West Virginia HOA Mediation & Dispute Resolution

Section 1: Overview — How HOA disputes are resolved in West Virginia

When a community-association dispute breaks out in West Virginia, it moves through a contract-and-court model built on the full Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act — and it now passes through a two-tier appellate system the state recently rebuilt. Here is how the pieces fit together. Communities created on or after July 1, 1986 answer to the West Virginia Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act (WVUCIOA), W. Va. Code § 36B-1-101 et seq., which draws on the 1982 UCIOA; condominiums created earlier still fall under the older Unit Property Act at Chapter 36A.^1,2 When a recorded declaration includes an arbitration clause, the West Virginia Revised Uniform Arbitration Act, W. Va. Code § 55-10-1 et seq., governs it — though the Federal Arbitration Act takes over for contracts that touch interstate commerce.³ Courts can send a civil case to mediation under West Virginia Trial Court Rule 25, which lets a circuit court refer the matter to a mediator.⁴ The Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia has the last word, and since July 1, 2022 civil appeals first travel through the Intermediate Court of Appeals of West Virginia, which the West Virginia Appellate Reorganization Act of 2021 (Senate Bill 275) created.⁵ West Virginia is one of only about nine states that adopted the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act, rather than building a comprehensive non-UCIOA regime like California or Florida.⁶ The sections that follow map the statutory architecture, the arbitration and mediation options, the order of precedence between the declaration and the statute, and the path a live dispute actually travels.

Section 2: The dispute resolution framework

2A. Statutory dispute resolution under WVUCIOA

WVUCIOA hands associations broad enforcement powers, yet it demands almost no formal dispute-resolution procedure. Under W. Va. Code § 36B-3-102, an association may adopt rules; "institute, defend, or intervene in litigation or administrative proceedings" on matters that affect the community; impose late charges; and, "after notice and an opportunity to be heard," levy reasonable fines for violations of the declaration, bylaws, and rules.⁷ That notice-and-hearing condition attaches only to fines, and it is the single pre-action procedural gate the statute places on an association. Collection runs through the assessment lien at W. Va. Code § 36B-3-116, which hands the association a lien the moment an assessment or fine comes due, gives that lien limited priority over most prior encumbrances except first security interests and tax liens, and wipes out the lien unless the association starts enforcement proceedings within three years.⁸ Fines, late charges, fees, and interest all become enforceable as assessments under that same section.

WVUCIOA sets no mandatory pre-suit mediation or arbitration requirement. Nothing in Chapter 36B forces an association or an owner to try mediation before filing suit, so West Virginia has no statutory pre-litigation ADR gate like California's Davis-Stirling Act or Florida's Chapter 720 pre-suit mediation rule. Any obligation of that kind arises only from the recorded declaration.

For condominiums created before July 1, 1986, the Unit Property Act (Chapter 36A) supplies the governing framework — but WVUCIOA reaches back into those communities selectively. W. Va. Code § 36B-1-204 applies an enumerated set of Chapter 36B sections — including the lien procedure (§ 36B-3-116), most association powers under § 36B-3-102, tort and contract liability (§ 36B-3-111), records access (§ 36B-3-118), and the violations-and-fees provision (§ 36B-4-117) — to every community created before the effective date, but only for events that occur after that date.² So the recording date of the declaration decides which framework governs: post-July-1-1986 condominiums, planned communities, and cooperatives take the full Chapter 36B, while pre-1986 condominiums take Chapter 36A plus the enumerated Chapter 36B carve-ins. Associations organized as nonprofit corporations also answer to the West Virginia Nonprofit Corporation Act, Chapter 31E.⁹

