South Carolina HOA fine rules

What this means for homeowners

• South Carolina has no statute governing HOA fines. Every section of Title 27, Chapter 30 was reviewed and none requires notice before a fine, sets a cure period, guarantees a hearing, or caps the amount of a fine. Whether an association may fine at all, and what procedure it must follow, is governed by the recorded declaration, bylaws and rules — the CC&Rs — which § 27-30-130(A)(1) requires to be recorded in the county land records "in order to be enforceable," and, as to rules, "In order to remain enforceable, a homeowners association's rules, regulations, and amendments to rules and regulations must be recorded in the clerk of court's, Register of Mesne Conveyance (RMC), or register of deeds office in the county in which the property is located by January tenth of each year following their adoption or amendment" (§ 27-30-130(B)(2)).
• South Carolina does have a homeowners association act, and this entry still records the state as having no HOA fine or enforcement statute, because that act is recording and disclosure legislation rather than enforcement legislation. Section 27-30-130 makes a declaration and an association's rules unenforceable unless they are recorded in the county land records, and no section of Title 27, Chapter 30 sets a fine, notice, cure or hearing procedure.
• What the Homeowners Association Act does provide is narrower: rules and amendments "are effective upon passage or adoption" and must be made accessible to a member on request unless posted in a common area or available on an association website (§ 27-30-130(B)(1)); an association must give homeowners notice "at least forty-eight hours in advance" of a meeting at which an annual budget increase is decided (§ 27-30-140(1)), although "[t]he provisions of this section do not apply to a homeowners association that is incorporated under the South Carolina Nonprofit Corporation Act found in Chapter 31, Title 33" (§ 27-30-140(2)); the access-to-documents provisions of the nonprofit corporation act "apply to all homeowners associations not subject to the South Carolina Nonprofit Corporation Act for the purposes of allowing homeowners access to inspect and copy a homeowners association's annual budget and homeowners membership lists" (§ 27-30-150); and "the magistrates court shall have concurrent jurisdiction to adjudicate monetary disputes arising under this article, provided the dispute meets the jurisdictional requirements of Section 22-3-10" (§ 27-30-160).
• The Department of Consumer Affairs records and reports HOA complaints under §§ 27-30-330 and 27-30-340, but the statute expressly prohibits the department from "promulgating regulations or issuing guidelines concerning homeowners association administration, governance, or governing documents" or "serving as an arbiter in disputes between the homeowner and homeowners association" (§ 27-30-340(E)).
• The Act's scope covers both housing types: a "homeowners association" is defined as "an entity developed to manage and maintain a planned community or horizontal property regime" (§ 27-30-120(6)), so the same chapter reaches single-family HOAs and condominium regimes. Condominiums in South Carolina are separately governed by the Horizontal Property Act, S.C. Code Ann. § 27-31-10 et seq.