Florida HOA Fining Authority

Section 1: Overview — Fining authority in Florida

Florida splits its fining authority across two statutes, and the split matters. Section 718.303 governs condominiums; section 720.305 governs homeowners' associations. Both cap a fine at $100 per violation and $1,000 in the aggregate, and both require a hearing before an independent committee of members before the board can collect. The condominium fining power sits in section 718.303(3) of the Florida Condominium Act,¹ while the planned-community power sits in section 720.305(2) of the Homeowners' Association Act.² Under both chapters, a board may not impose a fine or suspend a use right without first giving at least 14 days' written notice and letting the owner appear before a committee of at least three members — none of them board members, association employees, or relatives of either. If that committee votes down the fine, the board cannot impose it.¹ The chapters converge on that due-process framework and diverge sharply on liens: a condominium fine can never become a lien against a unit under section 718.303(3), while a homeowners' association fine of $1,000 or more can become a lien against a parcel under section 720.305(2), if the governing documents authorize it and the separate lien-and-foreclosure rules in section 720.3085 are satisfied.³ Florida rewrote both chapters in 2024 — House Bill 1203 for Chapter 720 and House Bill 1021 for Chapter 718 — and both took effect July 1, 2024, so the current statute text controls.⁴ The Quick-Reference table below lays out the mechanics for each chapter, with every value sourced in the detailed discussion that follows.

Section 2: Quick-Reference Fining Mechanics Table

Here's Florida's fining picture at a glance. The Condominiums column reflects Chapter 718 — section 718.303 and related sections. The Planned Communities column reflects Chapter 720 — section 720.305, section 720.3085, and related sections. The two genuinely differ, most consequentially on whether a fine can become a lien, so confirm the community type before applying any rule below. Every value in the table is sourced in the detailed discussion in Section 3.

The Condominiums column reflects Chapter 718 (§ 718.303); the Planned Communities column reflects Chapter 720 (§ 720.305, § 720.3085). A condominium fine may never become a lien. An HOA fine of $1,000 or more may, once the governing documents authorize it. Confirm the caps and lien rules against the current post-2024 statute text. Last verified: July 14, 2026.

Section 3: Fining mechanics in detail

3A. Source and outer limits of fining authority

Condominiums answer to the Florida Condominium Act. Section 718.303(3) grants the association power to levy reasonable fines when an owner, occupant, licensee, or invitee fails to comply with the declaration, the bylaws, or a reasonable rule.¹ The statute caps that power tightly: a fine "may not exceed $100 per violation, or $1,000 in the aggregate." The board can levy a fine for each day a violation continues, after a single notice and hearing, but the aggregate cap still governs the total. And that cap doesn't bend. Section 718.303(3) gives the governing documents no room to raise it, so no condominium declaration can authorize a fine above $100 per violation or $1,000 in the aggregate.

Homeowners' associations answer to a different statute — the Homeowners' Association Act. Section 720.305(2) grants parallel authority to levy reasonable fines for the same kinds of violations: the declaration, the bylaws, or a reasonable rule. But its cap reads differently in one operative respect. The statute says a fine "may not exceed $100 per violation ... unless otherwise provided in the governing documents. A fine may be levied by the board for each day of a continuing violation ... except that the fine may not exceed $1,000 in the aggregate unless otherwise provided in the governing documents. A fine of less than $1,000 may not become a lien against a parcel."² So the default caps mirror the condominium figures, but a Chapter 720 community can set higher per-violation or aggregate amounts if its governing documents say so. Watch that drafting difference closely — it's the first place a cross-chapter mistake creeps in.

The two chapters run parallel in structure but stand separate in text and effect — Chapter 720 doesn't incorporate Chapter 718, and neither borrows from the other. In both, the governing documents work alongside the statute: they can set lower fine limits, they must supply the substantive rules a fine enforces, and in the HOA context they can raise the aggregate cap. In the condominium context, they cannot exceed the statutory cap, full stop. Both chapters also carry new grounds-based limits. Section 720.305(7), for instance, bars an HOA from fining a homeowner for leaving garbage receptacles out within 24 hours of collection, or for certain holiday decorations.²

