Use this checklist for each board meeting. It follows the order of the work: before, during and after. For how to chair the meeting itself, see how to run HOA board meetings smoothly.
Before the Meeting
- Set the agenda with the president and the manager. List every item the board will discuss or vote on, and put a time estimate next to each one. The strategy behind an HOA board meeting covers how to build it.
- Give notice of the meeting in the way, and by the deadline, that your governing documents and state law require. Include the agenda if they call for it.
- Assemble the board packet: draft minutes of the last meeting, current financial reports, manager and committee reports, bids, and background for each decision.
- Send the packet to directors early enough to read it.
- Confirm that enough directors will attend for a quorum.
- Book the room or set up the video link, test it, and give owners the location or access details.
- Decide who will take the minutes.
During the Meeting
- Call the meeting to order, note the time and confirm a quorum is present.
- Approve the minutes of the prior meeting, with any corrections.
- Hear the financial, manager and committee reports.
- Hold the owner comment period, with the same time limit for every speaker.
- Take up old business, then new business. For each decision, state the motion clearly, get a second, discuss, vote and announce the result. Record the motion and the vote in the minutes.
- Decide which items belong in executive session and hold them for the closed session, as your state law allows.
- Set the date, time and place of the next meeting.
- Adjourn and note the time.
After the Meeting
- Draft the minutes within a few days and circulate them to the board for review. Minutes record what the board did, not everything that was said.
- Send directors and the manager a list of decisions and action items, each with an owner and a deadline.
- Notify owners of decisions that affect them, such as a rule change, a project schedule or a new assessment amount, using the notice your law and documents require.
- Make the minutes available to owners as your governing documents and state law require.
- File the notice, agenda, packet and approved minutes with the association’s records. See maintaining your HOA records.
- Follow up on action items before the next meeting, and carry unfinished ones onto the next agenda.
In California
California’s Common Interest Development Open Meeting Act sets these minimums.
- Notice. The association must give notice of the time and place of a board meeting at least four days before the meeting, or at least two days before a non-emergency meeting held solely in executive session. If your governing documents require a longer period, follow them. The notice must contain the agenda (Civil Code section 4920).
- Agenda. At a non-emergency meeting, the board generally may not discuss or act on an item that was not on the agenda in that notice, with narrow exceptions (section 4930).
- Executive session. The board may meet in executive session to consider litigation, matters relating to the formation of contracts with third parties, member discipline or personnel matters, or to meet with a member, at the member’s request, about the member’s payment of assessments. Anything discussed there must be generally noted in the minutes of the next meeting open to the full membership (section 4935).
For the kinds of meetings boards hold, see our breakdown of HOA board meetings. More checklists and worksheets are on the HOA board tools page.
The Law Behind This Page
Every legal point in this page comes from the official text. Each link below opens it in a new tab.
Civil Code sections: 4920 · 4930 · 4935
Want this checklist as a Word file? It is included in the free California HOA Board Toolkit, one Word download with the board templates from our board tools page.
This checklist is general educational information, not legal or financial advice. Laws vary by state and your association’s governing documents control many of these questions, so check with your association’s attorney or another qualified professional about your situation.