Unenforceable HOA Rules: The 50-State Guide

Quick answer: An HOA rule is unenforceable when one of five things is true. A state statute overrides it (ten states do that for native, drought-tolerant, or low-impact landscaping). The rule was never adopted or recorded the way the declaration or state law requires. The association skipped a notice or hearing that state law requires before a fine. The covenant has expired under a state expiry or marketable-title law. Or the board enforces it against you and not against your neighbors. Which of those you can actually use depends on your state, so this guide sorts all 50 and links each one to its own page, where the statute is quoted and sourced.

We have now read the HOA law of every state for this series, one state at a time, against each legislature's own statute site. The pattern that came out of it is simple enough to put on one page. Most states have no law about what you may plant, a few have a strong one, and the rest give you procedure, a clock, or nothing beyond the recorded declaration. Knowing which group your state is in tells you what to argue before you write a word to the board.

The five ways an HOA rule stops being enforceable

1. A statute overrides it. Ten states have passed a law that cancels a covenant requiring turf or banning drought-tolerant, native, or low-impact landscaping. Where that law applies, the rule in your declaration is void on that point no matter how clearly it is written. Texas Property Code 202.007 and Florida Statute 720.3075(4) are the two best known. The full list is in the first table below.

2. It was never properly adopted or recorded. A rule only binds you if the document that created it had the authority to. Board-made rules that go beyond what the recorded declaration allows fail on authority alone, and South Carolina goes further: under S.C. Code 27-30-130, governing documents are unenforceable unless recorded, and rules must be re-recorded every year by January 10. Idaho Code 55-3204 bars board rules that expand what the covenants already say. Kansas requires notice and comment before a board rule takes effect (K.S.A. 58-4617).

3. The association skipped the procedure. About fifteen states require written notice and an opportunity to be heard before a fine. Some set numbers: Virginia requires 14 days certified-mail notice and a result within 7 days, with fines capped at $50 or $10 per day for no more than 90 days (Va. Code 55.1-1819). Ohio gives you 10 days to request the hearing, and missing that window waives it (R.C. 5312.11). A fine levied without the required notice is the easiest kind to challenge, because the question is a date on a letter rather than an argument about taste.

4. The covenant expired. In Massachusetts a restriction imposed after 1961 becomes unenforceable after 30 years unless an extension was recorded (M.G.L. c. 184 sect. 27). Wisconsin runs the same idea on a 40-year clock (Wis. Stat. 893.33(6)), Iowa on 21 years (Iowa Code 614.24), and Louisiana extinguishes a building restriction two years after a visible violation goes unchallenged (Civil Code article 781). Whether a specific covenant has lapsed is a title question, so the answer comes from the registry of deeds and an attorney, never from arithmetic alone.

5. It is enforced selectively. Every state's courts recognize some version of waiver, acquiescence, or selective enforcement, where a board that ignored the same condition on three other lots cannot suddenly fine yours. Montana wrote it into statute: MCA 70-17-210 defines an enforcement action as equal and consistent application over a two-year period and adds a covenant-abandonment defence. Elsewhere it is an argument, and the homeowners lost on it in Nebraska's Pine Tree Neighborhood Assn. v. Moses (2023), so treat it as leverage rather than a guarantee.

States with a landscaping statute that overrides the HOA

These ten states have a law on the books that a board cannot write around. Each state page quotes the statute and explains what the association can still require, which is usually neatness, edging, pre-approval, and maintenance. Washington is the only one whose statute names pollinator habitat directly.

Narrower protections that are easy to overstate

Seven more states have something real, and in every case it is smaller than the summaries online make it sound. Read the state page before you cite any of these to a board.

• Arizona: A.R.S. 33-1819 protects artificial turf where grass is allowed, and 33-1816 protects solar. There is no statute for living native or drought-tolerant plants, and A.R.S. 33-1808 is about flags and signs, not xeriscaping.
• North Carolina: N.C.G.S. 47F-3-122 blocks forced irrigation during a declared severe drought, and 22B-20 voids solar bans. Nothing protects a native planting itself.
• Oregon: ORS 94.779 voids an irrigation requirement while a drought declaration or water-conservation ordinance is in effect, and lets an association require conversion of turf to xeriscape. It does not bar a ban on native planting.
• Michigan: the Homeowners Energy Policy Act (2024 PA 68) invalidates bans on rain barrels, clotheslines and solar. Native landscaping has no Michigan statute behind it.
• Minnesota: the 2023 managed natural landscape law (Minn. Stat. 412.925) binds cities, never associations, so you can be protected from a city citation and still violate an HOA turf rule.
• New York: A10102 would bar associations from limiting low impact landscaping. It passed both houses in 2026 and was unsigned on our last check, and a predecessor was vetoed in 2025. Pending is not law.
• Hawaii: HRS 421J-17 protects personal agriculture, meaning edible crops, in an enclosed yard, and HRS 196-7 protects solar. Ornamental and pollinator planting is governed by the declaration.

