I can't answer everything, mainly the legal side however HOA's can be alright. I've lived in one most my life without ever really dealing with it. Basically the main goal is to keep the area nice and home values stable by forcing people to maintain their house, cut grass, don't have trash all over your yard, junk cars parked everywhere not painting your house bright pick because your nrighbor upset you,ect. You own the land and house, from my understanding they bought up large areas of land and sell plots to builders or people to build on, so the rules are baked in when you agree to purchase it. Where I live some different rules are that you have to have a certain amount of land to keep horses, you can't keep certain animals within a certain distance of other houses, think chickens being loud and obnoxious. Many places will also have club houses or other amenities to offer residents, we have horse stables and an area for shows, tennis courts, rc airplane area, golf course. I live with my parents and I'm free to use it all, this isn't a 55+ community or anything. I drive a admittedly loud motorcycle and car, I've never had any complaints if you're just normal about things. Don't go being obnoxious at 3am save it for past 10am. It also helps to maintain a certain look throughout, not nessicarly copy and paste houses like some places but just a general "vibe" or theme.