Can Florida HOAs force background checks on residents?
Live in a home governed by a condominium, co-op or homeowner’s association? Have questions about what they can and cannot do? Ryan Poliakoff, an attorney and author based in Boca Raton, has answers.
Editor’s note: This is a rerun of a column that ran in April 2026. Ryan Poliakoff will return with a new column next week.
Question: Our association has very few reserves, and the board is finalizing an assessment for new roofs. Our “bad debt” receivables number has been going up, and I’m sure it will balloon once the assessment comes due.
Are we (the owners in the community) allowed to know just the number of people in arrears? We are not asking for any names or addresses, just the number of delinquent villa owners. Our board of directors believe giving out even this basic data might be illegal. Signed, P.D.
Dear P.D.,
You’re entitled to that information, and a lot more.
Every owner is entitled to inspect “a current account and a periodic statement of the account for each member, designating the name and current address of each member who is obligated to pay assessments, the due date and amount of each assessment or other charge against the member, the date and amount of each payment on the account, and the balance due.”
And if you think about it this makes sense, as every member in a community governed by a mandatory membership association is financially intertwined. When your neighbor doesn’t pay, you pay more. There’s no privacy for these kinds of issues, and owners are not allowed to shirk their responsibilities and then keep that information a secret.
Question: In February 2026, my HOA implemented a new policy that all vehicles in the community had to be registered, or they would be towed. As I started registering my family’s vehicles, my HOA would not allow me to register vehicles that were not in my name (the owner of the property). My parents live with me, and the HOA said I needed to add them to the occupant roster by filling out the HOA screening package. My parents have been living with me for 15 years. The HOA wants a $200 fee for background checks per person, or $200 fee if I provide a marriage certificate of my parents, and an additional $150 fee to process the screening paperwork. A total of 20 days, and then if approved, I can apply to register their vehicle.
The background check also includes a credit check that requires checking account numbers. Are they allowed to do this? Signed, L.R.
Dear L.R.,
There are a number of intertwined issues here. First, as a basic matter, covenants and rules cannot be applied retroactively. So, to the extent that your parents are living in the community and have been living in the community for many years, the association already has a very high hurdle to clear. Now screening, concerning parking is, strictly speaking, a new rule and not related to screening, but they are effectively forcing you to abide by their screening policy by denying your parents the right to park in the community.
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HOAs have two basic sources of authority. The declaration of covenants grants the association its primary powers and establishes basic rights for the association and owners; and provisions of a declaration are rarely found to be unenforceable (only in cases where they abridge a fundamental right or are arbitrary in their application). The board then likely has rulemaking authority, but the association’s rules are judged on a reasonableness standard – does the association have a real, existing problem and is the rule intended to address that problem?
I can certainly see where the association’s rule requiring vehicle registration would be reasonable, as it directly impacts security, the overuse of parking spaces and a host of other issues. But tying this rule to apply only to “approved” occupants may be a bridge too far.
Does the association have the power to approve occupants in the first place? That’s a right that would very likely need to be found in the declaration to be enforceable. And if it does, did this rule predate your parents’ residence in your home, or was it something that came up afterwards? And if the association doesn’t have such authority, how is it claiming to have the ability to screen and approve your parents? It ends up looking like a money grab, which would not be very attractive to a court.
While I’m skeptical that the association can do what it’s asking, the practical problem you’re going to run into is that the cost of fighting the association is going to be exponentially greater than the screening and processing fee they are demanding.
This is a very common situation where the HOA may be overshooting its authority, but the power imbalance is so significant that they will get away with it – because only a tiny percentage of people would be willing to invest the legal fees to push back (particularly given that, if the HOA were to win an eventual lawsuit, you are going to be held responsible for their costs and attorney fees, in addition to your own).
Still, if you don’t want to pay the fees and submit to the background check, you may want to consult with an attorney just to see if it’s worth the battle.
Ryan Poliakoff, a partner at Poliakoff Backer, LLP, is a Board Certified specialist in condominium and planned development law. This column is dedicated to the memory of Gary Poliakoff. Ryan Poliakoff and Gary Poliakoff are co-authors of “New Neighborhoods – The Consumer’s Guide to Condominium, Co-Op and HOA Living.” Email your questions to [email protected]. Please be sure to include your location.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Can Florida HOAs force background checks on residents?
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Reporting by Ryan Poliakoff, Special to the Palm Beach Post / Palm Beach Post
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This story was originally published September 20, 2026 at 6:03 AM.
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