Gated Community Maintenance Question:

In a gated community, is the HOA responsible for maintenance of the border (perimeter) fences?

The answer should be found in your governing documents, or your Reserve study plan. Our association has been removing timber retaining walls over the past four years, with the last one costing over $400,000 to do. All of those expenses were from our Replacement Reserve, even though some of the walls backed up to owners' lots.

You can also check the plats that were most likely recorded with the governing documents. Ours clearly show the boundary areas that the HOA owns vs private property. In our gated community, all of the fences and walls surrounding the community are property of the master association and we have to maintain them. If you look at the survey of an owner's property that backs up to a wall or fence, you can clearly see that their property line is a foot or more inside the wall or fence.

It may or many not be defined in your governing docs. In my last association, there was an entrance gate and brick wall on the main road, and wooden fences around much of the rest of the perimeter. The CCRs didn't detail who was responsible, but all of the walls and fences were on homeowner property with a 5 foot wall and fence easement granted to the association. The board decided that the association would maintain the brick wall, but not the fences.