Workman Chronicles
By Morris Workman
"Bigotry For Fun And Property Value"
NOTE-This article was rejected by the Editor of the Desert Valley Times
October 7, 2005
I’ve been thinking about joining the board of an HOA recently.
It’s not that I have some overwhelming desire to bully innocent lawn ornaments or join the garden-hose patrol, but I can see the advantage to being one of those carrying the whip.
It’s also one of the last places in America where bigotry can be practiced without some group with lots of A’s, U’s, and other vowels in their name threatening to hold their breath and throw lawsuits like so many rocks.
Before you get the wrong idea, the bigotry has nothing to do with skin color.
It’s not about anyone’s cultural heritage.
It’s not even a prejudice against a particular religion.
If you listen to the charlatans beating the association board drum, it is a bias against one of the lowest life forms in the human genome, a group of beings so lowly and despicable that they shouldn’t even be allowed to breathe, much less inhabit a building within the gun-turreted walls of a particular PUD.
According to the “prophets,” these two-legged vermin are responsible for declining property values, dead grass, toy proliferation, noise complaints, diphtheria, and global warming.
Unfortunately, the movement is gaining traction as innocent homeowners are taking the bait, convinced that their lives and neighborhoods would be better off without “their kind.”
That’s right, I’m talking about…renters.
To their credit, none of these anti-renter zealots are suggesting that renters be crucified, hung, or put in stocks, but I think it has more to do with the fact that such structures would violate architectural review committee rules.
The bigotry is manifesting itself in “rental restrictions” popping up in the CCR’s of homeowner associations all over the city.
Rental restrictions dictate that homeowners cannot rent out their homes to other people unless they are already doing so.
It also says that new buyers, particularly investors, cannot rent out their home.
In my not-so-humble opinion, I think it’s one of the most un-American rules I’ve heard of since Jim Crow died.
Although you think you own and control your home and property, a board can make a rule that tells you what you can and can’t do with it, and restricts who you can sell it to.
According to the myth which has been proffered in the propaganda pushing for the eradication of renters in our lifetime, the elimination of non-owners will increase your property value.
Apparently, renters are the bane of the residential world, leeches and parasites that drain a community of its escalating resale values and destroy its quality of life.
Of course, the “increasing property value” is the same excuse they use for punishing wayward residents who fail to get their garbage cans in on time, or who don’t get permission before planting rose bushes.
I suspect we’ll eventually see
“increasing property value” as the reason why residents aren’t
permitted outside their homes between
According to several realtors, the rental restrictions are having the opposite effect, chilling property values because up to 40% (depending on which realtor you talk to) of the new home buyers are investors, or folks who intend to rent the property for two or three years until they are ready to retire.
I’m not the smartest person (I’m a renter, so how smart could I be?), but according to the most basic economic principle of supply and demand, if you have six potential buyers instead of 10, meaning less demand, your price must go down.
But I’m more disturbed by the discrimination against the mortgage-challenged.
Before long, I expect to see signs cropping up in stores saying “Non-Renters Only” and little posters above drinking fountains with “Renters” and “Non-Renters” separating the bad people from the good people.
I’m even more disturbed because some of the people voting for this evil codicil were once renters themselves.
They’re the ones who say “I don’t have anything against renters, I just wouldn’t want my daughter to marry one.”
To the homeowners in associations which haven’t yet adopted these measures, I implore you to have a heart, be an American, use some common sense, protect your property values, and vote against these idiotic anti-renter rules.
And to the association board members promoting rental restrictions, I would beg that you stop hating the poor, downtrodden renters, and go back to hating people who paint their fences tan instead of taupe.
Published online at the Workman Chronicles WebLog October 7, 2005.
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