First, Work Out Which Document You Are Amending

The answer changes the process, the threshold, and who gets to vote, so this is not a formality.

Section 57-8-40(5) ranks the documents when they conflict: the condominium act; then Title 16, Chapter 6a or the organizing law; then the plat and the declaration, which control equally; then an organizational document filed with the state, such as the articles; then the bylaws; then a rule or policy adopted by the management committee.

Two consequences follow. You cannot fix a declaration problem by amending the bylaws, because the declaration outranks them. And a rule cannot do what the documents above it forbid, whatever process the committee followed to adopt it.

The Recording Rule That Governs Everything

No modification or amendment of the declaration or bylaws is valid unless it is set forth in an amendment and that amendment is recorded.

The chapter says it again from the other side. An initial or amended organizational document properly filed with the state does not need to be recorded, except amended bylaws.

So a vote in the minutes is not an amendment. Neither is a signed document sitting in the manager's file. Until it is recorded with the county, the old text remains the operative text. If your association is enforcing something adopted years ago, asking for the recorded amendment is a fair and often decisive question.

Amending the Declaration

After the period of administrative control ends, an amendment to the declaration may be adopted by a majority vote of voters, or a greater percentage if the declaration requires one, at a meeting where at least 51% of the voting interests are present. 

Read that as two separate tests. 51% present is the quorum for this vote. A majority of those voting then carry it. Owners routinely conflate the two and conclude that an amendment requires a 51% majority to vote yes. It did not.

The management committee may not amend a declaration. That is a flat prohibition with no exception written into it.

Voting interests are calculated in the manner the governing documents require, and this section applies regardless of when the association was created.

Keep in mind that, during the period of administrative control, a declarant may retain the right to unilaterally amend the governing documents.

Ceilings Your Documents Cannot Exceed

Section 57-8-39(1)(a)(i) caps what the governing documents may demand. For an amendment adopted after the period of administrative control, the documents may not require:

• the vote or approval of owners holding more than 67% of the voting interests;
• the approval of any specific unit owner; or
• the vote or approval of lienholders holding more than 67% of the first-position security interests.

And the documents may not put an amendment out of reach for an extended period. Any provision that prohibits a vote or approval to amend any part of the governing documents during a particular time period is invalid. 

These limits carry an exception. They do not apply to an amendment affecting only the undivided interest of each owner in the common areas and facilities, unit boundaries, or owners' voting rights. Those three subjects sit outside the caps, so the declaration may set its own terms for them.

Nothing in the section affects other rights the declarant reserved.

Amending the Bylaws Is a Different Question

The bylaws may specify the percentage of votes required to amend them. Note the verb: Section 57-8-16 says the bylaws may provide for that, which means some condominium bylaws are simply silent.

Where they are silent, the Revised Nonprofit Corporation Act fills the gap, and it fills it in the board's favor. The board of directors may amend the bylaws at any time unless the chapter, the articles, or the bylaws reserve that power to the members or prohibit the board from exercising it. Unless the bylaws provide otherwise, the members may also amend them.

So the declaration and the bylaws are not equally protected. Section 57-8-39(1)(c) bars the committee from amending the declaration and says nothing about bylaws. Whether your committee can rewrite the bylaws without an owner vote turns on one clause in your own documents, and it is worth finding before a dispute rather than during one.

Two cross-checks. The 67% ceiling in Section 57-8-39(1)(a)(i)(A) is written for "the governing documents," which includes the bylaws. The 51%-present-then-majority rule in Subsection (1)(a)(ii) is written for an amendment to the declaration, so it does not set the bylaws threshold. And however the bylaws are amended, the amendment still has to be recorded.

Changing the Rules

Rules are at the bottom of the hierarchy and the easiest thing for a committee to change. The bylaws may set the method of adopting and amending rules governing the details of operation and use of the common areas.

The condominium act sets no rulemaking procedure of its own. It requires no advance notice to owners, no open forum before the committee votes, and no delivery of the adopted rule afterward, so any procedure required would be in the governing documents. And there is no owner vote to disapprove a rule. 

What a condominium owner has instead is substance. Section 57-8-8.1 lists what a rule may not do, and a rule that exceeds those limits is vulnerable regardless of how it was adopted. Read design review and architectural control to see how they work in practice.

Signing and Filing

The management committee may modify a form of articles of incorporation or similar organizational document attached to the declaration for filing or re-filing, if the result is consistent with Section 57-8-40. An organizational document attached to a declaration may be amended under its own terms or under applicable law, whether or not it is recorded.

Which officers may prepare, execute, certify, and record an amendment is a bylaws question, so check there before assuming the president signs.

Working Through an Amendment

Identify the document. Read what your own governing documents require, then check that requirement against the Section 57-8-39(1)(a) ceilings, because a threshold above 67% adopted after administrative control is not enforceable. Confirm whether the period of administrative control has ended, since most of Section 57-8-39(1) turns on that. Hold the vote with the right quorum and the right majority. Then record it and keep the recording.

Reviewed against Utah Code, current as of September 9, 2026.