Obtain a currently dated copy of the CC&R's. The HOA has overstepped their authority. 1)Take physical photos of the top of the shades (close-ups) that show how they are "permanently" mounted to the casing. 2) Copy of the sales receipt for blinds. US Mail both, certified-return receipt requested, to the Board's President. Include a letter stating that any further harassment on this matter will result in legal action. Guard those receipts (for the blinds & the PO receipt) and the dated copy of the CC&R with your life - for as long as you live there. Dated is important, HOA can change the regulations in future but, with your dated copy, they can't enforce them retroactively. Personally have battled with an HOA...and won...twice.

Yes, yes, and more yes, to everything that chiflipper listed!

following

Brand new subdivision with covenants filed in 2020.

They specifically say “Window treatments must have white lining. Blinds must be white or a natural wood-tone and must be at least 2” faux wood. No mini blinds allowed. Blinds or window treatments must be installed within 30 days of occupancy. No decorations to be attached on windows with the exception of holiday decor.”

We think they have us with the first sentence regarding white lining.

NO, the "lining" required is so drapery/curtains show "all white" on the exterior of the buildings. Your blinds are "white" on the outside. There's nothing in that first sentence that addresses how "opaque" the treatment must be. Stand your ground, they have NO case. ADDENDUM, your sheers have a blue banding at the top. They can object to being able to see the "blue" through your blinds. Lining just the blue band is sufficient to meet the CCR.

If it actually says this:

"Blinds must be white or a natural wood-tone and mustbe at least 2" faux wood." Then you have a great argument. Think about it.

Blinds must be white OR a natural wood-tone and must be 2" faux wood.

See, blinds that are white are NOT actually faux wood tone. So, the blinds must be WHITE *OR* faux wood 2" blinds.

That would be the argument. Your blinds are white.

And as for the lining: I'm curious how 2" faux wood blinds are going to have white lining. I agree with Chiflipper that the goal is to have either faux wood OR white appearing in the window. So that if you have blue drapes, they need to be lined in white. But white blinds are ALREADY WHITE. And no, your blinds do not look like temporary blinds, nor do they look like mini blinds. It's definitely worth a fight. it was THEIR wording that provided the flexibility.

Regarding the blue band on the sheers, I never raise the cellular shade above that level so the blue can‘t be seen from the street.

Here’s an exterior picture.

they look fine. HOA needs a rewrite. how many people in this complex? I'd be mailing out flyers to all of them, calling for a community meeting, and demanding some leniency on what you put on the INSIDE of your home.

@Beth H. :Oh Beth, you have no idea of what goes on in some HOA's. Here are just a few of the restrictions in Sun City Grand in Surprise, AZ in 2002. Bird feeders must be located within 6 feet of the rear of the house, all landscaping must follow the "plant count rule" (minimum number of which is determined by home model size), plants must be on the approved list, sodded lawn size dictated by model size, you may fence the rear perimeter of your lot in wrought iron fencing only (no fencing is allowed just around the pool), garage door must be kept closed at all times (even while you are working in the front yard), no ornamentation of any kind allowed on the front facade or yard, modification to the exterior (which includes replacement in kind - such as windows, paint, gutters etc.) requires Board approval. Said approval was requested by submitting a form and a non-refundable "fee" of $100. Yes, there are "plant police" that travel up & down the streets counting your plants, and they DO enter your rear yard to check for the required amount and kind. Woe unto those who do not correct promptly - the fines levied are outrageous. Elderly Mom and Aunt resided in the community and I had to deal with infractions. (Fought the "infractions" twice and won both times.) I knew those CCR's like a devout Baptist knows the Bible. When my relatives died I sold their properties and swore I would rather live in a hovel as opposed to a home with a HOA. End of rant.

I feel for you. We are in a townhome and for the first time have an HOA in our lives. I thought ours was extreme but honestly- yours takes the cake. From the little I have learned, it seems they really can dictate this.

We put a rubber mat on a cement slab outside our walkout basement slider. We got a letter of violation for changing our "patio". When we sent pictures, they admitted that they had not gone up to it and thought from a distance that we had painted or put in some other material and removed the fine. Can't make this up.

I can't believe they specify the size of blinds.

The way I read your covenant, all blinds need to be 2" faux wood, and your cellular shades are not acceptable. So it really depends on how you read the "or" and "and". Punctuation matters (comma before the "or" would indicate any white blind is acceptable, but since there's no comma it reads as two different color options for 2" blinds). Too bad no one likes to use punctuation anymore.
I don't have a solution for you, but now I'm definitely concerned about what the HOA will require in the community we're moving to.

