-standing constitution to present a "united front" against this immigrant, and their first step is to make sure they themselves follow the constitution to the letter. This requires all the sheds being painted in regulation red: one allotment holder flatly refuses to do this, and is overruled. This becomes complicated when the immigrant helps him to paint his shed.
• The Sanford Neighborhood Watch Alliance of Hot Fuzz play a similar role to a homeowners' association, acting to protect the character of the village in hopes of winning a coveted "Village of the Year" award. They're Obsessively Normal with no tolerance for oddity, and they're completely willing to murder anyone who deviates from that desired norm in any way, whether by living in a McMansion, being a hammy actor in community theatre, or having an annoying laugh.
• Karen: The titular Karen is president of the Homeowners Association and uses her position to attempt a racially motivated eviction of Malik and Imani because they're black. When that doesn't work, she escalates to terrifying them and tries to kill them. However, at the end of the movie, after Karen's death, Imani takes over the association and is shown making it a force for good.
• The Purge: After a whole film in which the Sandin family home is besieged by a bunch of teenage Purgers, the climax of the film revolves around the Sandins’ neighbors, who are upset at the modifications the Sandins made to their house (expanding and reinforcing it) because it clashes with the looks of the neighborhood and believe it's the Sandins flaunting their wealth, arriving to kill the Purgers and try to kill the Sandins themselves. The twist is Foreshadowed by one of the neighbors (the leader of the mob) talking to Mrs. Sandin about the aforementioned clash of the home styles and that the HOA may have an issue with it.
• In the Lifetime movie Deadly Garage Sale, Marcia is a hoarder who frequents garage sales and swap meets and also holds plenty of her own garage sales. This upsets her neighborhood's homeowner's association, and nasty, killjoy association rep Evelyn starts harassing her over it, only to be found murdered a short while later. Since Marcia's adopted daughter Candice stood up to Evelyn during one of the altercations, suspicion falls on Candice, who gets arrested, except it was actually Trudee, a serial robber whose brother was accidentally killed by Marcia when they tried to rob Marcia's house during an earlier garage sale, who's infiltrated Marcia's life looking for revenge, and Trudee framed Candice for the murder.

Live-Action TV

• 3rd Rock from the Sun: In "Just Your Average Dick," the Solomons move into a new apartment, located in a building run by a strict tenants' association. Sally joins the tenants' association and eagerly takes to being a petty tyrant. At the end of the episode, when the rest of the family wants to move back to their original apartment, she refuses to go and give up her new position of power. Therefore, they break all the rules on purpose, tricking her into evicting them.
• Adam Ruins Everything: 'Adam Ruins The Suburbs' acknowledges the concept of homeowner's associations and how they have too much power over things most people don't care about. The segment creates a woman who polices everything including lawn care.
• The Big Bang Theory: In "The Tenant Disassociation," the apartment building's renters' association forces a new food truck that Leonard and Penny liked to move after Sheldon files a complaint. When Leonard and Penny try to contact the association themselves, they discover that Sheldon is its sole member.
• Burn Notice: In "Good Intentions", Sam buys time for Fiona to infiltrate the home office of the villain by pretending to be an inspector from the HOA: he first bugs the guy about not mowing his lawn often enough, then pretends to have found crabgrass to buy her the time needed to get out.
• In Frasier, the apartment-dwellers in Elliot Bay Towers have their equivalent of an HOA, a homeowners' committee headed by a woman who is both tyrannical and petty. The apartment owners can't complain or object to her decisions, as their terms of residence grant these powers to their local HOA equivalent. Frasier resorts to getting his father to stand for election to her position, when the chance is offered.
• Only Murders in the Building has the board of the Arconia, which functions as a homeowners' association (though applying to an Apartment Complex of Horrors).
  • The initial head of the board, Bunny Folger, is a petty tyrant and grumpy misanthrope who never smiles. The entire board shows complete disinterest in Tim Kono's death. While Bunny has cause to evict Oliver in Season 1 (which she does), she's still extremely humorless about it. The board also votes to evict Mabel and Charles, though they haven't done anything wrong except publish the podcast (and have actually exposed crimes at the Arconia). Bunny then becomes the Asshole Victim for S2, though she is revealed to have a softer side and a Hidden Heart of Gold.
  • Bunny's replacement, Nina Lin, is a cruel and dismissive woman who throws Bunny off the board and apparently has severe anger issues, even punching Howard in the face at one point. The trio find it easy to believe that Nina and her husband killed Bunny all to modify the building in some way. Although they are wrong. Nina genuinely mourns for and misses Bunny, didn't kill her, and is extremely upset that Bunny won't get to meet her baby.
• An episode of The X-Files featured a homeowner's association that would raise a golem to enforce all manner of esoteric "rules". Even small breaches of protocol or using decorations that the association considered bad taste could result in the golem taking often deadly retribution on the association's behalf.

