Academy/HOA & Community Association 101
What authority does an HOA have?
Where a board's power actually comes from, and why none of it is automatic.
An HOA's authority is never freestanding. It comes from a stack: state law sets the outer boundary, the recorded declaration creates the association's core powers, assessing dues, enforcing restrictions, maintaining common areas, and bylaws and board rules fill in the rest, but only within power those documents actually grant. Courts back board decisions made inside that authority, not outside it.
The stack, not the board, is where authority starts
Federal and state law sit on top of everything else. An association's documents can never override generally applicable law. Below that comes the recorded declaration (also called CC&Rs), the founding document that creates the community and the association itself, and hands the association its core powers, including the right to collect dues and maintain shared property. Below the declaration sit the articles of incorporation and bylaws, which organize the association as a legal entity. Below that are rules the board adopts, valid only if the declaration or bylaws actually gave the board power to adopt them. At the bottom are individual board resolutions and day-to-day decisions.
| Level | Document | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | State and federal law | Sets the outer boundary everything below must fit inside |
| 2 | Declaration (CC&Rs) | Creates the association, its assessment and enforcement power |
| 3 | Articles & bylaws | Organizes the association as a corporate or unincorporated entity |
| 4 | Board rules | Valid only if authorized by the declaration or bylaws |
| 5 | Board resolutions | Day-to-day application of the powers above |
This recorded declaration is the founding legal act; the association's articles and bylaws follow from it, not the other way around. [S1]
What that authority actually lets a board do
Three powers show up in nearly every declaration. The board can levy an assessment to fund shared costs. It can maintain and repair common property. And it can enforce recorded use restrictions uniformly against every owner, without re-proving in each individual case that the restriction is reasonable as applied to that owner.
"The covenants and restrictions in the declaration shall be enforceable equitable servitudes, unless unreasonable."
Source: Nahrstedt v. Lakeside Village Condominium Assn., Supreme Court of California
That presumption is what makes a declaration usable at scale. A challenger, not the association, carries the burden of proving a restriction unreasonable, arbitrary, or against public policy. Without it, a board would have to defend every rule against every owner from scratch.
Authority only reaches as far as it was actually delegated
Courts back a board's judgment inside that authority, not just because the board is the board, but because it did the work.
"courts should defer to the board's authority and presumed expertise"
Source: Lamden v. La Jolla Shores Clubdominium Homeowners Assn., Supreme Court of California
That deference is conditional on reasonable investigation, good faith, and staying inside the board's actual authority, not a blanket shield for any decision. The same boundary scales up past a single board. A master association, an organization that can govern shared amenities or roads across several sub-associations, has no built-in power over any of them; its authority exists only to the extent the sub-association's own declaration expressly delegated it. No delegation, no authority, no matter how reasonable the master association's request sounds. [S1]
Check yourself
Answer before you read the explanation, recalling it is what makes it stick.
A board wants to ban basketball hoops in driveways. An owner asks where the board's authority to do that comes from. What's the correct answer?
A master association tells a sub-association's board it is changing the sub-association's landscaping rules. The sub-association's declaration never mentions the master association having that power. What happens?
A board investigates a roof leak, gets a contractor's assessment in good faith, and chooses a repair method within its authority under the declaration. An owner sues, arguing a different method would have been better. What should the reader expect?
Sources
- Nevada Revised Statutes Chapter 116, Common-Interest Ownership (Uniform Act), Nevada Legislature
- Nahrstedt v. Lakeside Village Condominium Assn., 8 Cal.4th 361 (Cal. 1994), Supreme Court of California
- Lamden v. La Jolla Shores Clubdominium Homeowners Assn., 21 Cal.4th 249 (Cal. 1999), Supreme Court of California
Related elsewhere in the Academy
HOA & Community Association 101
Next, see the boundary from the other side: what authority doesn't an HOA have.
Which document (declaration, bylaws, or state statute) actually authorizes a specific board action, and what vote threshold applies to change it, vary by state and by your association's own recorded documents.