The officer inspected the teal minivan. He checked the license plate and the registration sticker, and he did the same for the yellow sedan. He walked the perimeter of the vehicles, and it seemed the officer told the HOA president that my cars were not violating any laws. I watched the president stare at his trapped truck for a long time, and eventually he had to call his wife to come pick him up in their other car. He left his beloved expensive truck sitting on the street, wedged between two of the ugliest vehicles in the county, still sealing my garage door shut.
My wife and I boarded our flight and enjoyed a fantastic vacation. For the next 21 days I received a steady stream of notifications from my doorbell camera. It became our favorite morning activity to drink tea on our hotel balcony and watch the updates.
The HOA president was basically forced to drive his wife’s tiny dented hatchback for three entire weeks. Every time he drove past my house, he had to look at his pristine massive truck held hostage by a rusty minivan and a peeling sedan, still parked like a wall in front of my garage. He couldn’t issue me any fines for the cars because the HOA rules strictly stated they had no jurisdiction over vehicles legally parked on city streets. He was completely powerless.
On the day we returned from our trip, our airport ride dropped us off in the afternoon. The cars were exactly where we left them. The white truck was still trapped in front of the garage, covered in a thick layer of dust and pollen. I went inside, unpacked my bags, and it was time to end this standoff.
I grabbed the keys to the minivan and the sedan and I moved the minivan down the street. I moved the sedan down the street too. Then I sent an email to the HOA board’s general inbox. I wrote a very direct message stating that I noticed a white truck had been illegally parked blocking my garage door for three weeks already and if it wasn’t moved within the hour, I would be calling a heavy machinery company to drag it into the street so I could open my own garage and get my cars out.
A bit later, the president sprinted down the sidewalk. He looked exhausted and furious and he got into his truck, started it up, and tore out of the neighborhood leaving black tire marks on the asphalt.
He never parked in front of my garage door again. The aftermath of the situation was even better than the prank itself. A few of our neighbors had watched the entire saga unfold over those three weeks and they had seen the police show up, they had seen the code enforcement officers, and they had realized that the HOA president was not invincible.
People started looking into the fines that he had been issuing them and it turned out I was not the only person he had been unfairly targeting. Several neighbors banded together and attended the next board meeting and they presented evidence of his arbitrary fines and his misuse of the towing company. The backlash was immense. A special election was called shortly after and he was voted out of his presidency by an overwhelming majority.