The holding, and the word doing the work

¶60: “As with their first argument, the Unit Owners fall far short of establishing that the 29-day occupancy restriction was—in fact and for legal effect—altered or amended. Without that proof, and despite the intention to do that, the restriction remains in full force and effect.”

“Despite the intention to do that” is the sentence. The court accepted that people meant to remove the restriction. Intent was not the question. The conclusion at ¶62 is categorical:

“Neither the language in the Building Code nor the initial steps taken by the Redevelopment Authority to waive or remove the 29-day occupancy restriction have any legal effect upon the restriction's validity, nor have the terms of the Declaration and/or Amended Restrictive Covenant been amended.”

A footnote adds the evidentiary detail that decided the Redevelopment Authority question: its actions “were never memorialized in any writing other than its minutes,” and no affidavit was produced on the Authority's behalf. Minutes recording a vote to waive are not a waiver.

Why this recurs in Wisconsin condominiums

Wisconsin's Condominium Ownership Act sets a floor for amending bylaws — Wis. Stat. § 703.10(5): “The bylaws may be amended by the affirmative vote of unit owners having 67 percent or more of the votes.”² That number is widely known, and it is also the wrong number in a case like this one, for two reasons.

First, § 703.10(5) governs bylaws. The 29-day limit lived in the declaration and in a separate recorded covenant, and declarations carry their own amendment provisions. Second, a declaration's clause can demand more than the statutory minimum and can add parties outside the association entirely — here a city, a redevelopment authority, a managing agent, a lender, and every unit mortgagee. Resort, redevelopment-financed and mixed-use Wisconsin condominiums routinely carry clauses of that kind, because the outside parties bargained for them when the project was financed.

The practical effect is that an association can hold a lawful vote, reach the number in its bylaws, and still not have amended anything.

The exposure this creates between the vote and the recording

There is an interval in these cases during which owners have been told a restriction is gone and the land records say otherwise. Munnik resolves who bears that gap: the restriction governs, so an owner who relied on the board's word was never protected.

That has knock-on effects an association feels later. A buyer's inquiry about use restrictions is answered from the recorded documents, not from board correspondence — the subject of our Wisconsin estoppel and resale page. And the court's own description of the remedy at ¶44 is electoral and documentary: owners “can elect a friendly majority to the Board and alter or amend the terms of the restriction,” which returns the question to the amendment clause.

The association here also carried its own risk. West Bend Mutual Insurance Company intervened on coverage, and the circuit court found a duty to defend. Four years of litigation followed a dispute that turned on whether a document had been signed.

What to watch next

The opinion was ordered for final publication on August 24, 2026. As published Wisconsin authority, ¶¶57–62 now supply the standard framework for any Wisconsin dispute in which a party claims a recorded restriction was informally waived — including the common variant where an association has simply stopped enforcing a covenant for years. Munnik does not address abandonment or laches, which the owners did not establish here, and that is the doctrinal space where the next case in this line is likely to be fought.