3B. The required fining procedure

Both chapters demand a set sequence before a fine becomes enforceable, and the independent committee sits at the center of it. Under section 718.303(3)(b), a condominium board cannot impose a fine or a suspension "unless the board first provides at least 14 days' written notice" and an opportunity for a hearing "before a committee of at least three members appointed by the board who are not officers, directors, or employees of the association, or the spouse, parent, child, brother, or sister of an officer, director, or employee."¹ That committee doesn't set the fine — it only confirms or rejects what the board already levied, and if it doesn't approve by majority vote, the board cannot impose the fine. Section 720.305(2)(b) sets the same 14-day notice and the same independent-committee makeup for homeowners' associations, then goes further: the hearing must happen within 90 days of the notice, and the notice itself must describe the alleged violation, spell out the specific action that would cure it, and give the hearing date and access details.² In both chapters, the hearing runs before the committee — never before the board alone — and a fine the committee rejects stays rejected.

Where the two chapters split is the back end of the procedure, largely a result of the 2024 amendments. For condominiums, section 718.303(3)(b) sets a short fuse: once the committee approves a fine, payment "is due 5 days after notice of the approved fine is provided."¹ For homeowners' associations, House Bill 1203 rebuilt that back end entirely. The committee must issue written notice of its findings within 7 days of the hearing under section 720.305(2)(d). A violation cured before the hearing bars the fine outright under section 720.305(2)(e). And if the committee approves the fine, it must set a payment date at least 30 days after that written notice, under section 720.305(2)(f).² Per-day fines still accrue in both chapters, subject to the $1,000 aggregate default.

The pre-suit posture differs too. Section 718.1255 sets up condominiums' mandatory-arbitration and pre-suit-mediation scheme, defining "dispute" around board authority and governance while expressly excluding disagreements that primarily involve levying or collecting a fee or assessment — so most fine-collection disputes fall outside that mandatory track.⁵ Section 720.311 requires pre-suit mediation for HOA covenant-enforcement disputes, but it draws the same exclusion: disputes "subject to presuit mediation ... shall not include the collection of any assessment, fine, or other financial obligation."⁶ The practical takeaway is direct. A fine imposed without the required 14-day notice and independent-committee approval invites a challenge, and in the HOA context, it may be voided outright.

3C. Enforcement of unpaid fines: assessments, liens, and foreclosure

This is where the two chapters split most consequentially. Section 718.303(3) states flatly: "[a] fine may not become a lien against a unit."¹ A condominium fine, in other words, is never securable by the association's lien and can never be foreclosed as a fine — period. Section 720.305(2) sets a different rule for homeowners' associations: "[a] fine of less than $1,000 may not become a lien against a parcel."² Read that against its terms and a fine of $1,000 or more can become a lien against a parcel — but only if the governing documents authorize a lien for that amount. Both the threshold and the authorization requirement matter, and swapping the condominium rule for the HOA rule, or vice versa, is the single most damaging error anyone can make reading this page.

Even a qualifying HOA fine doesn't foreclose automatically. Section 720.3085 builds the association's lien-and-foreclosure machinery around unpaid assessments and the "other amounts" the section provides for, and its foreclosure procedure, notice requirements, and payment-application rules are all keyed to assessments.³ Whether a fine-based lien of $1,000 or more can actually support a foreclosure — as opposed to merely attaching once authorized — depends on the governing documents and on how section 720.3085 gets applied. It is not a settled, mechanical right. Treat fine foreclosure as legally uncertain, and get counsel involved before attempting it.

Because condominium fines can't be liened, associations chase unpaid condominium fines through other means — a civil action on the debt, often in small claims court, backed by Chapter 718's prevailing-party fee provisions, plus suspension of use rights where authorized. Suspension tools exist in both chapters. A condominium can suspend common-element and amenity use, and voting rights, once an owner runs more than 90 days delinquent on a monetary obligation under section 718.303(4), and it can suspend use rights for rule violations after the hearing process.¹ An HOA can suspend common-area use for a rule violation after a hearing under section 720.305(2)(a), and it can suspend amenity use and voting rights for a delinquency running past 90 days under section 720.305(3) and (4).² Delinquency-based suspensions skip the committee hearing, but they still carry their own notice requirements — and in the HOA setting, boards cannot cut off ingress, egress, or parking.

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills

Florida didn't sit still in the last two legislative cycles. Lawmakers rewrote the fining procedure for homeowners' associations, expanded regulatory reach over condominium fine records, and passed one more condominium bill that left the fining rules themselves untouched.

