What This Office Can and Cannot Do

The Ombudsman's Authority, Its Statutory Limits, and Where to Take the Questions It Cannot Answer.

Read this before you call. Some of the most common requests this Office receives are ones that the statute does not allow it to answer, and knowing that now saves you time, money, and unnecessary frustration.

What This Office Is

The Office of the Homeowners' Association Ombudsman sits within the Utah Department of Commerce. It is staffed by attorneys whom the Department's Commissioner appoints for their background or expertise in community association law.

Those attorneys are required to develop and maintain expertise in the statutes affecting owners and associations and, upon request, to analyze a complaint and provide an advisory opinion. The Office also publishes educational materials on this site, as required in the same section.

What This Office Can Do

Issue a written advisory opinion on whether a state statute was followed. Any lot owner, unit owner, or association may request one. The opinion addresses compliance with the Condominium Ownership Act, the Community Association Act, or other applicable Utah statutes, and it must include a statement of the facts and law supporting its conclusions.
Publish its advisory opinions. The Office must make public each advisory opinion it issues.
Publish educational materials on this site, including a list of the statutes that affect owners and associations, an FAQ, a plain-language overview of each act, and instructions on organizing and dismantling an association.
Direct callers to those resources.

What This Office Cannot Do

These are limits the statute places on the Office, not matters of policy or staffing. They cannot be waived on request.

It cannot interpret your governing documents. Outside of determining compliance with state law, the Office may not provide any service that requires interpreting an association's governing documents, including deciding whether a provision of them is reasonable. This is the single most common request the Office has to decline. If your question is what your CC&Rs mean, that question likely belongs to your own attorney or to a court.
It cannot be your lawyer. Nothing an Office attorney does within the scope of employment creates an attorney-client relationship with any owner or any association. No conversation with this Office is privileged, and no one here represents you.
It cannot represent anyone in court. Neither the Office nor its attorneys may represent private parties, state agencies, local governments, or any other individual or entity in a legal action arising from or relating to a matter addressed in this chapter.
It cannot decide a purely contractual dispute. If a request deals solely with a contractual dispute, the Office must issue a written statement declining to review it.
It cannot act on a matter not governed by a state statute. The Office analyzes a complaint and issues an advisory opinion only for issues relating to a violation of a state statute.
It cannot order anyone to do anything. An advisory opinion is not an order. It is not binding on any party and generally not admissible in a dispute. What it can do is described below.
It cannot be compelled to testify about a review. No Office attorney may be compelled to testify in a civil action concerning the subject matter of any review or advisory opinion arranged through the Office, and evidence of a review, along with the Office's opinions, writings, findings, and determinations, is not admissible in a judicial action or arbitration, except as described below.

Before the Office Can Act, You Have To Try Your Association First

The Office may not issue an advisory opinion unless you have exhausted all existing dispute resolution procedures in your association's governing documents, and your request must describe how you complied with that requirement.

One protection sits alongside that requirement: an association may not require you to engage in binding arbitration before you request an advisory opinion.

The Office will also decline to issue an opinion, in writing, if the issues are not ripe for review, if you have not exhausted those procedures, or if the issues raised are beyond the scope of its statutory duty.

What an Advisory Opinion Costs, and the Deadline for Submitting It

A nonrefundable filing fee of $150.
Filed no later than one year after the day you knew or should have known about the act in question, and your request must include facts showing you are within that year.
Filed before you commence a court action or binding arbitration.
Describing the act complained of and its impact on you. You may also allege actual damages.

What an Advisory Opinion Is Worth

Advisory opinions are intended to be an alternative form of dispute resolution and to provide access to resources at a much lower cost than going to court. They are opinions from a neutral state agency on whether a specific act has violated state law. An advisory opinion is not the same as a court decision. It is neither binding on any party nor admissible as evidence in a dispute involving an association. Understanding that before you pay the fee matters.

Advisory opinions have one significant consequence, and it can be expensive for whoever ignores them. If the Office issues an opinion, the same issue is later litigated, and the court rules in favor of the same party the opinion favored in a final judgment, then the court may award the substantially prevailing party reasonable attorney fees and court costs relating to development of the cause of action from the date the Office delivered the opinion to the date the court resolved it. If the court also finds the opposing party knowingly and intentionally violated the law, it may impose a civil penalty of up to $5,000.

In practice, an advisory opinion in your favor puts the other side on notice at a datable moment, and the fee clock for later litigation starts there. For many parties, a neutral decision is enough to decide the dispute.

Two Ways a Request Can Cost You Access

The statute includes consequences for misuse of the process, and callers should be aware of them.

A knowingly false or fraudulent request. If the Office determines in the course of issuing an opinion that a person knowingly filed a false or fraudulent request, the Office shall prohibit that person from filing a complaint for two years and may impose a civil penalty of up to $1,000.
Repeated requests that cannot be reviewed. The Office may designate a person a vexatious filer after three or more requests in which, each time, the Office found that the person had not exhausted the governing documents' procedures, declined to issue an opinion, or that the request was solely a contractual dispute. After that designation, the Office may not accept a request from that person unless the person submits it in writing to the Department's Commissioner, who authorizes the filing.

Where to Take the Questions This Office Cannot Answer

Most calls this Office cannot act on, still have somewhere to go.

Information about my CC&Rs that the Office cannot answer. Your own attorney, or a court.
A dispute with a neighbor rather than with the association. Not a matter of association statute, so not something the Office can address by advisory opinion.
A contract dispute with a vendor, manager, or contractor. The Office must decline a request dealing solely with a contractual dispute.
Whether my association's corporate registration is current, or how to file an entity document. The Division of Corporations and Commercial Code. Association registration with the Department of Commerce is separate and is required by Section 57-8-13.1 for condominiums and Section 57-8a-105 for community associations.
A copy of my declaration, plat, or recorded bylaws. The recorder's office in the county where the property sits.
Money the association owes me, or a claim under a dollar threshold. A court. Small claims may be an option depending on the amount.
An urgent statutory deadline is closing in on me. Do not wait for an advisory opinion. Several deadlines in both acts are short, and a request to this Office does not stop any of them. Check the Frequently Asked Questions and the overview for your chapter, and get your own counsel if a deadline is approaching.

Start Here Instead

If you are not yet sure whether your question is one this Office can act on, the answer is often already on this site. The Frequently Asked Questions covers the ten topics the Office is asked about most. The list of statutes that affect owners and associations shows which laws reach you. And the overview for your chapter, either condominium or community association, summarizes what the law gives you and asks of you.

If your question is about forming, dissolving, or consolidating an association, see Organizing and Dismantling an Association.

Reviewed against the Utah Code, current as of August 18, 2026.