Condominium and HOA Owners: Your Rights in Brief

General information about Florida law, last reviewed in September 2026. It is not legal advice, and reading it does not make you a client of the firm. Florida has amended these statutes repeatedly in recent years, and your own association’s documents matter as much as the statutes do.

Condominiums are governed by chapter 718, Florida Statutes. Homeowners’ associations are governed by chapter 720, and cooperatives by chapter 719. On top of the statute sit the association’s own documents: the declaration, the articles, the bylaws and the rules. When they conflict, the statute usually wins. Where the statute is silent, the documents govern.

Owners have a right to inspect and copy the association’s official records: budgets, financial statements, contracts, bids, minutes, insurance and more. A condominium must make them available within ten working days of a written request, under section 718.111(12). A homeowners’ association must do the same within ten business days, under section 720.303(5). An association that does not can owe the owner damages set by statute.

Make the request in writing, keep proof of when it was received, and say which records you want. A request that is clear and dated is the one that can later be enforced.

An owner who does not pay assessments can face a lien on the unit or lot and, in the end, foreclosure of that lien, under section 718.116 for condominiums and section 720.3085 for homeowners’ associations. Florida law requires written notices, with waiting periods, before an association records a lien or files to foreclose. For owners, the notices are the moment to act. For boards, a notice that does not follow the statute can be challenged, and the fees built on it with it.

Before an association fines an owner or suspends a right to use common areas, it must generally give at least 14 days’ notice and a hearing before a committee of owners who are not on the board, under section 718.303(3) and section 720.305(2). A fine the committee does not approve cannot be imposed.

Enforcement also has to be even-handed. An association that lets a violation stand for some owners and enforces it against others may face a defense of selective enforcement or waiver.

Board meetings must generally be noticed in advance and open to owners, and owners have a right to speak on items on the agenda. Special rules apply to meetings that set budgets or special assessments. Elections and recalls of directors follow procedures in the statute and the bylaws, and disputes over them have their own process.

Many disputes cannot go straight to court. In a condominium, certain disputes between owners and the association must first go to non-binding arbitration through the state, under section 718.1255. In a homeowners’ association, certain disputes require an offer of pre-suit mediation, under section 720.311. Skipping the required step can get a lawsuit dismissed, so it is worth knowing which applies before the first letter goes out.

Since the Surfside collapse in 2021, Florida has rewritten large parts of chapter 718, particularly on building safety inspections, reserves and board duties, and has amended chapter 720 as well. A rule that settled a dispute a few years ago may not settle it now, so check the current statute before relying on an old answer.