The Connecticut legislature is considering a bill that would stop homeowners’ associations and towns from restricting clotheslines or the drying laundry outside if there is no area for air drying elsewhere.
On one side, you have people who want to save money or cut down on their energy usage.
On the other, you have homeowners associations whose main purpose is to enforce uniformity in their community in the name of protecting property values.
Everyone has a point.
When you buy a home within an association you leave some of your individuality at the gate. No garden gnomes or inflatable snow men (someone should actually ban those). But not being able to paint your front door purple isn’t going to cost you money. Rising energy costs do and drying your laundry outside can help your budget.
The associations are right to be concerned about the impact of property values, which are a result of perception. When buyers drive through a condo complex and they see sheets hanging from every back porch, they aren’t getting the feeling that the community is peaceful and park-like.
The issue is property rights - do you have the right to do what you want on your property?The answer is no - especially in a homeowners’ association which can seem to operate like a communist regime, squelching individual expression in exchange for the collective good. In your homeowners’ association, Big Brother is the little old lady in Unit 6F and she has lots of free time to report you to the Board.
As a kid, it was one of my jobs to hang up the laundry on the clothesline. Little did I know that our clothesline was driving down property values. Maybe my neighbors could have sold their house for $75,000 rather than $74,000 (this was the 80’s) if the buyers hadn’t seen my pillowcase flapping in the breeze.
I think a compromise can be made. Perhaps associations could install clotheslines or drying racks so they’re uniform or restrict laundry hanging to certain days of the week, avoiding weekends. The law does provide an exception for indoor air drying, provided it is accessible and does not use electricity or fossil fuels.
Personally, I’m going to ask my husband to set up a clothesline at our house. I’ll let you know if and when my property values start to plummet (wait, they already have).
For more about this, read:
Boston.com
Commondreams.org