Video Games

• Kingdom of Loathing: The Zombie Homeowner's Association are one of the bosses that can be encountered in the Dreadsylvania clan dungeon. Rather than moaning for brains, these zombies bemoan about lawn ornaments that violate code and contiguous square inches of weeds on the lawn (something that was based on Jick's own experience with the HOA) while attacking you with confiscated items.

Webcomics

• Parodied in Atomic Robo: After moving his scientific research operation into Jordana del Muerto, New Mexico; Robo ticks off his new neighbor Sir Richard Branson, who retaliates by using HOA rulings against him — despite the fact Jordana del Muerto is in the middle of nowhere and Robo and Branson are the only "homeowners" in the area. In one case, Branson manages to scare off a military bombing run (inadvertently saving Robo in the process) by citing violations of HOA guidelines.
• Casey and Andy: Sometimes, uneven enforcement isn't a product of favoritism. Mabel of the homeowners' association goes after Jenn for having a lawn gnome because it "reduces the property value of the whole neighborhood." However, she completely ignores the nuclear missile behind Casey and Andy's house next door, openly admitting that she's scared to go to that house. She then moves on to policing Jenn's dating habits.
• When Ben moved in to Lovecraft Manor in Goblin Hollow, the homeowners association, who also effectively ran the zoning board, heaped all kinds of ordinance complaints against Ben's mansion/video game arcade. Up until the posse found some incriminating photos, and Ben discovered that due to a drunken surveyor he technically owned large chunks of their plots, and then he threatened to turn his land into a trailer park if they didn't give up.
• A storyline in Kevin & Kell involved the Dewclaws being censured by the HOA for changing the colour of their home. Since the Dewclaws, like most inhabitants of Domain, have an Arboreal Abode, they're baffled by this, until they learn the HOA members all live in evergreens and refuse to consider that some animals don't.
• Subverted in Ozy and Millie, the HOA frequently harasses Llewellyn over his "tacky" castle with a moat, lawn flamingos wearing Che Guevera shirts, and rocket-propelled windmills. However, he's also quick to remind them that they have no legal ability to do anything about it (presumably since he's older than the concept of HOAs).

Web Video

• Brian David Gilbert: The video "Welcome to the Neighborhood" features an HOA that imposes strict rules about door color, garage condition, and garbage. They also police what shows you watch, cancel the main character's news subscriptions (giving them the "HOA News" in its place), and even seem to know the thread count on the main character's sheets (having rules about that as well). It's heavily implied that they're a cult.
• Hermitcraft Season 10: The Neighborhood is run by the Ministry of Ministers, which is a homeowners' association in all but name and illustrates all kinds of petty tyranny.
  • Ren's role as Minister of Administrating is essentially that of an HOA president, and declaring himself such prompts more immediate backlash than even the time he declared himself king in Season 9. While he's mostly more incompetent than evil, he abuses his authority to force the others to make improvements to The Neighborhood without doing anything himself and assigns jobs to the others that are either unwanted (Beef as the "Minister of Maps", who didn't want to see another map after Season 9), sound insulting (Xisuma as the "Minister of Idiots"^note he's in charge of villagers), or both (Cleo as the "Minister of Trash"). Efforts to overthrow him spring up only weeks after he claimed the job.
  • Cleo in her role of "Minister of Trash" illustrates how members of neighborhood organizations use small amounts of power to abuse those whom they have grudges against. First, when tasked with building a garbage dump, she places it right in front of Ren's tower as an act of petty revenge. Later, she declares Iskall's ugly house to be garbage and fines him for not removing it.

Western Animation

• American Dad!: "Roy Rogers McFreeley" starts with Stan refusing to buy Grenadine for Roger or taking his requests in the family seriously. This leads to Roger donning the titular persona and charming the HOA board members to start making Stan's life miserable. He installs a motion-sensor light directly outside of Stan's bedroom window, paints his curb into a no-parking zone, and plants non-native ornamental grass just to shock him. Stan and the other neighbors start to fight back by doing "Constructive Vandalism" to undo all of the changes, and the fight escalates from there.

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