What does the Homeowners Association do?

The vast majority of residential developments built these days are managed by their own individual Association. This is done to provide decision making of all aspects at the most local level possible by a group of individually elected owners within your Association. In addition, this helps to eliminate the burden of maintenance that would otherwise be placed on the local municipality. 

Most owners agree that the HOA will maintain the common areas better and more often than the local municipality. Therefore, it is more advantageous to be governed by an Association than oversight directly by the local city or town.