West Virginia HOA Director Qualifications

1. Overview — Who can serve on a common interest community board in West Virginia

West Virginia governs its condominiums, planned communities, and cooperatives under the West Virginia Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act, found at W. Va. Code Chapter 36B. The statute draws on the 1982 version of the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act. It supplies an executive board, a standard of care, and a period of declarant control. What it does not do is make directors certify or educate themselves, cap the number of terms anyone may serve, or automatically disqualify owners who fall behind on dues or who carry a criminal record.¹ The result is a moderate-touch state: the Act builds the board framework, and the declaration and bylaws do most of the work of screening who may run.

Chapter 36B reaches communities created on or after July 1, 1986, and it organizes itself into four articles: General Provisions, Creation, Management, and Protection of Purchasers.² Condominiums that predate that line still answer to the older West Virginia Unit Property Act, Chapter 36A, unless they have opted into Chapter 36B.³ One section does most of the board work. Section 36B-3-103 creates the executive board, fixes the period of declarant control, sets the standard of care, and hands owners the power to remove a director.⁴

That approach sets West Virginia well apart from a heavy-touch state like Florida. Florida makes newly elected condominium directors certify in writing that they have read the governing documents, and it makes them complete a state-approved education course; it also bars certain delinquent owners and felons from serving outright.⁵ West Virginia imposes none of those screens. The sections that follow lay out where director qualifications actually come from, the rules on eligibility and tenure, and the recent work of the Legislature and the courts.

2. Where director qualifications come from

2A. The Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act and the legacy chapter

Chapter 36B is the statute that controls community associations in West Virginia. It rests on the 1982 Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act, and it splits into four articles: Article 1 (General Provisions), Article 2 (Creation, Alteration and Termination), Article 3 (Management), and Article 4 (Protection of Purchasers).² The creation date decides how much of the Act applies. The Act reaches every common interest community created in the state after its effective date.⁶ Smaller or limited-expense planned communities — no more than twelve units and free of development rights, or capped on average common-expense liability — answer to only a handful of sections unless the declaration opts into the whole chapter.⁷ A defined set of provisions also reaches communities that already existed, for events that occur after the effective date.⁸

On the board itself, § 36B-3-103 carries the framework. It requires an executive board of at least three members elected once declarant control ends, sets the standard of care, and governs the declarant's control of the board.⁴ When a community pushes powers upward, § 36B-2-120 spells out how a master association elects its executive board after declarant control ends.⁹ What the Act withholds is just as telling: it demands no director certification or continuing education, sets no cap on the number of terms a director may serve, and disqualifies no one for falling behind on assessments or for a criminal past. Condominiums created before July 1, 1986 under Chapter 36A, the West Virginia Unit Property Act, stay under that older chapter, which places administration in a "council" run by a recorded code of regulations rather than the executive-board model of Chapter 36B.³

2B. The corporate-law layer: the West Virginia Nonprofit Corporation Act

Most West Virginia associations incorporate as nonprofit corporations under the West Virginia Nonprofit Corporation Act, Chapter 31E, and that Act supplies the corporate scaffolding beneath the Chapter 36B framework. It sets a few baselines. A board must hold three or more individuals, and the articles or bylaws fix the exact number.¹⁰ The articles or bylaws may also set director qualifications; absent such a requirement, a director need not live in the state or even belong to the corporation.¹¹ A director's term runs to the next annual meeting after the election, unless the articles stagger terms into as many as five groups.¹² Members who may vote for directors can remove one with or without cause — unless the articles allow removal only for cause — and only at a meeting called for that purpose.¹³ A circuit court can remove a director too, for fraud, dishonesty, or gross abuse of authority.¹⁴ Think of the Nonprofit Corporation Act as corporate plumbing rather than an HOA statute: it handles corporate formalities, while Chapter 36B governs the community.

2C. The declaration and bylaws

The declaration and bylaws set the eligibility screens that a candidate must clear inside the Chapter 36B framework. The Act points squarely at them: the bylaws supply the qualifications, powers, duties, and terms of office of executive board members, along with the manner of electing and removing them.¹⁵ Precedence runs in order — Chapter 36B for the communities it governs, then the declaration and bylaws, then the Nonprofit Corporation Act's defaults, then any rules the board adopts. So a manager or attorney vetting a candidate works the same sequence every time. First, decide whether Chapter 36B or the legacy Chapter 36A governs the community. Next, apply the statutory board provisions — the three-member minimum, the unit-owner majority, and declarant control. Then read the declaration and bylaws for the specific screens, because that is where West Virginia keeps its residency, membership, age, and good-standing conditions.

