HOA rules · Davie, FL

Where an HOA Can Stop a Kitchen Remodel in Davie

Where an HOA can stop a kitchen remodel in Davie is almost never inside the kitchen itself. Florida ties an association's architectural authority to what its recorded declaration actually says, and declarations describe location, size, type and appearance. A run of cabinets behind your front door changes none of the four. What an association can reach is the part of the job that becomes visible from the street.

What the declaration has to state: Location, size, type, appearance; F.S. 720.3035
Records after a written request: 10 business days; F.S. 720.303

Where an HOA can stop a kitchen remodel in Davie: a finished kitchen with a quartz-topped island, white shaker cabinets and a stainless hood on the wall above the range

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What the Declaration Actually Governs

An association is not a small government, and its power over what you build is not general. It comes from one recorded document, and the state says so plainly: architectural review authority exists only to the extent it is specifically stated or reasonably inferred as to location, size, type or appearance in the declaration of covenants, or in published guidelines the declaration itself authorizes.

Read those four attributes again, because they are the whole test. Location, size, type, appearance. Every one of them describes a building as seen from outside it. A declaration written to keep a street looking consistent is talking about rooflines, setbacks, paint and fences, and a kitchen rebuilt inside an existing footprint moves none of them.

The same statute requires those standards to be applied reasonably and equitably to every owner, which carries more weight than it first appears to. A requirement that shows up for your project and for nobody else's on the street is not a standard. It is a preference, and the recorded document is what tells the two apart.

How to Get the Document That Decides

So the answer does not live in a phone call to a board member, and you do not have to accept a summary of it. Florida lists the declaration of covenants and the bylaws among the official records an association is required to keep, and those records must be made available to a parcel owner for inspection or copying within 10 business days of a written request.

Written is the operative word there. A request made in writing starts a clock. The same question asked across a fence does not.

What you are looking for inside it is short. Find the architectural section. See whether it names anything your project actually touches, and whether it points to separate published guidelines, since those carry the same force as the declaration when the declaration authorizes them. If that section reaches only the exterior of the building, you have your answer before you order a single cabinet, and you have it in writing rather than as somebody's recollection of a meeting.

A finished kitchen with tall pantry cabinets beside a stainless refrigerator, a quartz countertop running into the corner and a tiled backsplash behind the range

The Part of the Job That Leaves the House

There is a real list of things an association can reach, and it is worth knowing before the crew arrives, because here the standing is genuine rather than assumed.

A kitchen remodel spills outside for a few days no matter how tidy the crew is. A container lands on the driveway. Two or three trucks park where one car normally sits. Cabinets arrive on a lift gate and get staged in the garage. Old counters leave in pieces. None of that happens inside the kitchen, and guidelines that set working hours, parking and the placement of a dumpster can reach every bit of it.

One decision does cross the wall permanently. A hood that vents outside puts a cap on an exterior wall or on the roof, and that is a change in appearance by any reading of the word. It is the item in a kitchen project most likely to need a submission, and the one worth raising first.

Why It Comes Up So Often Here

Davie is a town where this question comes up more than it does elsewhere, and the town itself is the evidence. It publishes a directory of homeowners associations, revised in October 2024 and running nine pages, alphabetical from 99 Pines at one end to Zona Village at the other. Ranch parcels, townhouse rows and condominium buildings sit within a few minutes of each other here, and none of the three is governed the same way. Two neighbors on the same errand can come back with opposite answers and both be right, which is why we ask which community a kitchen sits in before we talk about scope.

Common Questions

Does an HOA in Davie have to approve a kitchen remodel?

Usually not, when the work stays inside the existing walls. An association's architectural authority reaches what its declaration describes, and declarations describe how a property looks and how it sits on its lot. Cabinets, counters and appliances change neither. Read your own declaration anyway, because a few of them are written more broadly than the norm.

What can a Davie homeowners association actually require for a kitchen project?

Most often the parts that happen outdoors: where a container sits, when crews may work, where trucks park and how deliveries are staged. A new exterior vent for a range hood is the one decision made inside the kitchen that regularly needs a submission, because the cap for it changes the outside of the building.

Is HOA approval the same as a Davie permit?

No, and clearing one says nothing about the other. A permit is municipal and comes from the town. An association's review is private and comes from a recorded contract you agreed to when you bought the property. They are separate processes with separate paperwork, and neither one substitutes for the other.