The enforcement teeth: a defence that stops an eviction outright

New § 47-32-01.1 is the provision that makes the rest of the statute real:

“During an eviction proceeding against a tenant of a mobile home park, a tenant may present a defense that the landlord violated a provision of section 47-10-28. If the court finds the landlord violated a provision of section 47-10-28, the court may not order an eviction. In a second or subsequent eviction proceeding, a tenant only may raise violations that arose after a prior order between the parties was entered, or violations that were unknown to the court at the time of the prior order.”

Note what it does not say. It does not say the court may weigh the violation, or excuse a trivial one, or require the violation to relate to the ground for eviction. It says the court may not order an eviction. A park owner who overcharged a late fee by a dollar has, on the face of the statute, lost that eviction.

Subsection 12 adds money: “A person that violates a provision of this section is subject to a civil penalty not less than two thousand five hundred dollars but not exceeding the greater of ten thousand dollars or actual damages, plus actual attorney's fees and costs.” A floor of $2,500 per violation, with fees.

The eviction notice now has to say the resident can stay

Subsection 10 prescribes language, and it is unusual:

“A notice of intent to evict a tenant from a mobile home park under section 47-32-02 must include clear, boldfaced language stating: “You do not have to vacate immediately. You have the right to remain until a court issues an eviction order.””

An eviction notice that omits it is a notice that violates § 47-10-28, which is a defence under § 47-32-01.1.

Receivership

The Act added a new chapter to title 23 giving the state a remedy no community-association statute in North Dakota provides. When the department revokes a park's licence, it “may file a petition with the district court to place the mobile home park under the control of a receiver for repeated or serious violations of chapter 23-10 or the administrative rules of the department, or to protect health or safety.” The court appoints the commissioner, who may designate a qualified individual or a nonprofit to execute it, and “The receiver may not liquidate the assets of the mobile home park.”

Why this reaches an HOA or condo board at all

Two reasons, and neither is that the statute applies to you — it does not. Section 47-10-28 governs mobile home parks, not associations.

First, it is the legislature's own model of how community rules should change. Thirty days' notice of a rule change, then three months to comply before enforcement, with an extension where compliance is physically impossible. North Dakota associations operate under no such rule; a board can adopt a regulation and enforce it on whatever timeline the declaration allows. When the question of association governance returns, that three-month structure is the template the legislature has already endorsed. Our North Dakota fining authority page covers what constrains enforcement inside an association today.

Second, mixed communities exist. Where an association's land includes leased lots, or where a community sits adjacent to a park under common ownership, the two regimes can meet in the same eviction. The defence in § 47-32-01.1 is available to a park tenant regardless of what any association document says.

What to watch next

Watch for the first reported application of § 47-32-01.1 and whether North Dakota courts read “the court may not order an eviction” as absolutely as it is written. Watch, too, for whether the ten-percent late-fee cap and the ninety-day rent-increase notice start appearing in proposals aimed at associations — they are the provisions most easily lifted from one context to the other.