A Springfield subdivision's deed restrictions were held waived and abandoned
A Springfield subdivision's deed restrictions were held waived and abandoned
2026-09-12 · Missouri · Courts
What happened. On 2 July 2026 the Missouri Court of Appeals, Southern District, affirmed a judgment holding that a set of 1920s-era construction covenants over a Springfield neighbourhood had been waived and abandoned, and could not be enforced against a developer. The decisive facts were that the grantor had intended the restrictions to work as a single package, and that every homeowner suing to enforce them was violating them.1
The case is Dixie Sleight, et al. v. BK&M, LLC, et al., No. SD38733. Chief Judge Jennifer R. Growcock wrote; Judges Matthew P. Hamner and Bryan E. Nickell concurred. It came up from a two-day bench trial before Judge Derek Ankrom of the Greene County Circuit Court. Oral argument was heard on 31 March 2026 at Branson High School, under the Southern District's travelling-argument programme.
The restrictions
The grantor's deeds imposed a familiar cluster: one single private residence per lot, exterior materials limited to brick, stone or stucco, and setback requirements. The trial court found the grantor had intended those to operate together, quoting its own finding:
“Mrs. Mackey intended these restrictions, where more than one was used, to be tied together.”
That single finding is the hinge of the whole case, and it was not appealed.
The doctrine
The court restated settled Missouri law:
“A restriction upon land may be waived and abandoned by continuous acquiescence evidenced by persistent violations.”
And on whether a set of restrictions stands or falls together:
“Whether a contract is entire or severable is a question of intention, to be gathered from the language used and the subject matter of the agreement.”
“restrictive covenants are examined in the context of the entire instrument and not in just a single clause”
The findings that ended it
The trial court found, and the opinion records, that:
“No Plaintiff is in compliance with the Single Private Residence Covenant”
that the landowners, “by their inaction, acquiesced in continuous and widespread violation,” and that “such uniform noncompliance is significant enough to constitute waiver of the covenant scheme.”
The appellate point that decided the appeal
The appellants attacked the legal conclusion — that the scheme was unenforceable — without attacking the factual finding underneath it. The court held them to that choice:
“Having failed to challenge the trial court's finding that Mrs. Mackey intended for the Construction Covenants to 'to be tied together[,]' we must accept that finding as true.”
Once non-severability was accepted as true, waiver of one restriction carried the rest — and the standing question the appellants had raised became moot. The court also noted that an against-the-weight-of-the-evidence challenge “requires completion of four sequential steps,” a requirement Missouri appellate courts enforce strictly.
Read it next to the case that came out the other way
Almost exactly a year earlier, on 8 July 2025, the Eastern District decided Bellemeade Homeowners Association v. Taylor, No. ED112825, on the same doctrine and reached the opposite result. There, the trial court had found a fencing restriction ambiguous and waived by the association's inconsistent past enforcement. The Court of Appeals reversed, and directed an award of the association's attorney's fees and costs on appeal.2
The visible difference between the two outcomes is a clause. The Bellemeade declaration contained one, quoted in that opinion:
“A decision not to enforce shall not be construed a waiver of the right of [Bellemeade] to enforce such provision at a later time.”
The court in Bellemeade also held the restriction itself unambiguous — “[f]encing must start at the rear corners of the residence constructed” — and said: “The plain and ordinary language of the provision is not susceptible to more than one meaning… the fencing restriction is unambiguous and we must enforce the language as written.” A homeowner's argument that their own lot was unique did not manufacture ambiguity.
So: same state, same doctrine, twelve months apart. One instrument had a non-waiver clause and severable restrictions and survived years of patchy enforcement. The other had restrictions the grantor tied together, no shield, and plaintiffs who were themselves non-compliant, and the whole scheme went.
What a Missouri board or trustee should take from the pair
- Find out whether your restrictions are severable. This is not a theoretical question any more. If the instrument bundles several restrictions into one sentence, or into one paragraph governing the same subject, a fact-finder may treat them as a package — and then the weakest one is the one that matters. A severability clause is cheap; discovering you do not have one during trial is not.
- Find out whether you have a non-waiver clause. If the declaration or indenture contains one, inconsistent past enforcement is far less dangerous. If it does not, every unenforced violation is evidence in someone's future waiver defence.
- Audit compliance before suing, starting with your own plaintiffs. The single most damaging finding in Sleight was that no plaintiff complied with the covenant they came to enforce. A board considering enforcement litigation should know, in writing, whether the directors and the complaining owners are themselves in compliance.
- Understand who carries the burden. Missouri places the burden of proving waiver on the party asserting it. That allocation favours an association — and it did not save the covenant scheme in Sleight, because uniform non-compliance carried the burden without difficulty.
- Do not read either case as a rule about your subdivision. Both turned on findings of fact about specific instruments and specific enforcement histories. What is category-level is the doctrine and the drafting difference, not the outcome.
The structural point about Missouri
These cases land harder in Missouri than they would in most states, and the reason is structural. Missouri has no comprehensive planned-community statute. A non-condominium homeowners association or subdivision trustee board runs primarily on its recorded declaration or indenture, with Chapter 355 supplying corporate mechanics where the association is incorporated. There is no statutory floor that survives an abandoned covenant scheme.
In a state with a planned-community act, waiver of a covenant leaves a statutory framework standing. In Missouri, for a non-condominium community, waiver of a non-severable covenant scheme can leave very little. That is what makes the severability question in Sleight a governance question and not a drafting curiosity.
One caution about the reporting
A Missouri television station ran this decision on 3 July 2026 under the headline “Missouri State Supreme Court issues ruling in University Heights development lawsuit.” That is wrong: the decision is the Court of Appeals, Southern District's, not the Supreme Court's. The docket is SD38733. If a board has been handed a summary describing this as a Supreme Court ruling, the summary is mistaken about the court, which also means it is mistaken about the decision's authority.
What we have not confirmed
Whether a motion for rehearing was filed in Sleight, or an application for transfer to the Supreme Court of Missouri made, are docket events we did not obtain; Missouri's judicial websites block automated access. Nothing here should be read as asserting that either case is beyond further review. The grantor's name appears in the opinion as we have quoted it.
Related Missouri HOA Topics
Stay on top of Missouri HOA law
Every week: new Missouri legislation, court rulings, and regulatory developments affecting condos, planned communities, and property managers. Free.
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.