Overview

South Dakota runs two foreclosure tracks: the non-judicial advertisement route and the judicial action route. Once a sale concludes, a statutory one-year redemption period kicks in — and the state compresses that window to 180 days for certain short-term mortgages and to 60 days when a property sits abandoned. Appeals go straight to the South Dakota Supreme Court; there is no intermediate appellate layer between the circuit courts and the high court.

Condominium communities operate under SDCL Chapter 43-15A — a developer-registration and disclosure framework, not a Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act (UCIOA) regime. Non-condominium planned communities have no comprehensive enabling statute at all. Those associations run on recorded covenants, conditions, and restrictions (CC&Rs), the South Dakota Nonprofit Corporation Act, and common-law contract and property principles.

The procedural sequence runs from lien establishment and recording, through pre-foreclosure notice and demand, to a sheriff's sale under either Chapter 21-48 (advertisement) or Chapter 21-47 (action), and then into the post-sale redemption window. Federal overlays apply throughout: the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act as interpreted in Obduskey v. McCarthy & Holthus LLP, the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, and the Bankruptcy Code automatic stay.

The statutory framework

The condominium framework and CC&R-primary planned communities

South Dakota's condominium statute is SDCL Chapter 43-15A, titled "Condominiums."¹ An association enters the chapter by recording a master deed or declaration with the county register of deeds.² Chapter 43-15A is principally a developer-registration and disclosure regime administered by the South Dakota Real Estate Commission: it requires a notice of intent to sell, Commission examination and a public report, and delivery of that report to purchasers before a binding sale, with a ten-day reading period.³

Chapter 43-15A does not contain a self-executing statutory lien for unpaid common-expense assessments. The only lien provision in the chapter, SDCL § 43-15A-29, addresses liens for the erection, repair, or improvement of a development and their apportionment — a construction-lien concept, not an assessment-lien grant.⁴ A South Dakota condominium association's authority to lien and to foreclose for delinquent assessments therefore derives from its recorded master deed and declaration, supplemented by the corporate powers in the South Dakota Nonprofit Corporation Act (SDCL Title 47, Chapters 47-22 through 47-28) where the association is incorporated.⁵

Non-condominium planned communities have no comprehensive enabling act at all — South Dakota has not adopted UCIOA and maintains no planned-community statute. Those associations are CC&R-primary: lien and enforcement rights arise entirely from the recorded declaration, and the South Dakota Nonprofit Corporation Act supplies corporate governance for incorporated associations.⁶ Because South Dakota carries no UCIOA-style statutory super-priority lien, an association assessment lien is generally junior to a prior recorded first mortgage. The recorded declaration, not statute, fixes the lien's reach, and ordinary recording-priority rules govern. This structural gap contrasts sharply with super-priority states and is a central fact for any creditor or board evaluating recovery prospects.

Sources

1. S.D. Codified Laws ch. 43-15A, Condominiums ↩
2. S.D. Codified Laws §§ 43-15A-3, 43-15A-4 ↩
3. S.D. Codified Laws §§ 43-15A-10, 43-15A-17, 43-15A-19 ↩
4. S.D. Codified Laws § 43-15A-29 (lien for erection, repair, or improvement of development) ↩
5. S.D. Codified Laws tit. 47, chs. 47-22 to 47-28 (South Dakota Nonprofit Corporation Act) ↩
6. S.D. Codified Laws tit. 47 (CC&R-primary framework; corporate governance for planned communities) ↩
7. S.D. Codified Laws § 21-48-1 (foreclosure by advertisement; power of sale) ↩
8. S.D. Codified Laws § 21-48-3 (default required before foreclosure) ↩
9. S.D. Codified Laws §§ 21-48-6, 21-48-6.1 (publication of notice; written notice; 21-day minimum) ↩
10. S.D. Codified Laws ch. 21-48 (sheriff's sale; certificate of sale) ↩
11. S.D. Codified Laws § 21-48-9 (application to require foreclosure by action) ↩
12. S.D. Codified Laws ch. 21-47, § 21-47-13 (judgment of foreclosure and sale; possession deferred during redemption) ↩
13. S.D. Codified Laws § 21-48-1 (power-of-sale prerequisite limiting advertisement track) ↩
14. S.D. Codified Laws § 21-52-11 (one-year redemption from date of sale) ↩
15. S.D. Codified Laws §§ 21-49-30, 21-49-12, 21-49-40 (180-day period; statutory caption; citation as One Hundred Eighty Day Redemption Mortgage Act) ↩
16. S.D. Codified Laws §§ 21-49-13(8), 21-49-38 (60-day reduction on abandonment) ↩
17. South Dakota Unified Judicial System, Court Structure (two-tier system; no intermediate appellate court) ↩
18. Obduskey v. McCarthy & Holthus LLP, 586 U.S. 466 (2019) ↩
19. Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, 50 U.S.C. § 3931 (military-status affidavit and appointment of counsel required before default judgment) ↩
20. Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, 50 U.S.C. § 3901 et seq.; Bankruptcy Code automatic stay, 11 U.S.C. § 362 ↩
21. 12 C.F.R. § 1024.41 (120-day pre-foreclosure rule) ↩
22. S.D. Codified Laws § 21-52-14 (amounts required for redemption) ↩
23. S.D. Codified Laws §§ 21-48-14, 21-47-16, 21-47-17 (deficiency standards) ↩
24. S.D. H.B. 1090 (2024), An Act to revise provisions related to tax deeds and to declare an emergency; Pacific Legal Foundation, South Dakota Bans Home Equity Theft Following Supreme Court Case; Tyler v. Hennepin County, 598 U.S. 631 (2023) ↩
25. SDCL 10-25-12, South Dakota Legislature (liens surviving a tax deed, as amended SL 2025, ch 49) ↩
26. SDCL 43-45-3, South Dakota Legislature (homestead sale-proceeds exemption, as amended SL 2025, ch 185, § 1) ↩
27. Plains Commerce Bank, Inc. v. Beck, 2023 S.D. 8, 986 N.W.2d 519 (S.D. 2023) ↩