What the recorded documents actually say about Birchwood Farms in Osceola — fences, sheds, pools, pets, parking and the rest — with the part of the document each answer comes from.
3 homes have sold here in the last four years, which is why this neighborhood was compiled early.
Before you rely on this page
WHAT THIS PAGE RESTS ON. The answers below come from the Protective Restrictions, Covenants, Limitations and Easements for Birchwood Farms, recorded in St. Joseph County on June 24, 1999 as Instrument No. 9929070, by the developer Place Realty Inc. It is a single eleven-page recorded instrument, read in full, including the page images. There are no amendments on file and no later instrument of any kind.
THIS IS NOT BIRCHWOOD ESTATES. There is a separate neighborhood with a similar name in the same county, and the two are not the same place and not governed by the same document. Birchwood Farms is a 1999 development by Place Realty Inc. with a homeowners association, a three-car side load garage standard and minimum house sizes of one thousand to eleven hundred square feet. The Birchwood Estates covenants are a 1977 instrument by a different developer, Hilton Realty Inc., with a thirty-five thousand dollar minimum build cost, an eleven hundred and fifty square foot standard, a two-stall garage and no homeowners association. Nothing from those documents was used here.
WHICH LOTS. The restrictions say on their face that they are for Birchwood Farms, consisting of thirty-eight lots, and the assessment paragraph reaches every lot in all additions to and sections of the recorded plat. The legal description bound into the copy on file is a title office exhibit that names sixteen specific lots in Birchwood Farms Section One, per the plat recorded May 21, 1999 as Instrument No. 9922983, rather than the full thirty-eight. Have your title company confirm that this instrument is recorded against the particular lot you are buying.
WHAT IT DOES NOT SETTLE. The association may adopt by-laws and set its own mailbox and architectural criteria, and none of that is part of the recorded document or on file here. The dues cap is a 1999 figure that owners could have amended since. The architectural committee's authority was written to run twenty years from the recording of the plat, so who approves what today is a question for the association. The copy on file is a scan of typed paper read by optical character recognition, which can misread individual words, so each answer carries the document's own wording.
WHAT TO DO BEFORE YOU RELY ON IT. Ask the association for its by-laws, the current annual dues, the current architectural and mailbox criteria, and who sits on the architectural committee now. If you are planning a fence, a pool, a storage building, a satellite dish or any tree removal, those all run through that committee and are worth settling in writing first.
Perimeter fencing is out. What the fencing paragraph allows instead is privacy fencing around an immediate patio or pool, no more than six feet, which has to match the architectural standards set by the style of the house and be approved in writing by the Birchwood Farms Architectural Control Committee. The paragraph also contemplates a written variance from the fence requirement. Two other paragraphs touch fences: on a corner lot nothing obstructing sight lines between two and six feet above the roadway may sit inside the twenty-five foot triangle at the intersection, and no screen planting over thirty-six inches is permitted between the building setback line and the front lot line.
A detached storage building or pet shelter is allowed, with approval. The detached building paragraph covers structures for storing lawn tools, toys, swimming pool apparatus or any other personal property, or for sheltering pets. It requires quality construction, an attractive and neat appearance, a look that blends with the established home, and submission to the Birchwood Farms Architectural Control Committee for approval before construction begins; the committee may also require protective screening around the structure. No size, height or placement limit is given, so those come from the committee. A separate paragraph bars a trailer, modular home, manufactured home, pre-built home, tent, shack, barn, outbuilding or temporary structure being moved onto or built on a lot and used as a residence, which is about living in one rather than about a storage building.
The recreational and commercial vehicles paragraph is one sentence: no recreational or commercial vehicles - it names campers, trailers, trucks and boats - may be kept in open areas in this subdivision, whether those open areas are on or off the lot of any lot owner. The document never defines what an open area is and it never mentions a garage in either direction, so what it does not say is as important as what it does. Every house here has to have an attached garage holding two to three cars, and the garage paragraph separately requires that cars and garage doors not be readily visible from the street. If you own a camper, a boat or a trailer, get the association's position in writing before you rely on it.
Above-ground pools are not permitted. Inground pools, and tennis courts, are permitted with the prior approval of the Birchwood Farms Architectural Control Committee. The fencing paragraph then allows privacy fencing up to six feet around an immediate patio or pool, with committee approval in writing. No depth, size, placement or pool-fencing standard is set out in the covenants, so those come from the committee and from county rules.
Nothing gets built or altered here without written approval first. No building or other structure may be erected, placed, maintained or altered on a lot, and the natural topography or drainage may not be altered, until construction plans have been approved by the Birchwood Farms Architectural Control Committee. The plans have to show floor plan, quality of construction, materials, outside colours, how the external design sits with existing structures, location against lot lines, topography and finish grade elevations, in two complete sets, one kept by the developer and one returned. Approval or disapproval is in writing, nothing that does not comply fully with the approved plans may be built, and no deviation may be made without the committee's prior written consent. The committee is three people appointed by the developer, and its authority runs for twenty years from the recording of the plat. Materials are controlled too: the front exterior of every dwelling is to be brick, wood, stone or a combination with vinyl, subject to committee approval. Driveways may not be stone or cinder, have to be at least twelve feet wide and built of brick or concrete with concrete at least four inches thick, and all fireplace chimneys are to be masonry brick. Every lot also has to carry a dusk to dawn light of a type the committee approves, in front of the front building setback line.
