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Your rights · Alabama
Alabama's Homeowners' Association Act is young and narrow by design. It only binds your community if your declaration was recorded on or after January 1, 2016, or your association is older and its members voted, by majority, to opt in under § 35-20-3(a); condos, timeshares, co-ops, and commercial developments are carved out entirely. Where it does apply, it gives real teeth: § 35-20-11(a)(2) blocks a fine unless you first get a hearing and the right to be represented by counsel before the board, and § 35-20-4(b) puts an explicit statutory good-faith obligation on every duty the board owes you, including how it enforces its own rules.
Guides in this state
Controlling law: Alabama Homeowners' Association Act (Ala. Code § 35-20-1 et seq.)
Last reviewed July 6, 2026· Citations link to the statute text
Before you rely on anything else in this guide, confirm the Act actually reaches your community. Ala. Code § 35-20-3(a) applies Chapter 20 to a development whose declaration providing for a homeowners' association was recorded in the probate office on or after January 1, 2016, and, separately, to an association formed before that date only if a majority of its members has elected to be governed by the chapter. If your HOA predates 2016 and never took that vote, this chapter simply doesn't govern it; your rights come from your declaration, your bylaws, and general Alabama contract and nonprofit-corporation law instead. Section 35-20-3(b) narrows the scope further even for post-2016 communities: it excludes a development for commercial, industrial, or other nonresidential use; any association already regulated under Chapters 8 or 8A of Title 35 (Alabama's separate condominium statutes); and a real estate cooperative, time-share development, or campground. This chapter is subdivision-HOA law, not condo law.
Where the Act does apply, it requires the homeowners' association itself to be organized as a nonprofit corporation under Title 10A, Chapter 3 (§ 35-20-5(a)), and to be formed before the declarant conveys a single lot in the development (§ 35-20-6). It also requires specific filings with the Secretary of State, articles of incorporation, bylaws or other governing documents, and the original covenants, conditions, and restrictions, kept in a public, searchable electronic database (§ 35-20-5(b)(2)-(3)). If a conflict ever arises between your declaration and the association's other governing documents, § 35-20-8 resolves it: the declaration wins, except where the declaration itself conflicts with this chapter.
On fines, § 35-20-11(a)(2) is unusually direct: the board may "[a]ssess reasonable penalties against a member for any violation of the declaration or rules adopted by the board of directors after the member is afforded the opportunity to be heard and represented by counsel before the board of directors." That's two rights bundled into one clause: a hearing, and an explicit right to bring a lawyer to it. That counsel right is a real, distinctive feature; not every state's fining statute names it. The statute doesn't set a dollar cap on the penalty itself, only the word "reasonable," so whatever ceiling exists beyond that comes from your declaration.
On money, § 35-20-12 gives the association a lien on your lot for unpaid assessments (and, per § 35-20-11(c), unpaid penalties, which are treated as assessments for lien purposes) from the date the assessment is due. That lien is expressly subordinate to state and county ad valorem taxes, municipal improvement assessments, UCC fixture filings, mortgages, and deeds of trust securing an indebtedness (§ 35-20-12(b)), meaning it never leapfrogs a mortgage lender. Perfecting and enforcing it takes real paperwork: a verified statement of lien recorded within 12 months of the assessment becoming due, 30 days' advance written notice by certified mail before that recording, and, to actually foreclose, a verified court complaint and a judicially ordered sale advertised by published notice, not a self-help nonjudicial process (§ 35-20-12(c)-(f)). On transparency, § 35-20-13 requires the association to make ten categories of records, from current CC&Rs and architectural regulations to pending lawsuits and liens, available to a member or even a potential purchaser within 30 days of a written request, for a reasonable cost. And § 35-20-4(b) backstops all of it with a chapter-wide statutory duty: "Every duty governed by this chapter imposes an obligation of good faith in its performance or enforcement." None of this is the board's favor to grant. It is your statutory floor, real where the Act reaches, silent where it doesn't.
The local twist
Ala. Code § 35-20-3(a) applies this entire chapter to a development whose declaration was recorded on or after January 1, 2016, or to an older association only if a majority of its members voted to be governed by it. An HOA that predates 2016 and never took that opt-in vote gets none of the protections in this guide from Chapter 20 itself; check your community's declaration date and any opt-in vote before citing any section below.
§ 35-20-11(a)(2) doesn't just require an opportunity to be heard before a penalty; it requires the member be "afforded the opportunity to be heard and represented by counsel before the board of directors." Notably, when the board fines a member's tenant directly for the tenant's own violation, § 35-20-11(b)(2) only requires notice and an opportunity to be heard, but it doesn't repeat the counsel language, a real gap between the two provisions.
§ 35-20-12(b) subordinates the association's lien to ad valorem taxes, municipal improvement assessments, UCC fixture filings, mortgages, and deeds of trust securing an indebtedness, with no carve-out giving the association any super-priority slice ahead of a lender the way some other states' statutes do. And enforcement runs through the courts: § 35-20-12(e)-(f) requires a verified complaint and a judicially ordered sale advertised by published notice, not a nonjudicial power-of-sale process.
Owner guides
Each guide explains your rights from the owner’s side, cites the controlling statute, walks the steps, and answers the questions boards hope you won’t ask.
Notice, hearing, and cure rights before a fine can stick.
When unpaid dues become a lien, and what limits foreclosure of your home.
The books and records you can inspect, how to ask, and the clock the board is on.
Quorum, ballots, proxies, recalls, and open-meeting rights that check board power.
ARC timelines, approvals, and the laws that protect solar, flags, and antennas.
Fined when a neighbor wasn't? How the docs and statute frame the defense.
Alabama Homeowners' Association Act (Ala. Code § 35-20-1 et seq.), full text, section by section — the primary source behind every guide above.
The HOA and condo legislation we track in Alabama, with plain-English notes on what each bill means for homeowners.
The violation-letter analyzer reads your fine or notice and points you at the Alabama rights that apply.
Browse Alabama associations — homeowner reviews, ratings, and the public records behind each community.