I have to agree shades of all sorts are not an acceptable finishing of a window. They always look temporary, slapped up and cheap. Bite the bullet, remove them and invest in proper window panels. And well HOA's are horrid, why ANYONE would buy into a neighborhood of them is beyond me. You got what you are paying for in the end~!!

Reminds me of a t-shirt I saw.

Punctuation matters.

Let’s eat, grandma!

Let’s eat grandma!

I read a book once that was about punctuation called: "eats, shoots and leaves". The title was a reference to an article about pandas. Pretty funny.

OMG there is no end to the HOA crap . I live i8in Canada we have few of these where I live thank god . There is something terribly wrong with cookie cutter homes all the same in a sub division and honestly people should start refusing to buy homes where an HOA tells you how to do anything with YOUR home.

Lack of punctuation: It works in the OP's favor.

Reasonable people can interpret it in two ways, therefore they shouldn't be able to enforce it.

And, for those of you who think it means that all blinds need to be 2" faux wood, what do YOU make of the next line that: "Window treatments must have white lining." ?????

You don’t appreciate HOA‘s window covering rules until you live across the street from a 3 story home with different color coverings on numerous windows. We once had bright red, pink, blue, orange and often a offensive flag in the windows of a neighbor. At night it was pretty awful.

We cannot tell the OP to fight the HOA, they are wrong! Read and reread your HOA, pick your battles.

Don’t understand the great horror of seeing different colored curtains/draperies on windows from the outside.

OP’s HOA sound like the real horror.

I am thankful my HOA doesn't have stipulations about the window coverings.....that I know of.

As the president of my HOA of custom homes, I’m amazed at the number of people that don’t read their documents prior to purchase. And then they wonder why they can’t park their 40 ft. motor home in their driveway. By law, you have a right to review the Covenants prior to purchase.

For the OP- is that wording about the lining in the Covenants, or the Rules and Regulations?

maddielee well yes, of course what you described is going to look janky, like a student house. but what the OP put up is well within the realm of acceptable looking. so many of the new build (rather expensive) houses in my city come with pleated shades these days. they're super popular. and honestly, I think that the lining on some types of curtains look pretty bad from the outside. I agree with Beth. get your neighbors in on it and fight it. the HOA should amend their requirements to include pleated shades, as long as they're not crooked or damaged looking.

saminnie to answer your question: no, I don't think you can line the back of your shades. the only think I can think of is a doubled up situation where maybe you have a roller shade between the window and the pleated shades. but that will look weird and you will have to close both of them every time. if you lose the fight with the HOA, the best looking and easiest option is to replace them.

On my screen, your upstairs blind appears very white, and then downstairs a gray-blue. I’m not sure if it’s just angle of the sun.

I've lived in a condo complex for over 20 years. Never had a problem except for last August, but it had to do with my front lawn (I finally just won the fight!!!!). I know the HOA can be a royal pain. Mine never had any problem with my curtains. I always put sheers just for the purpose of privacy. is it possible for you to use sheers in this case?

Having lived in a subdivision in a city that didn't enforce ordinances I am happy to put up with 'must be white on the exterior view of a window' and a few other front yard requirements. In exchange for a few rules I don't have to deal with the slobs who can't cut the grass, park boats, trailers, etc. in the front yards, have smokers in the front yard and who knows what else. I like my clean neighborhood. I also like the fact the city I moved to has taken steps in the last 2 years to clean up the city in general. As a result the city is growing and if the HOA can't get the slobs to clean up the property the city will. I read the ordinances prior to purchase. If you don't like them don't buy in the neighborhood.

Can you take a picture at another time of day? I’m wondering if the concern is they do not appear to be white from the outside and don’t match the upper window.

chiflipper. wow. how anal can an HOA be? I mean, I understand the rules and why they are there, but some of these have taken it completely over to the far side of absolute nonsense. A bird feeder in the backyard? out of sight of anyone passing by? 'yard police' trespassing on your property to measure this feeder or check to see if you have one too many plants??? wtf? I'm assuming these restrictions are there to avoid unkempt yards, unsightly colors or other adornments, but "you can't leave your garage door up while working on your yard" ? WTH? I work out of my garage on things and would die in the summertime if I had to leave the door closed. That rule is nothing short of a tyrannical, OCD administration.

These types of HOA board members are a perfect example of what happens to people who have no life, and get drunk on 'power'.

It's currently a seller's market. I might be looking for a new home. Without the Stepford Wives in charge.

