Montana HOA Board Elections

Section 1: Overview, how board elections are governed in Montana

In Montana, board elections run on two separate tracks, and neither one is a dedicated HOA election code. For condominiums, the Montana Unit Ownership Act, Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-101 et seq., reaches board elections — but it is a traditional unit-ownership statute that requires an association of unit owners and then sends most of the election detail to the recorded bylaws.¹ Non-condominium planned communities get no coverage from any Montana common-interest statute. Their board elections answer to the recorded declaration and the association bylaws, and the Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act, Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-101 et seq., supplies the corporate defaults — director election, terms, removal, and vacancies — for the many associations that organize as nonprofit corporations.² Montana never adopted the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act, so none of UCIOA's board-governance or declarant-control machinery applies here. The state's court structure stands out too: there is no intermediate appellate court, so disputes start in the Montana District Courts and appeals go straight to the Montana Supreme Court.³ All of this puts Montana among the states where board elections are mostly contractual and corporate rather than statutory. The sections below lay out what each statute actually requires, what it leaves to the bylaws, and where the recent legislative debate stands.

Section 2: The election framework

2A. The Montana Unit Ownership Act and condominium board elections

The Unit Ownership Act is the only Montana statute that reaches condominium governance, and it applies only to properties whose owners have recorded a declaration submitting the property to the Act.¹ The key election provision is § 70-23-308. It directs that the bylaws "must provide for" several things: the election, from among the unit owners, of a board of directors; the number of people on the board; terms staggered so that at least one-third of the directors turn over each year; the powers and duties of the board; director compensation, if any; the method for removing directors; and the method for calling meetings, along with the quorum percentage.⁴ So the Act fixes only two structural rules directly: directors must be unit owners, and terms must stagger so that at least one-third expire annually. Everything else — board size, term length, nominations, balloting, and the mechanics of removal — falls to the bylaws. Those bylaws have to be recorded with the declaration, and § 70-23-307(3) provides that "[a]n amendment of the bylaws shall not be effective unless approved by 75% of the unit owners" and recorded.⁵ Under § 70-23-102(13), "[m]ajority" or "majority of the unit owners," unless the declaration says otherwise, "means the owners of more than 50% in the aggregate of the undivided ownership interests in the general common elements."⁶ This is a traditional condominium statute from the 1965 generation. It does not carry the prescriptive election machinery of UCIOA or California's Davis-Stirling Act — no mandatory secret ballots, no independent inspectors of election, no fixed nomination timelines.

2B. Planned communities: no statute, declarations and corporate law

Montana has no planned-community statute, and it offers no statutory board-election machinery for non-condominium HOAs. For those communities, the recorded declaration and the association bylaws are the primary source of board-election rules. Because most Montana associations organize as nonprofit corporations, the Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act supplies the corporate defaults that fill the gaps. The Act requires a board of three or more individuals, with the number fixed by the articles or bylaws.⁷ Directors other than the initial ones are elected at the first annual members' meeting and at each annual meeting after that, unless the articles or bylaws set another time or method.⁸ The articles or bylaws set director terms, which may not exceed five years and default to one year if unspecified; staggered terms are allowed.⁹ The Act also supplies defaults for filling vacancies, letting the members or the board fill a seat unless the governing documents say otherwise.¹⁰ Figuring out which framework applies takes two steps: first, ask whether the community is a condominium that recorded a declaration under the Unit Ownership Act; second, ask whether the association is incorporated as a nonprofit, which you can confirm through the Montana Secretary of State. The Nonprofit Corporation Act is corporate scaffolding, not an HOA election law. It governs the association as a corporation and says nothing specific to common-interest communities beyond a remote-meeting provision discussed below.

2C. Bylaws and corporate law as the operational rulebook

For both community types, the structural choices that decide an election — board size, term length, staggering, nominations, quorum, and balloting — come from the bylaws. The order of precedence runs from any applicable Unit Ownership Act provision (condominiums only), to the recorded declaration, to the bylaws, to the Nonprofit Corporation Act gap-fillers, and finally to board-adopted rules. Where the bylaws and the statute say nothing, common-law contract and property doctrine takes over, because Montana courts read recorded covenants and bylaws as contracts among owners. The operational takeaway for a manager is direct: there is no generic Montana board-election rule to quote. You can state the rule for a given community only after you read that community's declaration and bylaws and confirm whether the Unit Ownership Act applies at all, and whether the association is an incorporated nonprofit.

Section 3: Election mechanics

The table records the rule for each mechanic by community type. "Condominium" means a property submitted to the Unit Ownership Act; "planned community" means a non-condominium HOA, with the corporate defaults stated for the typical incorporated nonprofit. Where no statute governs, the entry reads "Not addressed by statute; set by the declaration and bylaws."

A. Eligibility and nominations

For condominiums, directors must be elected from among the unit owners — a requirement the Unit Ownership Act imposes through the mandatory bylaw contents.⁴ For planned communities, the Nonprofit Corporation Act asks only that directors be individuals, and it lets the articles or bylaws add qualifications; that is a corporate rule, not an HOA-specific one.⁷ Nomination procedure is bylaw-set for both community types. No Montana statute prescribes a nomination method or timeline.

