HOA glossaryGoverning documents

What are governing documents?

The full set of instruments that binds an association and its members, read in a fixed order of authority.

The stack usually runs: applicable law, then the recorded plat and declaration or CC&Rs, then the articles of incorporation, then the bylaws, then the rules and regulations and board resolutions. Higher beats lower. Where a state statute is mandatory it beats all of them.

Knowing the order matters more than knowing the contents, because most real questions are conflicts. An owner cites a rule; the board cites the covenant; the covenant wins. A board cites a policy; the statute says otherwise; the statute wins.

The set should be complete and current, including every recorded amendment. A community operating from a 1998 photocopy that predates two amendments is enforcing a document that no longer exists.

Why it matters to a board

Give every new director the complete set on day one, in order. It is the cheapest risk reduction available to an association.

Where the answer lives

Your recorded declaration and bylaws first, then the act that governs associations in your state. Whichever is stricter is the one that binds you.

Board Academy: the documents

Related terms

CC&RsThe recorded covenants that run with the land in a community, binding every owner to the same set of use restrictions and obligations.BylawsThe association's internal operating manual — how directors are elected, how meetings are called and run, and what the officers may do.Articles of incorporationThe charter filed with the state that brings the association into existence as a corporation, usually a nonprofit one.Rules and regulationsStandards adopted by the board under authority granted in the covenants — enforceable, but subordinate to them.AmendmentA formal change to a governing document, adopted at the threshold that document requires and, for covenants, recorded to take effect.Board resolutionA formal, recorded-in-the-minutes decision of the board, used to adopt policies that need to be provable later.
General information, not legal advice. This entry explains what the term means, not what your association must do about it. Any notice period, cure window, fine cap, vote threshold or deadline comes from your recorded declaration and your state's act — those differ in all fifty states and are amended every session. Updated August 2026. Confirm the current requirements with an attorney licensed in your state before acting.
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