Four Oklahoma cities, four different answers on whether your covenant matters
Four Oklahoma cities, four different answers on whether your covenant matters
2026-09-15 · Oklahoma · Regulation
Oklahoma has no statute reconciling city ordinances with private covenants, so each city has decided for itself. Four of them have reached four different answers, all in force at once.
Oklahoma City: the covenant is a ground for denial
OKC is the only Oklahoma city that gives an association an affirmative municipal remedy. Under § 59-9350.38.1(I):
“When evaluating an application for a home sharing/short term rental Special Exception, the Board of Adjustment may consider as a basis for denial any restrictive covenant which both: 1) specifically identifies home sharing/short term rental, as that term is defined in Section 13-500 of this Code, as a prohibited use of the real property on which the use would occur and 2) is filed of record against the real property on which the use would occur…”1
And the licensing article yields expressly, at § 13-517: “Nothing in this Article is intended to invalidate or supersede any restrictive covenant, deed restriction, or lease agreement which may be applicable.”
Tulsa: not our problem, in writing
Tulsa's entire codified ordinance set contains zero instances of “restrictive covenant,” “deed restriction,” “homeowners association” or “property owners association.” The disclaimer lives on the City's short-term rental FAQ instead:
“What if my neighborhood covenants prohibit short-term rentals? City of Tulsa Code Officers are unable to enforce neighborhood covenants. Any applicable neighborhood restrictive covenants must be enforced by the applicable neighborhood association.”2
Owasso: the shrug is in the ADU section
Owasso Zoning Code § 4.6.8, on accessory dwelling units: “Some neighborhoods may have restrictive covenants prohibiting accessory dwelling units. The City does not enforce local private covenants” and leaves owners to verify whether accessory dwellings are allowed in their neighborhoods.3
Edmond: whichever is stricter wins
Edmond § 23.40.060(D): “Abrogation and Greater Restrictions. This Ordinance is not intended to repeal, abrogate, or impair any existing easements, covenants, or deed restrictions. However, where this Ordinance and another conflict or overlap, whichever imposes the more stringent restrictions shall prevail.” Lawton uses the same formula, amended by Ord. No. 09-21 on June 24, 2025.
The trap inside the Oklahoma City provision
OKC's rule looks like the answer to every board's problem. It is much narrower than it reads, and the narrowness is the story.
Prong 1 requires a covenant that “specifically identifies home sharing/short term rental, as that term is defined in Section 13-500” as a prohibited use. Not “residential purposes only.” Not “no business or commercial use.” The ordinance's own defined term, named in the covenant.
Almost no Oklahoma declaration does that, because almost every Oklahoma declaration was drafted before short-term rental platforms existed.
The proof is currently before the Oklahoma Supreme Court. In SilverHawk Homeowners Association v. Tawose, the covenant restricts business use and does not mention short-term rentals; the Court of Civil Appeals found it ambiguous and held the association “was not entitled to declaratory judgment or an injunction.” Certiorari was granted November 17, 2025 and the case is still pending. A covenant of that kind would not satisfy prong 1 either.
So the practical instruction for an Oklahoma City association is: amend and record a covenant that uses the ordinance's defined term. Until it does, the municipal lever is not available to it.
Note also what OKC's scheme does not do. Its ADU provision at § 59-9350.2.1 contains no covenant language at all — it defers only to PUD and SPUD conditions. A board that wants to stop an accessory dwelling in Oklahoma City has its declaration and its lawyer, and nothing municipal.
What the other three postures mean in practice
In Tulsa, a licensed short-term rental next door is not a code violation and never will be. The city licenses it, the city will not enforce your covenant, and the city has told you so. The association's only route is its own enforcement action.
In Owasso, accessory dwelling units are permitted by right in every residential district — the use table lists “Accessory Dwelling Unit — All R Districts” — with no covenant check anywhere in the permitting path. The conditions are structural only: building code compliance, one per lot of record, one off-street parking space, a principal residence on the property, and nothing on a utility easement or right-of-way. A covenant banning ADUs still binds the owner. The city simply will not be the one enforcing it.
In Edmond, the “more stringent prevails” formula is the most association-friendly of the four in principle, because a covenant that is stricter than the ordinance survives contact with the ordinance. It appears in the floodplain chapter and, as a nice illustration of how deep the idea runs in Edmond's drafting, twice in the animal ordinances: the horses-and-cows provision at § 7.09.110 ends “This ordinance is not intended to be construed in derogation of any restrictive covenants,” and the laying-hens provision at § 7.09.130 says the same.
What a board can actually do
Find out which posture your city takes before you plan enforcement. It determines whether city hall is a venue or a dead end.
In Oklahoma City, read prong 1 against your own declaration, today. If it does not use the ordinance's defined term, amending it is the single highest-value covenant amendment available to an OKC association. Amendment thresholds in Oklahoma generally run through 11 O.S. § 42-106.1 — 70% of owners after ten years, 60% after fifteen.
Everywhere else, assume you are on your own and budget enforcement accordingly. The Court of Civil Appeals cut an association's appeal-related fee award from $53,990 to $43,320 in Grand Crest Owners Association v. Stites, 2026 OK CIV APP 22 — and that was a case the association won.
Do not tell owners a city licence overrides the covenant, or that the covenant voids the licence. Neither is true anywhere in Oklahoma. They are separate systems and an owner can comply with one while violating the other.
What to watch next
The Supreme Court's decision in SilverHawk, which will tell every Oklahoma association whether a generic residential-purposes covenant reaches short-term rentals at all — and, by extension, how much work an amendment has to do.
Also worth pulling: Oklahoma City Ordinance No. 27847, adopted May 20, 2025, is the most recent amendment to § 59-9350, the section containing both the ADU standards and the short-term-rental standards. Which subsections it touched is not visible in the codified text, and if it is the source of the covenant denial ground at (I), that provision is newer than it appears.
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