When does an HOA have to be audited

Ed,

The owners can always ask, they can't demand.
When asked, the Board can always say no.

Keep in mind that an audit has to be paid for: $3,000 to $6,000

You might simply want to review the financials yourself.
Any member, under corporate statute, and likely your own governing documents, has the right to review the records of the Association.

Looking at the by-laws is a very good starting point, but it is not the end point. Please review your state laws that pertain to this topic to determine if the law(s) give an answer to your question. Our association has chosen years ago to do an audit each year and to have our financial documents available on a monthly basis.

since audits cost money, as Tim noted, you should start by determining if an audit is necessary. There are different audits out there, so it maybe easier to determine if one is necessary by reviewing the financial records, along with the board meeting minutes to get an idea of what's happened.

Send a written request and quote the section in your documents that may state what records homeowners are entitled to. If they refuse, a note from a private attorney may blast the information out of them. Send your letters certified with return receipt requested.

Even better- ask around the community and see if you have neighbors who are as annoyed as you are. All of you can attend the next meeting and demand answers. This could be the start of a movement that will make the board more transparent or you can recall the entire bunch and vote in replacements. One may have to be you.

From that point, you can talk to an accountant about audits and the type you'll need. Good luck!

There's no right to "call" for an audit but your HOA should be getting annual audits conducted and, when requested, supply the audit upon request. There's nothing sensational in the audit results of a well-run HOA operation.

Given your HOA board is resistant to explaining cash outflows, then your HOA board is dysfunctional. Period.

We do but it is very sparse. They no longer explain what some of the expenses are, they are very vague. We had a take over a year or so ago, so the board is not as transparent as it used to be. They have thrown out all bylaws that had been updated since the beginning of the subdivision which had been put in place to try to keep the board honest and transparent. The ones they now follow say that the board doesn't have to ask for much of anything anymore.

We have found a discrepancy of several thousand dollars, and we receive give very vague answers if you can any. Their other response is always "the board has 10 days to reply" to anything that we ask.

There have been many problems with documents and transparency since this board has taken over, and we feel that we can not get any answers.