2B. General civil ADR and arbitration

A recorded declaration may carry a binding arbitration clause, and West Virginia enforces those clauses under the West Virginia Revised Uniform Arbitration Act, W. Va. Code § 55-10-1 et seq. That article, which carries the short title "Revised Uniform Arbitration Act," governs any agreement to arbitrate made on or after July 1, 2015, and it superseded the state's earlier Uniform Arbitration Act, which took effect July 1, 2001.^3,10 Under § 55-10-8, a record agreement to arbitrate is "valid, enforceable and irrevocable except upon a ground that exists at law or in equity for the revocation of a contract."¹¹

When a declaration or contract touches interstate commerce, the Federal Arbitration Act (9 U.S.C. § 1 et seq.) governs and preempts any state rule that conflicts with it. The controlling case is Marmet Health Care Center, Inc. v. Brown, 565 U.S. 530 (2012), a per curiam decision handed down February 21, 2012, in which the U.S. Supreme Court vacated a ruling by the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia (Brown v. Genesis Healthcare Corp.). That state ruling had declared, as a matter of West Virginia public policy, that predispute arbitration clauses could not be enforced for nursing-home personal-injury and wrongful-death claims.¹² The Court held that "West Virginia's prohibition against predispute agreements to arbitrate personal-injury or wrongful-death claims against nursing homes is a categorical rule prohibiting arbitration of a particular type of claim, and that rule is contrary to the terms and coverage of the FAA," and it sent the case back for the state court to weigh whether the clauses failed under generally applicable contract defenses — such as unconscionability — that do not single out arbitration.¹² For an HOA, the working rule is simple: a recorded arbitration clause will generally hold up, but it still has to survive ordinary contract defenses.

Court-connected mediation runs under West Virginia Trial Court Rule 25. A circuit court "may, on its own motion, upon motion of any party, or by stipulation of the parties, refer a case to mediation," and a party then has 15 days to file a written objection.⁴ For community-association cases, in other words, referral is discretionary rather than automatic. Mediators come from a roster the West Virginia State Bar maintains, the parties usually split the mediator's fee, and mediation communications stay confidential and count as settlement negotiations under Rule 25.12 and West Virginia Rule of Evidence 408. West Virginia has not enacted the Uniform Mediation Act, so that confidentiality rests on the trial court rule and Rule 408 rather than on a standalone mediation-privilege statute.

For lower-value assessment disputes, magistrate courts offer a streamlined forum. Under W. Va. Code § 50-2-1, magistrate court civil jurisdiction now reaches claims up to $20,000, but these courts cannot hear matters in equity, cases where title to real estate is at issue, or proceedings that seek to satisfy liens by selling real estate.¹³ An association can therefore take a straightforward money judgment on delinquent assessments to magistrate court, but it must bring any lien foreclosure in circuit court.

2C. CC&R-based dispute resolution and order of precedence

The recorded declaration is the operative contract, and its dispute-resolution clause works alongside WVUCIOA rather than replacing it. Common clauses include mediation as a condition precedent to suit, binding or non-binding arbitration, venue and forum selection, and prevailing-party attorney-fee provisions. Governing documents often set up internal grievance procedures and architectural-review processes that an owner has to exhaust before a denial hardens into a formal dispute. The order of precedence runs like this: WVUCIOA's non-waivable provisions come first, then its default rules as the declaration modifies them, then the unmodified WVUCIOA defaults, then the bylaws, and finally the board-adopted rules. In practice, that means you always read a declaration against the Chapter 36B backstops, and you evaluate a declaration's arbitration clause under the West Virginia Revised Uniform Arbitration Act — and, for interstate-commerce contracts, under the FAA.

Section 3: Dispute resolution pathways and obligations

A. Internal / association-level resolution

Before an association imposes a fine, W. Va. Code § 36B-3-102(a)(11) requires "notice and an opportunity to be heard" — a statutory duty that applies to WVUCIOA communities, and to pre-1986 condominiums to the extent § 36B-1-204 carries the enumerated powers in.⁷ Internal grievance and architectural-review procedures come from the recorded declaration and bylaws, so they bind any community whose documents create them. West Virginia keeps no administrative or agency forum for HOA disputes, so an owner who exhausts internal review has no state regulator to petition and must move on to court, arbitration, or mediation.

