There have been occasional references on this and other sites about living with the rules of a community. The dos and don'ts if you will. I recall several casual references to the rules of Sun City Grand as being a bit overbearing compared to Sun City. Now comes the question. Are Sun City Grand rules (cc&rs) more prohibitive than the rules of the original Sun City (or Sun City West) ? If so, in what way? Or, are the references I've seen here just a way of showing the "exceptionality" of Sun City over Grand?
Great question or point R. The whole question of CC&R's and HOA's is one that often cuts both ways. Some folks like rigidity in their rules, many prefer no rules at all. I find there need some order, though I hate overbearing; a little chaos makes life more interesting. My first several years I was at the Sun City Visitor Center and we used Sun City's CC&R's as a selling point. They are minimal at best; easy to follow and yet help keep the community looking good (not identical). Even with that, we have folks who balk and usually whine that old lament: "it's my property and I can do what I want." I've not looked at Grand's but I know folks living there and they have a color chart for paint, what kind of plants are acceptable, how many trees and bushes you can plant and the kind of yard art you can put in. That's just for starters. Not sure on Sun City West but I think they are more in tune with us. The biggest problem they have has been in deciding who is responsible in pursuing residents who refuse to comply. PORA does the initial paper work and tries to resolve things at the lowest levels. By the time Sun City West had been built the evolution had begun into more a streamlined structure. They were kind of caught in between. Now days HOA's in age restricted communities are single entity organizations where SCHOA is freestanding and PORA is kind of free standing. There's good and bad to both, but that's another discussion for another time. My advice is simple, no matter where you buy, get a copy of the CC&R's and take a good hard look at them. They will tell you a lot about the community. Then it's just a matter of personality preference...do you like ones more rigid or less.
Just did a bit of checking and here are a few examples of the differences between the Original Sun City & Sun City Grand(which is actually only the name for a Del Webb neighborhood development area)in Surprise. There are 76 Pages of Residential Design Guidelines which must be adhered to and any request for changes must be submitted and approved. There are 60 Pages of CC&Rs. If you check the Sun City Homeowners Association CC&Rs it's only 11 pages and is pretty lenient while insuring that compliance will maintain property values. The annual assessment for the Rec Centers in Sun City Grand is currently $1266 per property(2 cards) and the property taxes because it's in the city of Surprise are around 3-4 times higher than in the original Sun City. Many don't have the resources to live the lifestyle of Sun City Grand and many don't care to live by so many rules. It's good to have numerous housing choices in the West Valley.
In 1960s CC&Rs were a very new concept. Over time CC&Rs have become complex and restrictive. Today most CC&Rs come in a 3" ring binder. Architectural control is a significant portion. As a general rule the newer the community the bigger the binder. We did a mandatory rewrite of 25 year old governing docs and easily doubled the content. BTW it took one year.
Sorry Cynthia, my input wasn't clear.... ....this was not in Sun City. We was the board of a 256 home HOA , and me. My intended point was the time and complexity of re writing 25 year old CC&Rs. What started out as a manageable set of community governing docs became a 5lb binder, despite our mission of simplification. Some condo associations and HOAs have a CC&R expiration, requiring new CC&Rs.
Thank you folks! Good stuff. Always depend on this site to get needed info. If anyone else has perspective don't hesitate to add.
