‘That right is being taken away,’ rages man threatened with $1k HOA fine for eating lunch at own home under truck rule

A RESIDENT was warned with a $1,000 parking ticket from their HOA after getting an at-home lunch.

The driver said he parked his truck at the home for a few minutes while grabbing the food but the HOA said the quick stop violated contracted rules.

Juan Rivera said he added the at-home pitstop mid-way through his daily schedule before receiving the warning, according to Myrtle Beach-based NBC affiliate WMBF in 2019.

Rivera, a local plumbing employee, grabbed his company truck for a brief break.

"What I would do is come in, park it on the road, come in, have lunch and jump back in my vehicle and go to work," Riviera explained.

"That’s not acceptable anymore."

The HOA had enacted rules around commercial parking in the neighborhood.

According to the HOA contract, commercial vehicles were not allowed to "be parked within the properties."

Rivera said the rules stopped him from grabbing the mid-day lunch at home.

"It’s my house. I pay the bills there," he told the station.

"I should be able to come in for lunch when I want to come in for lunch. I guess that right is being taken away from me."

After obliging to the HOA request, Riviera's fine was canceled.

Another resident, Marcos Andrade, faced a similar fine. He was not able to get his charge thrown out.

Andrade, a wood flooring installer, was picked up by a coworker every day in his company's van.

The HOA also charged the resident after catching the truck driving through the neighborhood.

"It has letters, but it doesn’t have my company name, it just says 'Hardwood Floors,'" Andrade said about the truck.

Andrade said the truck was never parked overnight.

Still, he received a $100 fine from the HOA when his coworker came to pick him up.

Can an HOA ban street parking?

According to a North Carolina lawyer, an HOA holds the legal right to band parking anywhere - even in a homeowner's driveway.

He claimed the HOA levied a second fine after he failed to respond to an email.

"I don’t even check emails like that," he said.

"If you call me and say, 'You cannot do this,' I won’t do it anymore. Nobody tells me I have to send an email back."

Other residents in the area said the HOA was over-enforcing the rules at the time.

However, they pointed out the community had previously struggled with lines of surprise commercial trucks lining the streets.

The residents said they wanted a better middle ground on enforcement.

"Rules and regulations are out there for a reason and by no means am I saying that those should not be there," Chet Crockett, another homeowner, told the station.

"But we have to add common sense to these rules and regulations and we have to look at exactly what are we trying to accomplish with these regulations."