Yes, a New Hampshire condominium association can put a real lien on your unit over unpaid common expenses, even if your mortgage is current. RSA 356-B:46 gives the unit owners' association a lien on the unit for unpaid assessments, but only once it's perfected by filing a sworn memorandum in the county registry of deeds within six months of the assessment's due date. Once perfected, the lien generally ranks behind real estate tax liens, prior encumbrances, and sums unpaid on a first mortgage held by an institutional lender. But there's a real exception: for the six-month period immediately before the memorandum is filed, unpaid regular monthly common assessments (plus collection costs) can actually jump ahead of that first mortgage — as a genuine "super-priority" — if the association sends the owner and the first-mortgage lender the specific notices the statute requires, on the specific timeline it sets out. Miss those notice steps and the priority claim over the mortgage doesn't attach.
What that priority does not cover matters just as much. RSA 356-B:46(I)(c) says explicitly that the priority lien "shall not include any amounts attributable to special assessments, late charges, fines, penalties, or interest assessed by the unit owners' association" — only the ordinary regular assessments get to leapfrog the mortgage. The association also has other tools short of foreclosure: it can suspend a delinquent unit's common privileges and services after 30 days' written notice (RSA 356-B:46(IX)), and it can collect up to six months of assessments in advance and hold them in escrow against a future default (RSA 356-B:46(X)). Any suit to enforce the lien has to be brought within six years of when the memorandum was recorded (RSA 356-B:46(IV)), and an owner who thinks the underlying assessment was wrong can challenge it directly — RSA 356-B:46(VII) preserves the ordinary right to sue over the debt under RSA 356-B:15.
Rent garnishment, and the honest gap for non-condo HOAs
New Hampshire condo law also gives associations an unusually direct collection tool: RSA 356-B:46-a lets an association, once a unit owner is more than 60 days delinquent on common expenses, send a 30-day written notice of its intent to collect, and then — if the owner doesn't pay or prove the assessment was already paid — direct the owner's tenant to pay rent straight to the association instead of the owner, until the debt is satisfied. The tenant can't be penalized for complying, and any lease clause trying to waive the rule is void as against public policy. The catch: an association has to adopt this power into its declaration or bylaws by a majority vote at an annual meeting before it can use it, so check whether yours actually has.
If your community isn't a legal condominium, none of RSA 356-B:46 or 46-a applies to you, and RSA Chapter 292 doesn't create a substitute. There is no state statute giving a non-condo homeowners' association a lien on your lot, a foreclosure process, or a priority scheme against your mortgage. Whatever lien or collection power your HOA claims to have comes entirely from what's written into your recorded declaration as a private contractual matter, enforced (if it comes to that) through general New Hampshire real-property and foreclosure law that sits outside this two-chapter statutory scheme entirely. That's exactly the situation where reading your declaration's assessment-lien clause carefully, and talking to a real-estate attorney about what it actually lets the association do, matters more than anywhere else in this pillar.
The authority
The statutes behind this
Cited by name as authority, for your own reading. Informational only, not legal advice.
RSA 356-B:46
Establishes the condo association's lien for unpaid assessments, its perfection and filing requirements, its priority against a first mortgage, and the six-month super-priority window for ordinary regular assessments only.
RSA 356-B:46-a
Lets an association redirect a delinquent owner's tenant's rent directly to itself after 60 days' delinquency and 30 days' written notice, once the association has adopted the power by owner vote.
RSA 356-B:45
Governs how common expenses are assessed against units — specially for limited common areas, or proportionally by voting interest — which is what the lien in RSA 356-B:46 actually secures.
RSA 356-B:15
Preserves an owner's ordinary right to sue over an assessment believed to be wrong, alongside (not instead of) the lien-enforcement process.
Step by step
How to respond to a New Hampshire condo or HOA lien notice
Steps to take when you receive notice of a lien, an intent to garnish rent, or a foreclosure threat over unpaid HOA or condo assessments in New Hampshire.
- 01
Confirm you're actually in a legal condominium
RSA 356-B:46's lien scheme only applies to condominiums. If your community is a subdivision HOA, the lien claim rests on your declaration and general contract/property law, not this statute.
- 02
Check the memorandum's filing date and the notice trail
Verify the lien memorandum was actually recorded within six months of the assessment's due date, and that the notices required for mortgage-priority status went to you and your lender on the statute's timeline.
- 03
Separate what's actually priority debt from what isn't
Get an itemized ledger. Only regular common assessments (and the costs of collecting them) can carry the six-month super-priority; RSA 356-B:46(I)(c) keeps fines, penalties, late charges, and special assessments out of that category.
- 04
Know the rent-garnishment sequence if you're a landlord
If you rent out your unit, confirm whether your association has actually adopted RSA 356-B:46-a into its declaration or bylaws, and understand the 60-day-delinquency-plus-30-day-notice sequence before your tenant can be pulled in.
- 05
Get a real-estate attorney involved for a non-condo HOA lien
Since RSA Chapter 292 creates no lien or foreclosure process, a lien claim from a standalone HOA depends entirely on your declaration's own language and general New Hampshire property law — get counsel before a filing deadline runs.
Straight answers
Common questions
Can my New Hampshire condo association really jump ahead of my mortgage over unpaid dues?
Yes, but only for six months of unpaid regular common assessments and only if the association follows the specific notice steps in RSA 356-B:46(I)(c). Outside that window, or for other kinds of debt, the association's lien generally ranks behind a first mortgage already on file.
Are fines and special assessments included in that priority lien?
No. RSA 356-B:46(I)(c) expressly excludes special assessments, late charges, fines, penalties, and interest from the priority category — only ordinary regular monthly common assessments get to leapfrog a first mortgage.
Can the association take rent directly from my tenant?
It can, under RSA 356-B:46-a, but only after you're more than 60 days delinquent, only after a 30-day written notice, and only if the association has adopted the provision into its declaration or bylaws by an owner vote in the first place.
My community isn't a condo — can it still put a lien on my house?
Possibly, but not because of anything in RSA Chapter 292, which has no lien or foreclosure provision for homeowners' associations. Any such power has to come from your recorded declaration itself, enforced under general New Hampshire property and foreclosure law outside this statutory scheme.