3. Director eligibility, disqualification, and tenure rules

3A. Eligibility to serve

Chapter 36B imposes exactly one eligibility screen directly, and it is structural. Once declarant control ends, the unit owners must elect an executive board of at least three members, and a majority of them must be unit owners.⁴ (Source layer: Chapter 36B; applies to communities created on or after July 1, 1986.) Beyond that, the Act does not require every director to own a unit, and it sets no residency, age, or good-standing test. Those conditions live in the declaration and bylaws, which the Act authorizes to set director qualifications.¹⁵ For an incorporated association, the Nonprofit Corporation Act says the same thing from the corporate side: a director need not be a resident or a member unless the documents demand it.¹¹ (Source layer: declaration/bylaws and Chapter 31E.) That makes the treatment of co-owners, spouses, trustees, and entity representatives a documentary question. The statute stays silent, so the bylaws decide who may stand for a unit that more than one person — or an entity — owns. Where a community delegates powers to a master association, § 36B-2-120 lays out how that master board is elected after declarant control: by all unit owners across the communities, by the constituent boards, or community by community.⁹

3B. Disqualification and removal

Chapter 36B hands unit owners a direct power to remove. Whatever the declaration or bylaws say to the contrary, the unit owners may remove any executive board member — with or without cause — by a two-thirds vote of everyone present and entitled to vote at a meeting that has a quorum, with the lone exception of a member the declarant appointed.⁴ (Source layer: Chapter 36B.) For an incorporated association, the Nonprofit Corporation Act runs a parallel track at the corporate level: the members may remove a director, with or without cause unless the articles require cause, at a meeting called for that purpose.¹³ A circuit court may remove a director as well, for fraud, dishonesty, or gross abuse of authority.¹⁴ The mechanics of the removal vote — notice, quorum, balloting — are a separate subject; the qualification-side rule is the two-thirds statutory threshold under § 36B-3-103(g). Neither statute disqualifies a candidate or a sitting director for falling behind on assessments or for a criminal record. Any such bar has to come from the governing documents. (Source layer: declaration/bylaws.) Here West Virginia parts sharply with Florida, where a person more than 90 days behind on a monetary obligation cannot serve on the board at all. West Virginia carries no equivalent statute.⁵ Conflict-of-interest limits work through the standard of care and the Nonprofit Corporation Act's conflicting-interest-transaction rules, not through a categorical bar.

3C. Board composition and terms

The governing documents fix the number of executive board members, working above a statutory floor: at least three under Chapter 36B, and three or more under the Nonprofit Corporation Act.^4,10 (Source layer: Chapter 36B and Chapter 31E; the documents fix the exact number.) Term length and staggering come from the documents and the corporate statute — terms run to the next annual meeting unless the articles stagger them into as many as five groups.¹² West Virginia sets no statutory term limit on association directors; any cap is a creature of the documents. (Both Chapter 36B and the Nonprofit Corporation Act's director provisions say nothing about term limits.) Once again West Virginia diverges from Florida, where a condominium board member cannot serve more than four consecutive two-year terms without a two-thirds supermajority vote.⁵ Section 36B-3-103 governs declarant control. The declaration may carve out a period in which the declarant appoints and removes board members, but that period ends no later than the earliest of three dates: sixty days after 75 percent of the units are conveyed, two years after the declarant stops offering units in the ordinary course of business, or two years after the declarant last exercises any right to add units — with graduated owner representation required at the 25 percent and 50 percent conveyance marks.⁴ (Source layer: Chapter 36B.)

3D. Onboarding and ongoing qualification duties

West Virginia asks for no director certification, no examination, and no continuing education as the price of serving on a community association board. This is the sharpest contrast with Florida, which conditions condominium board service on a written certification that the director has read the governing documents, plus a state-approved education course within 90 days and continuing education after that.⁵ West Virginia offers no analog. The statutes stay silent, so a newly elected director takes office on election, carrying no onboarding credential at all.⁴ What does govern is the standard of care. Under § 36B-3-103(a), a board member the declarant appoints owes the care of a fiduciary, while a member the unit owners elect owes ordinary and reasonable care.⁴ For incorporated associations, the Nonprofit Corporation Act adds its own standard: a director must act in good faith, in a way the director reasonably believes serves the best interests of the corporation, and with the care a person in a like position would reasonably exercise.¹⁶ Conflict-of-interest disclosure flows from these standards and from the corporate conflicting-interest-transaction rules, not from any standalone HOA disclosure statute. (Source layer: Chapter 36B and Chapter 31E.)

