Comment by tikhonj

Eh, I live in Berkeley, a lot of the neighborhoods here are amazing, and there are almost no HOAs (besides the kind that keep condo buildings running). It's nicer than the bast majority of American suburbs I've seen. If anything, the amazing yards and cozy houses are only viable because there is no HOA pushing down arbitrary top-down rules on aesthetics. Forcing people to have traditional lawns would have totally killed the place.