States where procedure is the leverage

None of these states protects a planting by statute. What they have is an umbrella association act that tells the board how it must behave before it fines you, and a board that skips a step hands you the dispute. The numbers matter, and so does who the clock runs against.

States where an old covenant can expire

In nine states the date a restriction was recorded matters more than its wording. Each works on a different clock, and in most of them the answer needs a title professional rather than arithmetic.

• Massachusetts: 30 years from recording for a post-1961 restriction unless an extension was recorded, and each extension buys only 20 more (M.G.L. c. 184 sect. 27).
• Wisconsin: 40 years for covenants under Wis. Stat. 893.33(6), against 30 in the general rule next door at 893.33(2).
• Iowa: 21 years under Iowa Code 614.24 unless the association filed a verified renewal claim, and the statute names landscaping in its own definition of use restrictions.
• Louisiana: two years from a noticeable violation under Civil Code article 781, and it frees only that lot.
• Montana: no fixed clock, but MCA 70-17-210 (2023) supplies a covenant-abandonment defence and bars enforcement where the governing body has not met in 15 years.
• Wyoming: the marketable title law (W.S. 34-10-101 through 109) can void a use restriction that predates a forty-year root of title unless it was preserved by a recorded notice.
• South Dakota: SDCL 11-5-4 caps a municipal use-restriction declaration at 40 years, raised from 25 in 2021.
• Indiana: a 50-year Marketable Title Act (Ind. Code 32-20) that runs from a root of title, so it needs a real title analysis.
• Rhode Island: a 40-year root of title under the Marketable Record Title Act (R.I. Gen. Laws 34-13.1-1), which may or may not reach an old subdivision restriction.

States where the declaration is the whole rulebook

Nine states give a subdivision homeowner no landscaping statute, no umbrella act with a fine procedure, and no expiry clock worth counting on. You still have leverage there. It sits inside the recorded declaration itself, in whether the board followed its own adoption and notice procedure, and in whether it enforces the rule uniformly.

• Missouri: RSMo 442.404 overrides covenants for political displays, solar, for-sale signs and six chickens, and says nothing about landscaping.
• Tennessee: no statewide HOA act for single-family neighborhoods. Governance runs under the Nonprofit Corporation Act and landscaping lives entirely in the CC&Rs.
• Arkansas: no landscaping statute, no umbrella act, and no solar override either, the barest state in the series.
• Mississippi: no umbrella act for subdivisions. One 2021 subchapter (79-11-751 to 761) regulates how associations handle money and awards legal fees to the prevailing party.
• Georgia: the Property Owners Association Act is opt-in, so the first question is whether your declaration ever elected it.
• Nebraska: three bills to protect native or pollinator planting (2023 to 2025) were all indefinitely postponed, and no general act covers standard subdivisions.
• New Hampshire: ordinary associations fall under RSA 292, a short corporate statute with nothing on fines or hearings. Two citations that circulate online, RSA 477:56 to 58, do not exist.
• North Dakota: no general act for standard subdivisions, no solar override, and an unsettled marketable-title question.
• Oklahoma: the Real Estate Development Act (60 O.S. 851-858) covers assessments and liens and says nothing about landscaping. A covenant can still be amended by 70 percent after 10 years or 60 percent after 15 (11 O.S. 42-106.1).

Where legislatures acted on solar and stayed silent on planting

The clearest finding across the fifty state reads is how often a legislature has already overridden private covenants for one thing and left planting alone. Wisconsin voids any platted-land restriction that unduly restricts a solar or wind system (Wis. Stat. 236.292(2)). Indiana regulates the colour of solar mounting hardware (Ind. Code 32-25.5-3.5-5). Kentucky amended its yard-sign statute in 2025 to void even pre-existing contrary declaration provisions (KRS 381.800). Missouri, Virginia, Ohio, Delaware, Connecticut, West Virginia, Hawaii and more protect a solar device by statute. In every one of those states the silence about gardens is a choice the legislature made, which is worth knowing before you argue that the law must surely be on your side. In most states, for now, it is not.

How to check your own rule, in order

1. 1Ask for the exact recorded provision.Ask the board in writing for the section of the declaration, bylaws, or rules being cited, by number. A violation letter paraphrases. The recorded text is what a court reads, and in several states the letter itself has to say certain things to be valid.
2. 2Find your state in the tables above and open its page.If your state has an overriding statute, the state page tells you what to quote and what the association can still require. If it does not, the page tells you which of the other four doors is open.
3. 3Check the date and the recording.Pull the original declaration date at the county recorder or registry of deeds and look for any amendment or extension. In an expiry state that is the whole case. In every state it tells you whether the rule you were cited under was ever recorded at all.
4. 4Check the procedure before you argue the merits.Did the notice arrive the way the statute requires, with the content the statute requires, inside the time it requires? Was a hearing offered? In Ohio, request yours inside 10 days or lose it. Keep paying assessments while you dispute a charge.
5. 5Document how the rule is applied on other lots.Dated photographs of the same condition elsewhere in the community, and any record of the board declining to act on them, are what a selective-enforcement argument is made of.
6. 6Bring a documented plan.A plant list, a simple layout with a defined edge and clear sight lines, and a maintenance schedule read as a considered project to an architectural review committee. Most turf-adjacent rules are really about tidiness, and a plan answers that without turf.

