Tal, I would love for you to share more of what happened to you with HOAs. So many horror stories begin with “I bought this property inside as HOA and…” You know what is coming is not good.
When an institution, public or private, expects unreasonable things from you, one of their defenses is to take a pre-emptive holier than though attitude. Like, “What, you mean you didn’t read the paragraphs that were in a size 2 font?” In the same spirit, the government takes the position that it has no obligation to provide crucial information about a property. They tell you haughtily, “You have the obligation to do a title search. Are you saying you did not do your duty?” Well, what we need sometimes is not in the chain of title, and no, it shouldn’t be our duty. I have been having problems with finding utility poles in properties I am interested in, and getting information about easements with the power company is like pulling teeth.
Like you say, some of these properties are poisoned pills. If you inadvertently buy one, you can’t use it and you can’t sell it. You can’t even stop paying your taxes so the county will take it back because that will have all kinds of bad consequences for your record.