B. Recent appellate rulings

Florida's appellate courts have stayed close to procedure this cycle rather than rewriting substance — one ruling on when a homeowner can go to court over a contested fine, another on a different track of covenant enforcement that happens to run through the same statute.

No qualifying condominium fining decision — a case interpreting section 718.303 — reached a District Court of Appeal or the Florida Supreme Court within the past 36 months. Trial-level fining disputes still run through Florida's circuit and county courts, with appeals landing at the District Courts of Appeal, including the Sixth District Court of Appeal, created effective January 1, 2023 to cover the Ninth, Tenth, and Twentieth circuits, and discretionary review available at the Florida Supreme Court.¹²

C. Active legislative debates

House Bill 657 (2026) cleared the Florida House by a lopsided 108-2 vote on March 5, 2026, then died in the Senate when the session closed on March 13, 2026. It would have created a Community Associations Court and imposed civil penalties of up to $5,000 per violation against board members who don't comply. Its sponsor, Representative Juan Porras, says he plans to refile it in the 2027 session.¹³

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

Step back, and Florida fits a two-statute pattern, like Arizona — condominiums and planned communities stay under separate acts rather than converging into one code. Florida pairs that split structure with specific dollar caps and a distinctive requirement: fines must clear an independent committee of non-board members before they stick. That's a different model from single-statute California, where a monetary penalty imposed as discipline "may not be characterized nor treated in the governing documents as an assessment that may become a lien" enforceable by sale of the owner's interest, under California Civil Code section 5725(b). It's different again from the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act states — Alaska, Connecticut, Colorado — which follow a more uniform, code-based framework.¹⁴ Because Chapter 718 and Chapter 720 genuinely diverge, confirm the community type before applying any Florida fining rule. The fine-lien split defines Florida enforcement: condominium owners carry more protection, since a condominium fine can never become a lien, while HOA parcels face a possible lien once a fine reaches $1,000 and the governing documents allow it — subject to the section 720.3085 foreclosure analysis.

HOA Weekly updates this coverage quarterly as the Legislature and the Florida courts act, with particular attention to how the 2024 reforms play out. Federal law applies here too, regardless of what Florida's own statutes say — notably the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, which can reach third-party collection of fines, along with the Fair Housing Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, and the rules governing satellite dishes and antennas.

1. Fla. Stat. § 718.303 (2025), Obligations of owners and occupants; remedies (The Florida Senate) ↩
2. Fla. Stat. § 720.305 (2025), Obligations of members; remedies at law or in equity; levy of fines and suspension of use rights (The Florida Senate) ↩
3. Fla. Stat. § 720.3085 (2025), Payment for assessments; lien claims (The Florida Senate) ↩
4. CS/CS/HB 1203 (2024), Homeowners' Associations, Ch. 2024-221, eff. July 1, 2024 (The Florida Senate); CS/CS/CS/HB 1021 (2024), Community Associations, Ch. 2024-244, eff. July 1, 2024 (The Florida Senate) ↩
5. Fla. Stat. § 718.1255 (2025), Alternative dispute resolution; mediation; nonbinding arbitration; applicability (The Florida Senate) ↩
6. Fla. Stat. § 720.311 (2025), Dispute resolution (The Florida Senate) ↩
7. CS/CS/HB 1203 (2024), Homeowners' Associations, Ch. 2024-221 (The Florida Senate); see History note to Fla. Stat. § 720.305 (2025), "s. 7, ch. 2024-221" ↩
8. HB 1021 (2024) Bill Summary, Ch. 2024-244 (The Florida Senate) ↩
9. HB 913 (2025), Condominium and Cooperative Associations (The Florida Senate) ↩
10. Pirman v. South Pointe of Tampa Homeowners Ass'n, Inc., 370 So. 3d 701 (Fla. 2d DCA 2023), Case No. 2D23-58 (Florida Second District Court of Appeal) ↩
11. Mooney v. Color Le Palais of Boynton Beach Homeowners Ass'n, Inc., Case Nos. 4D2024-0967 & 4D2024-2082 (Fla. 4th DCA Aug. 27, 2025) (Florida Fourth District Court of Appeal) ↩
12. Florida Sixth District Court of Appeal (created eff. Jan. 1, 2023; Ninth, Tenth, and Twentieth circuits) (flcourts.gov) ↩
13. HB 657 (2026), Homeowners' Associations (The Florida Senate) ↩
14. Cal. Civ. Code § 5725(b) (California Legislative Information) ↩