I live in an HOA and am on the board. The rule for HOAs in general is white or off white interior coverings showing to the exterior. The specificity I’m reading here is nuts. Got to read ALL governing docs BEFORE purchase though.

I have owned several homes in communities with HOAs in both USA and Canada for the past 19 years and I thought I've seen it all! But truly, "garage door must be kept closed at all times" takes the cake. Are you even allowed to leave your home?

Your window treatments DO have a "white lining", inasmuch as any cellular shade can feature a "lining". There is nothing in the verbiage you've shared to indicate that ONLY draperies or faux wood blinds are permitted. Somebody just doesn't happen to like the looks of what you chose, but that's purely arbitrary on their part and doesn't appear to have any teeth when it comes to enforcement in line with your CCRs. The restrictions have to do with uniformity of color and timeliness of installation. Mini blinds are outlawed, clearly. Cellular shades are not; in fact, no provision permitting or restricting shades appears to be present at all. Punctuation isn't an issue here. A lack of specificity is.

With all due respect, tell them to blow it out their collective arse.

And to those claiming they would never deign to live in an HOA community, you should know that there are many areas around the country where it is impossible to buy a new home that is not encumbered by CCRs. To some of us, buying new was important enough to incur the attendant conditions.

"Window treatments must have white lining."

Unlike the blinds on the second floor, the blinds in the first floor windows don't look white. That's why they are complaining. All these comments condemning HOAs are irrelevant.

Why do the blinds look so ... grey ... in the exterior picture?

My guess is that is low-e windows and when the lights hit them, they don't appear to be clear.

It says, "Blinds or window treatments must be installed within 30 days of occupancy.”

So blinds and window treatments are addressed separately. You don't have blinds, you have window treatments, so we go to the window treatments part:

"Window treatments must have white lining."

You state that your cellular shades are white backed. Now, this is clearly within the spirit of the regulations, which is to say that everything should look white or wood tone (for blinds) from the exterior - no bare windows, no mini blinds, no colors. We only need to figure out if the cellular shades meet the letter of the regulation, as well. Since they're white, the back and front are both going to look white, so its hard to determine if they're white backed because they're white or if that backing constitutes lining, so let's consider if you had gotten blue. Would blue cellular shades come with white backing or the option of white backing? If so, they would be lined, meaning that so long as yours have white backing, they can be considered lined (since they show a presentable white face to the exterior, which does not have to be the same as the interior color).

Okay, now that I've got that posted without having to rewrite it a third time, onto the fluff:

I understand dictating the color of window treatments, HOAs just take things to the extreme. When I was growing up, we were allowed to decorate our rooms however we wanted, but window coverings had to look white from the street (or equivalent for fairness, since not all windows looked out to a street). I was allowed to have my pale lavender/lilac sheers because they looked white from the street; I was not allowed to have plum colored sheers. Colored curtains had to have white linings. (House rules were enforced by mom ordering or making the window treatments, and you know, being mom.) HOAs are just a stricter version where "reads white" isn't necessarily good enough. They have to be specific because otherwise it's too difficult to enforce, and one exception leads to others using said exception as a precedent. Mom could enforce with the "because I said so" clause ... HOAs need something more concrete to prevent the polka dot bed sheet window covering ... it must be a white lined polka dot bed sheet.

Blueberry- The blinds look gray to the street. That’s the issue. Compare downstairs and upstairs pic.

Blinds must be white or....you just need to send a letter, quoting that reg. Any ambiguity does go in the homeowner’s favor. If you have an added window tint, affecting the perceived color from the street, there will be a reg about that, too. If the window tint color came from the builder who built the whole community, you will find that the builder is exempt from the rules! You should, if you have not already, sit down with the rules.
When we lived in SoCal, I had quite a few discussions with the HOA...but we never paid a fine. For example, we seeded the back yard....yup, seed is plant material, and it was installed within the three month window....

As much as I dislike it, I am in SoCal, and I have heard of ALL of these rules. My friend was cited because her front yard hose wasn't wound up all the way on a Saturday morning.

Some HOA's have rules that you MUST park 2 cars in a 2 car garage before you can leave one in the driveway. And they will check and find out. (and if anyone reading this isn't from SoCal, then you need to understand that there are no basements here, and no room for sheds (or they're not allowed), and the garage is the place where everyone stores all their stuff).

Our HOA will nitpick its way through a backyard design, specifying all manner of things they "recommend" (if you want to wait until the NEXT HOA meeting in 6 weeks, then go ahead and fight on every new "recommendation"). It might take you 3-4 months to get an approval.

It's horrible because over time, I've noticed that the Board members' homes/yards sometimes don't meet up to the standards they impose on others.