Watch it done

• Water Talk: Encouraging Native Plants in HOA Landscapes, Upper Trinity Regional Water District, 51 minutes. A member of her own HOA's architectural review committee walks through step 6 above with her own paperwork: the hand-drawn plan at full scale, a photo of every plant on it, and what a Texas board can still require after Property Code 202.007.

What your HOA can still require, in every state

• Pre-approval of landscaping changes through an architectural review committee, including in the ten protected states
• Neatness, edging, weed control, and a maintenance standard
• Height limits, setbacks, and sight-line rules at corners and driveways
• Containment, so a planting does not spread onto a neighbor's lot or common property (Illinois writes this into the statute)
• Noninvasive plants where a statute names that condition, as Washington does
• Turf, where no statute reaches it and the recorded declaration says so plainly

All 50 states

Every state in the series, alphabetically. Each page was written from the state's own statute site and says which of the five doors is open there.

• Alabama
• Alaska
• Arizona
• Arkansas
• California
• Colorado
• Connecticut
• Delaware
• Florida
• Georgia
• Hawaii
• Idaho
• Illinois
• Indiana
• Iowa
• Kansas
• Kentucky
• Louisiana
• Maine
• Maryland
• Massachusetts
• Michigan
• Minnesota
• Mississippi
• Missouri
• Montana
• Nebraska
• Nevada
• New Hampshire
• New Jersey
• New Mexico
• New York
• North Carolina
• North Dakota
• Ohio
• Oklahoma
• Oregon
• Pennsylvania
• Rhode Island
• South Carolina
• South Dakota
• Tennessee
• Texas
• Utah
• Vermont
• Virginia
• Washington
• West Virginia
• Wisconsin
• Wyoming

For the ten protected states, the native plant laws by state page lays the statutes side by side.

People also ask

What makes an HOA rule unenforceable?

One of five things. A state statute overrides it, which ten states do for native, drought-tolerant, or low-impact landscaping. The rule was never adopted or recorded the way the declaration or state law requires. The association skipped a notice or hearing that state law requires before a fine. The covenant expired under a state expiry or marketable-title law. Or the board enforces it against you and not your neighbors. Which of those applies depends on your state, and this guide links each state to its own page.

Which states have a law protecting native or drought-tolerant landscaping from an HOA?

Ten: Texas (Property Code 202.007), Florida (F.S. 720.3075), California (Civil Code 4735), Maryland (Real Property 2-125), Colorado (C.R.S. 38-33.3-106.5), Utah (Utah Code 57-8a-231), Nevada (NRS 116.330), Illinois (765 ILCS 167/), Maine (LD 649) and Washington (RCW 64.38.057). Seven more have something narrower: Arizona and Michigan for artificial turf or energy devices, North Carolina and Oregon for irrigation during drought, Minnesota for cities rather than associations, Hawaii for edible crops, and New York has a bill that passed both houses in 2026 but was unsigned on our last check.

Can an HOA fine me without a hearing?

In about fifteen states, no. Virginia, Ohio, Connecticut, Kentucky, New Mexico, Alaska, Delaware, Vermont, West Virginia, Alabama and others require written notice and an opportunity to be heard before a fine, and some set numbers: Virginia 14 days notice and a $50 cap, Ohio a 10-day window for you to request the hearing, Connecticut 10 business days notice. In the other states the procedure is whatever your recorded declaration and bylaws say, which is why the declaration is the first thing to read.

Do HOA covenants expire?

In some states. Massachusetts restrictions lapse after 30 years unless extended (M.G.L. c. 184 sect. 27), Wisconsin after 40 (Wis. Stat. 893.33(6)), Iowa after 21 unless a renewal claim was filed (Iowa Code 614.24), and Louisiana extinguishes a restriction two years after a visible violation goes unchallenged (Civil Code article 781). Wyoming, Indiana and Rhode Island run marketable-title rules from a root of title that needs a title professional. Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska carve subdivision restrictions out of their marketable-title acts, so an old covenant there does not lapse with age.

Is a rule unenforceable if the HOA never enforced it against my neighbors?

It is an argument, and sometimes a winning one, but rarely a guarantee. Courts in every state recognize some version of waiver, acquiescence, or selective enforcement. Montana wrote it into statute at MCA 70-17-210, which defines an enforcement action as equal and consistent application over a two-year period. In Nebraska the homeowners lost on it in Pine Tree Neighborhood Assn. v. Moses (2023). Dated photographs of the same condition on other lots, and any record of the board declining to act, are what the argument is made of.