system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5:Home Owners Associations.

Can they actually tell you you can't do something or can they just strongly advise against it and tell the rest of the neighborhood to give you dirty looks?
gpt
Home Owner Associations are started by someone who owns a big area of land and decides to subdivide it into lots and sell the lots to people who will build houses on them. These groups of lots are called subdivisions because they were subdivided from a single big area.

The person who subdivides the land wants to get the most money that he can for the land and he knows that people will pay more if they know that the lot next to theirs won't be bought by someone who wants to build a some noisy or smelly business. So he (the subdivision developer) puts a list of rules into the purchase contract that you sign when you buy a lot. If you don't agree to the rules then you can't buy one of the lots.

Most buyers are willing to follow the rules and feel better about buying one of these little lots even though it means that they will be living very close to a lot of other people because they know that everyone else who buys lots in the subdivision has to agree to the same rules.

One of the rules in the purchase agreement is that the rules can change over time, but only if the majority of the lot owners agree. That is why they have meetings and rule changes from time to time.