B. Mediation

A circuit court may send a community-association case to mediation under West Virginia Trial Court Rule 25, which reaches any case in circuit court no matter which property act governs the community.⁴ Referral is discretionary, not mandatory, and a party may object within 15 days. The parties ordinarily share the cost, and mediation communications stay confidential under Rule 25.12 and West Virginia Rule of Evidence 408. Any mediation duty that comes before suit arises only from the declaration.

C. Arbitration

A recorded declaration's arbitration clause is enforceable under the West Virginia Revised Uniform Arbitration Act, W. Va. Code § 55-10-1 et seq., which reaches agreements made on or after July 1, 2015, and under the Federal Arbitration Act, 9 U.S.C. § 1 et seq., which governs wherever the declaration or contract involves interstate commerce.^3,11 Under Marmet Health Care Center, Inc. v. Brown, 565 U.S. 530 (2012), the FAA preempts categorical state rules against enforcing predispute arbitration agreements, though the clauses still have to clear generally applicable contract defenses.¹² Whether arbitration binds the parties or not depends on the clause; the West Virginia act treats a compliant agreement as binding and irrevocable.

D. Litigation and appeals

Circuit courts are the trial venue for HOA disputes that involve injunctive relief, lien foreclosure, or amounts above the magistrate ceiling, and they carry general jurisdiction. Magistrate courts handle assessment money judgments up to $20,000 under W. Va. Code § 50-2-1, but they cannot foreclose a lien.¹³ The association must enforce the assessment lien within three years under W. Va. Code § 36B-3-116(d), and that section requires a judgment to "include costs and reasonable attorney's fees for the prevailing party" — mandatory as written.⁸ The broader violations provision, W. Va. Code § 36B-4-117, says a court "may award reasonable attorney's fees," which leaves the decision to the court's discretion.¹⁴ Consistent with the American rule, no one recovers fees otherwise absent a statute or a contract term. For the statute of limitations, written contracts run ten years and unwritten contracts five years under W. Va. Code § 55-2-6, while the general tort limitation is two years under W. Va. Code § 55-2-12.^15,16 A civil appeal now runs from circuit court to the Intermediate Court of Appeals of West Virginia, which took effect July 1, 2022, and then to the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia on discretionary review.⁵ West Virginia keeps no HOA agency, no ombudsman, and no community-association-manager licensing requirement; the West Virginia Real Estate Commission licenses real estate brokers and salespersons generally and does not regulate community managers.¹⁷

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills

B. Recent rulings

A parallel line of litigation, Justice Holdings, LLC v. Glade Springs Village Property Owners Association, Inc., 250 W. Va. 563, 906 S.E.2d 216 (2023), is still active. The Supreme Court of Appeals has directed further circuit-court findings on assessment liens in 2026, and the case confirms that Chapter 36B governs qualifying communities in full and that developer lots cannot escape assessments.²¹

C. Active legislative debates

No bill that would directly amend WVUCIOA's dispute-resolution provisions is pending. Lawmakers have trained their recent attention on adjacent topics — magistrate court jurisdiction and discriminatory-covenant land records — rather than on HOA dispute procedure itself.

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

West Virginia is a UCIOA-adopting state with a recently modernized appellate system, and that places it between two other kinds of jurisdictions: the comprehensive non-UCIOA regulatory states like California and Florida, with their dedicated statutes and pre-suit mediation mandates, and the CC&R-primary states that leave associations to the common law of covenants. The UCIOA framework supplies default rules for powers, fines, liens, and enforcement, and the 2022 Intermediate Court of Appeals means covenant and assessment disputes now generate a deeper body of appellate precedent than the state produced before. If you already operate in another UCIOA jurisdiction, the model-act similarities shorten the learning curve in West Virginia — though counsel should confirm that civil appeals now run through the Intermediate Court of Appeals to the Supreme Court of Appeals on discretionary review.