4. Recent legislative and judicial activity

4A. Recent bills

No qualifying activity in the period. A review of West Virginia Legislature bill records over the past twenty-four months turned up no enacted bill that amends Chapter 36B or the Nonprofit Corporation Act's director provisions as they touch association director qualifications, board composition, or director removal. The executive-board framework at § 36B-3-103 traces back to the Act's 1986 enactment and the sessions that preceded it, and no one has amended it to add qualification or term-limit rules.⁴

4B. Recent appellate rulings

No qualifying activity in the period. No West Virginia appellate decision in the past thirty-six months squarely takes up executive-board eligibility, director qualification, director removal, or board composition under Chapter 36B or the Nonprofit Corporation Act. Two recent common-interest-community decisions brush against board governance at the margins, but neither decides a director-qualification question.

Keep the court structure in mind when you read these decisions. For civil orders entered after June 30, 2022, appeals go first to the Intermediate Court of Appeals, with discretionary review by the Supreme Court of Appeals; before that date, no intermediate court existed, and appeals went straight to the Supreme Court of Appeals.^19,20

4C. Active legislative debates

No active proposal that would change director qualifications, board composition, or removal under Chapter 36B has advanced in the West Virginia Legislature as of June 24, 2026.

5. National positioning and related coverage

West Virginia lands in the moderate-touch, 1982-UCIOA category for director qualifications. The Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act supplies the executive board, the standard of care, and declarant control, and it leaves certification, term limits, and most of the eligibility screens to the governing documents. It stands far from a heavy-touch state like Florida, which mandates director certification or education, caps service at eight years without a supermajority vote, and disqualifies delinquent owners and certain felons by statute,⁵ and it sits closer to a light-touch state like Wyoming, where the documents do most of the eligibility work. For a multi-state operator, the practical takeaway is simple: West Virginia's executive-board and declarant-control rules follow the 1982 UCIOA, but the eligibility screens themselves come from the declaration and bylaws. That places West Virginia among the states that took up the 1982 UCIOA framework — Alaska, Colorado, Minnesota, and Nevada — and apart from the four 2008-UCIOA states, Connecticut, Delaware, Vermont, and Washington, which adopted a later and more detailed uniform code.²¹ One structural note worth keeping: West Virginia's highest court is the Supreme Court of Appeals, and civil matters entered after June 30, 2022 head first to the Intermediate Court of Appeals.

HOA Weekly's West Virginia Director Qualifications coverage updates quarterly as the Legislature, the Intermediate Court of Appeals, and the Supreme Court of Appeals act. Federal frameworks rarely dictate director qualifications, but West Virginia associations remain subject to federal law — 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 — across their broader operations.

Footnotes

1. W. Va. Code § 36B-3-103, Executive board members and officers ↩
2. W. Va. Code Chapter 36B, Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act (four-article structure) ↩
3. W. Va. Code § 36A-1-1, Unit Property Act (short title) ↩
4. W. Va. Code § 36B-3-103, Executive board members and officers (full text: standard of care (a), declarant control (d)–(e), owner-elected board minimum (f), removal (g)) ↩
5. Fla. Stat. § 718.112(2)(d) (condominium director certification, education, eligibility, and four consecutive two-year term cap); see also Fla. Stat. § 720.306(9)(b) (HOA delinquency disqualification after 90 days) — cited for out-of-state contrast ↩
6. W. Va. Code § 36B-1-201, Applicability to new common interest communities ↩
7. W. Va. Code § 36B-1-203, Exception for small and limited expense liability planned communities ↩
8. W. Va. Code § 36B-1-204, Applicability to preexisting common interest communities ↩
9. W. Va. Code § 36B-2-120, Master associations ↩
10. W. Va. Code § 31E-8-803, Number and election of directors (three or more) ↩
11. W. Va. Code § 31E-8-802, Qualifications of directors ↩
12. W. Va. Code § 31E-8-806, Terms of directors generally; see also § 31E-8-807, Staggered terms for directors ↩
13. W. Va. Code § 31E-8-809, Removal of directors by members or directors ↩
14. W. Va. Code § 31E-8-810, Removal of directors by judicial proceeding ↩
15. W. Va. Code § 36B-3-106, Bylaws (qualifications, terms, and manner of electing and removing executive board members) ↩
16. W. Va. Code § 31E-8-830, Standards of conduct for directors ↩
17. Lindemuth v. The Woods Homeowners Association, Inc., No. 23-ICA-379 (W. Va. Ct. App. Oct. 1, 2024) (memorandum decision) ↩
18. Justice Holdings, LLC v. Glade Springs Village Property Owners Association, Inc., 250 W. Va. 563 (2023) (Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia) ↩
19. W. Va. Code § 51-11-4, Intermediate Court of Appeals jurisdiction (civil orders entered after June 30, 2022) ↩
20. W. Va. Code § 51-11-10, Discretionary review by the Supreme Court of Appeals ↩
21. Community Associations Institute, Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act (UCIOA) (identifying 1982-version states, including West Virginia, and 2008-version states Connecticut, Delaware, Vermont, and Washington) — cited for national positioning ↩