Condominium Ownership Act Education Homepage
First: Is Your Community a Condominium?
Being a condominium is not about whether your homes are attached, how tall the building is, or how new the project is. Two things decide it, in this order.
- Your declaration. If it states that Chapter 8 applies, Chapter 8 applies.
- Your recorded plats. If the declaration is silent, then your association is under Chapter 8 if its plats are designated as condominium plats.
This rule applies no matter when your association was created.
What you own in a condominium is a single unit together with an undivided interest in the common areas and facilities. That ownership structure is why many answers about these types of communities differ from those for community associations, particularly regarding maintenance, insurance, and common areas.
One situation reaches both chapters. If your condominium association is part of a larger development, your unit can also be a "lot" under the Community Association Act, which means a master association may govern you at the same time. If you pay assessments to two associations, it is important to understand the structure and governing laws of each.
Start With the Overview
Read Rights and Responsibilities in a Condominium first. It is a summary of what Chapter 8 provides and requires of you, and it points to the detailed page for each subject.
If you have one specific question, the Frequently Asked Questions section answers the ten subjects this Office is asked about most. If you want the law itself, the list of statutes that affect owners and associations gives every statute that reaches you, what it does, and its effective date.
Topics in This Section
The buttons on this page go to the condominium page for each subject. Each one states the governing section of Chapter 8, the applicable deadlines and dollar figures, and the date the page was last checked against the code.
Your Association Has To Be Registered
An association of unit owners must register with the Department of Commerce no later than 90 days after the declaration is recorded, renew that registration every year, and file an update within 90 days of any change to the information it gave.
Registration is not paperwork for its own sake. While an association is out of compliance, no lien arises under Section 57-8-44, and the association may not enforce any existing lien. The period of noncompliance does not start until the 90 days run out, and the association ends it by registering. Once it does, a lien may then arise for events that happened during the gap. But if a unit is conveyed to an independent third party while the association remains out of compliance, the lien on that unit is extinguished, and the missed events cannot support a new lien.
If You Are in a Dispute With Your Association
Put it in writing to the association and use whatever dispute procedure your governing documents set out. You must exhaust that procedure before this Office can issue an advisory opinion.
Then read What This Office Can and Cannot Do before you file. It sets out the fee, the filing deadline, what an advisory opinion is worth, and the questions the statute does not permit this Office to answer, the largest of which is interpreting your governing documents.
If you are forming, dissolving, or combining one, start with Organizing and Dismantling an Association.
Reviewed against the Utah Code, current as of September 8, 2026.