HOA Weekly updates its West Virginia dispute-resolution coverage quarterly as the Legislature, the Intermediate Court of Appeals, and the Supreme Court of Appeals act. Federal frameworks — notably the FAA, along with the FHA, ADA, FDCPA, SCRA, and OTARD — also bear on West Virginia association disputes no matter which state framework applies, and fuller treatment of them is on the way.

1. W. Va. Code § 36B-1-101 (short title; Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act) ↩
2. W. Va. Code § 36B-1-204 (applicability to preexisting common interest communities; enumerated Chapter 36B sections applied to pre-effective-date communities) ↩ ↩
3. W. Va. Code § 55-10-1 (short title; Revised Uniform Arbitration Act) ↩ ↩ ↩
4. West Virginia Trial Court Rules, Rule 25 (Mediation), West Virginia Judiciary ↩ ↩ ↩
5. W. Va. Code § 51-11-3 (West Virginia Intermediate Court of Appeals created; established and operable on or before July 1, 2022) ↩ ↩
6. Community Associations Institute, Priority Lien — West Virginia (identifying West Virginia among the states that adopted the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act) ↩
7. W. Va. Code § 36B-3-102 (powers of unit owners' association; litigation, rules, and fines "after notice and an opportunity to be heard") ↩ ↩
8. W. Va. Code § 36B-3-116 (lien for assessments; priority; three-year enforcement limitation; costs and reasonable attorney's fees for the prevailing party) ↩ ↩
9. W. Va. Code § 31E-1-101 et seq. (West Virginia Nonprofit Corporation Act) ↩
10. W. Va. Code § 55-10-5 (article governs an agreement to arbitrate made on or after July 1, 2015) ↩
11. W. Va. Code § 55-10-8 (validity of agreement to arbitrate; "valid, enforceable and irrevocable except upon a ground that exists at law or in equity for the revocation of a contract") ↩ ↩
12. Marmet Health Care Center, Inc. v. Brown, 565 U.S. 530 (2012) (per curiam), Oyez (verify final text at U.S. Reports vol. 565, p. 530) ↩ ↩ ↩
13. W. Va. Code § 50-2-1 (magistrate court civil jurisdiction up to $20,000; exclusions for equity, real-estate title, and lien-sale proceedings) ↩ ↩
14. W. Va. Code § 36B-4-117 (effect of violations on rights of action; "the court, in an appropriate case, may award reasonable attorney's fees") ↩
15. W. Va. Code § 55-2-6 (limitation of actions on contracts; ten years for written contracts, five years for other express or implied contracts) ↩
16. W. Va. Code § 55-2-12 (general two-year limitation for personal-injury and certain other tort actions) ↩
17. West Virginia Real Estate Commission (broker and salesperson licensing under W. Va. Code ch. 30, art. 40; no community-association-manager license) ↩
18. H.B. 2761, 2025 Regular Session (amending W. Va. Code §§ 50-2-1, 50-4-4a; magistrate court civil jurisdiction raised to $20,000), West Virginia Legislature ↩
19. Wilber v. Locust Hill Unit Owner's Association, Inc., No. 25-ICA-280 (W. Va. Ct. App. June 11, 2026) (memorandum decision), Intermediate Court of Appeals opinions portal, West Virginia Judiciary ↩
20. Lindemuth v. The Woods Homeowners Association, Inc., No. 23-ICA-379 (W. Va. Ct. App. Oct. 1, 2024) (memorandum decision), Intermediate Court of Appeals opinions portal, West Virginia Judiciary ↩
21. Justice Holdings, LLC v. Glade Springs Village Property Owners Association, Inc., 250 W. Va. 563, 906 S.E.2d 216 (2023), No. 22-0002, Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia (holding Chapter 36B applies to the community and vacating and remanding the assessment judgment) ↩