B. Notice, annual meeting, and quorum

For planned communities organized as nonprofits, an annual members' meeting is required, and notice must go out not less than 10 days before the meeting — or, if sent by certified mail, not less than 30 nor more than 60 days before.^11,12 The corporate quorum default is 10% of the votes entitled to be cast, unless the articles or bylaws set a different figure.¹⁷ For condominiums, the Unit Ownership Act tells the bylaws to set the method of calling meetings and the quorum percentage, defaulting to a majority of undivided interests if the bylaws stay silent; those are bylaw-set figures, not statutory ones.^4,6

C. Voting methods, proxies, and ballots

For planned communities, the Nonprofit Corporation Act permits proxy voting unless the articles or bylaws restrict it, with a proxy good for 11 months absent a stated period and never more than three years.¹³ Action by written ballot is permitted unless restricted, and cumulative voting applies only if the articles or bylaws expressly provide for it.^14,15 Both incorporated HOAs and associations of unit owners may meet by remote means unless the governing documents say otherwise.¹⁶ For condominiums, voting weight and methods are contractual — governed by the declaration and bylaws — with the statutory "majority" default tied to undivided ownership interests.⁶

D. Terms, vacancies, removal, and recall

For condominiums, the Unit Ownership Act requires staggered terms — at least one-third of the directors turning over annually — and requires the bylaws to state the method of removal; term length and recall thresholds are bylaw-set.⁴ For planned communities, the corporate defaults govern: terms may not exceed five years and default to one year if unspecified; members may remove a director with or without cause at a meeting called for that purpose, on a vote sufficient to elect the director; vacancies may be filled by the members or the board; and a director may also be removed through a district court proceeding brought by members holding at least 10% of the voting power.^9,19,10,20

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills

B. Recent Montana Supreme Court rulings

A review of Montana Supreme Court opinions over the past 36 months turned up no decision that squarely addresses common-interest-community board elections — no contested elections, no declarant-control transition, no director removal, no voting or proxy disputes. The recent HOA decisions from the Court deal with covenant interpretation rather than board elections. Clover Meadows Homeowners Association, Inc. v. Spear (2024 MT 102N), for example, was a noncitable memorandum opinion that turned on the meaning of "single-family dwelling," not on any election or governance-mechanics question.²² Consistent with the publication's verification policy, we report no board-election ruling here, because none exists in the relevant window. Disputes that do arise would be heard in a Montana District Court and appealed directly to the Montana Supreme Court, since Montana has no intermediate appellate court.³

C. Active legislative debates

The Legislature enacted House Joint Resolution 50 in 2025. Rep. Griffith sponsored it, and it was filed with the Secretary of State on May 6, 2025, requesting an interim study of the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act. The enrolled resolution notes that the Unit Ownership Act "governs condominiums in Montana and has not been thoroughly amended since its adoption in 1965," and it directs that the study — which could add statutory election procedures — "be concluded prior to September 15, 2026," with results reported to the 70th Legislature.²³

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

Montana sits with the states where board elections are largely contractual and corporate. The recorded declaration and bylaws carry the operative rules, the Nonprofit Corporation Act supplies the director-election, term, removal, and vacancy defaults, and a traditional 1965-era condominium statute governs unit-ownership communities — with no comprehensive planned-community statute at all. That sets Montana apart from UCIOA states such as Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Minnesota, Vermont, and Washington, and from prescriptive-procedure states such as California, where the Davis-Stirling Act dictates ballots, inspectors, and timelines. Montana's single-tier appellate structure reinforces the point: there is no intermediate court, and an election dispute moves from a District Court directly to the Montana Supreme Court. For a multi-state operator expanding into Montana, the practical implication is plain — the governing rulebook is the community's own declaration and bylaws, read against corporate-law gap-fillers, not a state election statute.

Federal frameworks also reach Montana associations no matter what the state framework says — the Fair Housing Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, and the FCC's OTARD rule.

1. Mont. Code Ann. tit. 70, ch. 23 (Unit Ownership Act — Condominiums) ↩
2. Mont. Code Ann. tit. 35, ch. 2 (Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act) ↩
3. Montana Supreme Court, Montana Judicial Branch ↩
4. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-308 (Contents of bylaws) ↩
5. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-307 (Bylaws — adoption, recording, and amendment) ↩
6. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-23-102 (Definitions), 2025 Montana Code Annotated ↩
7. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-415 (Qualifications and number of directors) ↩
8. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-417 (Election, designation, and appointment of directors) ↩
9. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-419 (Terms of directors generally; staggered terms) ↩
10. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-424 (Vacancy on board) ↩
11. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-526 (Annual and regular meetings) ↩
12. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-530 (Notice of meeting) ↩
13. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-539 (Proxies) ↩
14. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-533 (Action by written ballot) ↩
15. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-540 (Cumulative voting for directors; exception) ↩
16. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-525 (Homeowners' association; remote meetings) ↩
17. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-537 (Quorum requirements) ↩
18. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-538 (Voting requirements) ↩
19. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-421 (Removal of directors elected by members or directors) ↩
20. Mont. Code Ann. § 35-2-423 (Removal of directors by judicial proceeding) ↩
21. H.B. 619, 2025 Reg. Sess. (Mont. 2025), Montana Legislature Bill Explorer ↩
22. Clover Meadows Homeowners Ass'n, Inc. v. Spear, 2024 MT 102N (noncitable memorandum opinion), Montana Supreme Court ↩
23. H.J. Res. 50, 2025 Reg. Sess. (Mont. 2025) (enrolled), Montana Legislature ↩