The one provision that helps associations

Buried in the same act is a genuine new tool for creditors, and it is the part of most immediate use to counsel. Section 513.380.1 deletes the old five-year window on debtor examinations and replaces the whole trigger:

“A judgment creditor [in such execution, his executor, administrator or assign, may,] shall, upon motion made at any time [within five years after such return so made] before the judgment has been satisfied of record by the judgment creditor and before the judgment being presumed paid and satisfied under section 516.350, be entitled to an order by the court rendering such judgment, requiring the judgment debtor … to appear before such court … to undergo an examination under oath touching his or her ability and means to satisfy said judgment…”

Two changes there. The right is no longer conditioned on having first run an execution that came back unsatisfied, and it no longer expires. From 1 January 2027 an association holding an unsatisfied assessment judgment can move at any time, for as long as the judgment lives, and is entitled to an order compelling the owner — or a corporate owner's chief officer — to be examined under oath about assets. For a board facing an LLC-owned lot whose bank accounts are invisible, that is the single most useful sentence in the bill.

Bank garnishment, from 2028

New section 525.235 makes account garnishment the exclusive route and narrows it substantially:

“2. All orders of garnishment issued in this state for the purpose of attaching to account funds on deposit held by a financial institution shall be issued only under this section and shall attach only to such funds held by the financial institution on the date of service on the financial institution, provided the effective date of service shall be a banking day and provided service is made prior to the financial institution's business cutoff time… The return date for orders of garnishment under this section shall not be less than thirty days from the effective date of service.”

Alongside that: no more than one garnishment for the same claim against the same judgment debtor in any 30-day period without a court order; the garnishor must hold a good-faith belief the garnishee actually holds the debtor's assets; and account holders — including an innocent joint holder whose entire balance is withheld — get notice within two business days and 30 days to object or claim an exemption. Serial fishing garnishments are finished.

The distinction that decides whether any of this reaches you

This is the part most likely to be reported wrongly, so we will be explicit. Section 513.475 is an exemption from attachment and execution on a judgment. It is not a rule about liens.

A Missouri association generally has two different remedies for unpaid assessments, and they run on different machinery:

1. Sue the owner and get a money judgment, then execute against the owner's property. This is the route the new exemptions restrict. A $40,000 homestead, CPI-indexed, sitting in front of a judgment lien makes execution against a modest Missouri home substantially less productive.
2. Enforce the assessment lien the declaration creates, by whatever foreclosure mechanism the recorded instrument provides. That is a consensual security interest arising from the covenants, not an execution on a judgment, and the homestead exemption does not by itself defeat it.

Which remedy an association has, and on what terms, is a question about its declaration or indenture — Missouri has no general planned-community statute supplying one. Boards and their counsel should be clear about which remedy they are using before assuming this act has changed their position.

What a board can do before 1 January 2027

1. Ask counsel to triage the existing judgment file now. Judgments obtained and executed on before 1 January 2027 are governed by the old amounts, and section 513.423.3 says CPI adjustments “shall not apply with respect to cases commenced before the date of such adjustments.” Where execution against a homestead is realistically productive under the $15,000 figure and would not be under $40,000, the calendar matters.
2. Stop planning on personal-property execution against residential debtors. A fivefold rise in the household-goods exemption and a near-tripling of the wildcard makes a levy on furniture pointless in most cases. It was rarely worth the sheriff's fee before.
3. Re-read the declaration's lien and remedy provisions. If the recorded instrument gives the association a lien with a workable enforcement mechanism, that route is unaffected by this act and is now comparatively more valuable. If it does not — and in older Missouri indentures it often does not say clearly — that is a governing-document problem that has just become more expensive.
4. Move earlier on delinquencies, not harder later. The arithmetic of this act rewards catching a delinquency at three months rather than at three years. Every collection tool downstream of a judgment got worse; nothing about the front end changed.
5. Calendar the debtor examination. From 1 January 2027 it is available at any time on motion, for the life of the judgment. On an LLC-owned or absentee-owned lot it is the discovery step that makes the rest possible.
6. Budget for slower bank garnishment from 2028. A 30-day minimum return date and a one-per-30-days limit change the cash-flow assumption behind any collection policy that treats garnishment as a quick lever.

What to watch next

The first CPI adjustment lands 1 April 2029 and will be published rounded to the nearest $25. Nothing in Missouri law requires anyone to tell an association board what the number became.