All condo buildings and PUDs have CC&Rs. It is vital to read everything in these documents prior to removing a Property Condition Contingency. The rules of a PUD are usually to protect the “quiet enjoyment” and aesthetics of the complex.

In many of these complexes on the Peninsula there are the obvious rules such as pet restrictions, parking rules, and noise factors.

One of the more obscure rules is the restriction regarding hanging your laundry on a clothesline in your private patio or backyard area. The purpose of this rule is so that your neighbor does not have to look at unmentionables flapping in the wind if the are sitting by their window.

But now that the conservation of energy is top of mind for many people, it could save a lot of electricity and energy costs if a PUD could change the rules regarding hanging out your laundry.

Once such PUD in Foster City has done just that. The board of directors has voted to change the rules to allow homeowners to hang their laundry out in their own tiny private backyards. Each homeowner must vote to approve this new rule.

While visiting a friend in this complex she had mixed feelings about the new rule change. While her home faces the bay, her master bedroom faces her back patio area AND part of the next door neighbor’s patio.

I ask you as a homeowner or potential buyer of a PUD: what would you do? How would you vote?