The utilities paragraph is flat on this: no outside above-ground television, AM, FM or short wave radio antenna of any type, including any type of satellite dish antenna, may be erected or maintained on any lot or structure in the subdivision. All utility services are to be underground and not visible, and street and lot lighting on posts with no lines visible. There is no approval route written into the paragraph and no amendment on file that softens it, which is worth knowing because several neighbourhoods of this era did later record one. Federal rules on over-the-air reception devices can bear on how a clause like this is enforced, which is a question for a lawyer rather than for this page, so ask the association how it handles a dish today.
We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →Trees are the thing to know about here. No live tree over four inches in diameter, measured twelve inches above the ground, may be cut without the prior approval of the Birchwood Farms Architectural Control Committee, and nor may any tree generally known as a flowering tree, with dogwood and redbud named as examples, any broad leaf evergreen, or live vegetation on a slope steeper than twenty percent. The committee sets the rules for selective clearing. Separately, no live tree of any size within ten feet of the perimeter of a lot may be cut without that approval. Protective screening areas marked as non-access easements on the plat have to be kept planted by the lot owners at their own expense to form an effective screen, and no screen planting over thirty-six inches may sit between the building setback line and the front lot line. Yards are to be planted with grass seed, sod or ground cover within one hundred and twenty days of the house being completed or occupied, whichever is earlier, unless the committee approves otherwise.
Mailboxes have their own paragraph. Each lot has to have a mailbox at all times, kept in good condition and repair, conforming to the design criteria set by the Architectural Control Committee. The covenants do not print the design itself, so ask the association what the current criteria are before replacing one.
Dogs, cats and other household pets are permitted. Animals, livestock or poultry of any kind may not otherwise be raised, bred or kept on a lot. The two conditions on the pets that are allowed are that they not be kept, bred or maintained for any commercial purpose, and that they not be allowed to become a neighbourhood nuisance or hazard. No number, weight, breed or leash rule appears. A pet shelter structure counts as a detached building and needs committee approval before it is built. The home occupation paragraph also rules out running an animal hospital or any form of animal care or treatment such as dog trimming from the house.
We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →This one is stricter than most and it catches something sellers care about. No sign of any kind may be displayed to public view on any lot unless the developer gives prior written approval - and the paragraph says expressly that this includes a sign advertising the property for sale or for rent, and a builder's sign during construction and sales. The developer also reserved its own right to put up signs promoting lot and home sales. Since the developer finished here long ago, who gives that approval now is a practical question for the association. Indiana law on certain sign types can bear on how a clause like this is enforced, which is a question for a lawyer rather than for this page.
The garages and parking paragraph does several things at once. Every dwelling must have a full-size attached garage holding at least two cars and no more than three. Garages and parking have to be positioned so that no cars or garage doors are readily visible from the street and are effectively screened from other lots, which is why most of the garages here are side load; the building type paragraph allows a non-side-load garage only where the committee approves one with a drywalled and textured interior. No vehicle may be parked on the grass or landscaped part of a lot at any time, and no vehicle may be parked on a right-of-way on a regular, recurrent or permanent basis. Recreational and commercial vehicles are dealt with separately and may not be kept in open areas. What the covenants do not set is a limit on cars in a driveway or an overnight guest parking rule.
A lot may be used only as a single-family residence, except that a home occupation may be permitted where it meets all of the conditions listed: conducted entirely within the dwelling, carried on solely by a member of the immediate family living there, clearly incidental and secondary to use of the home as a home and not changing its character, with no sign or display showing from the outside, no commodity sold on the premises, nobody employed other than an immediate family member living there, and no mechanical or electrical equipment used. The paragraph then names uses that can never qualify: a barber shop, styling salon, beauty parlour, tea room, fortune-telling parlour, animal hospital, or any form of animal care treatment such as dog trimming.
We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →No lot may be used or maintained as a dumping ground for rubbish, and trash, garbage or other waste may not be kept except in sanitary containers. Any incinerator or other equipment for storing or disposing of waste has to be kept in a clean, sanitary condition. The association is separately given power to enforce the restrictions about accumulations of rubbish, weeds or trash. Nothing is said about where containers are stored between collections, whether they must be screened, or when they may go to the curb.
No grill or barbecue is named anywhere in these covenants, in either direction. The fires paragraph is one sentence and it is aimed at a particular place: no fire may burn on any street or roadway in the subdivision. It does not reach a fire on a lot, which is where a grill would normally sit, so on the face of that wording grilling in your own yard is not what the paragraph is about. The nuisance paragraph, which bars noxious or offensive activity and anything that becomes an annoyance in the neighbourhood, is the clause smoke complaints would run through instead.
We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →We don’t have this one confirmed yet — we can ask the association and get you an answer before you commit to anything.
We can find out →Tell us the question and we will get you the answer from the recorded documents.