> Yes it is. You can just move. Or not buy a house in that housing addition. Or rent in that renting addition. How is that different than "you just move if you don't like the city government's rules, or not buy a house there"? It's not. You're literally replacing one authority with the exact same thing that just have a different name. > One is enforced by the state at gunpoint and/or imprisonment if you push it enough. The other is contracts between individuals who choose or choose not to associated with each other. This is the foundational difference between authoritarianism and libertarianism. Except that's not what you're proposing. What contract do you enter into if you purchase a home with an HOA that you don't enter into when you buy a home in a specific city? They both have a list of rules that you can look up before you buy. In both cases you can choose not to buy. Each state is different, but in many states the HOA is ***more*** authoritarian than the city. An HOA can foreclose on your house, something a city cannot do for code violations. And HOAs are just as prone to corruption and apathetic voters as governments. I see it play out time and time again. You cannot construct a successful system that relies in whole or in part on changing human nature. That's why communism fails every time, and it's why any system that grants individuals power over other individuals will always have the same result - whether it's power over a city block or over a state. > Correct. It's much easier to get free-association rules changed by talking to the 10-100 home owners in your HOA than it is to change the entire state's law or the federal law. Codes are city-level.