Nevada Flipped Its HOA Rental Law on July 1, 2026

The change is the whole story, so start with the date. The Nevada Legislature amended NRS 116.335 at Statutes of Nevada 2025, page 2382, with an effective date of July 1, 2026. The Nevada Revised Statutes still print both texts, the older one flagged [Effective through June 30, 2026] and the replacement flagged [Effective July 1, 2026]. Anything written about Nevada HOA rental rights before mid-2026, and any summary still describing a right to keep renting because the CC&Rs allowed it on the day you closed, is quoting the expired section. The leadline itself changed from "Association prohibited from requiring unit's owner to obtain approval to rent or lease unit" to "Adoption of rules and regulations by association related to certain restrictions or prohibitions in declaration concerning renting or leasing units."

The current section is a grant of rulemaking power with a gate on the front of it. Subsection 1 applies only if the declaration already authorizes the association to prohibit or restrict an owner from renting or leasing, or already contains a provision establishing a maximum number or percentage of units that may be rented or leased. If the declaration is silent on leasing, NRS 116.335 gives the board nothing, and the association is back to amending the declaration under its own supermajority procedure. Where the gate is open, the board may adopt rules and regulations to prohibit or restrict the renting or leasing of residential units, but only "to the extent that the restriction is reasonably related to meet underwriting requirements" of two named categories: institutional lenders that regularly make loans secured by first mortgages on units in common-interest communities or regularly purchase such mortgages, and insurance companies that issue insurance policies to associations or to units in a common-interest community.

That underwriting hook is the only substantive check an owner has left, and it is a real one. A Nevada board cannot now adopt a leasing rule for aesthetic or neighborly reasons and cite this section; it has to tie the restriction to what a first-mortgage lender or an association insurer actually requires, which in practice means investor-concentration and owner-occupancy ratios that affect whether units in the project remain financeable and whether the master policy stays in force. A rule that goes further than the lender or carrier requirement is outside the words "to the extent that."

The companion amendment shows how far the Legislature meant to go. NRS 116.31065, the section that governs association rules generally, was amended in the same 2025 act, also effective July 1, 2026. Subsection 4 previously read that rules "must be consistent with the governing documents of the association." It now opens "Except as otherwise provided in subsection 1 of NRS 116.335," which carves rental rules out of the consistency requirement. The remaining constraints in NRS 116.31065 still apply to a rental rule: it must be reasonably related to the purpose for which it was adopted, explicit enough to tell a person what compliance requires, not adopted to evade an obligation of the association, and uniformly enforced under the same or similar circumstances against all owners, and a rule that is not uniformly enforced may not be enforced against any owner at all.

Two owner protections carried forward into subsection 3 and are stated to apply "notwithstanding any other provision of law or the declaration to the contrary." First, an owner who is blocked because the maximum number or percentage of rentable units is already used up may seek a waiver from the executive board on a showing of economic hardship, and the board may grant it and approve the lease. Second, when the association measures the cap, units owned by the declarant must not be counted or considered, which stops a builder still holding inventory from consuming the community's rental allowance. What did not carry forward is as important: the expired version's bar on requiring association approval to rent, its bar on amending a cap downward, and its rule that an association could not charge a fee for tenant registration or demand information from a landlord that it does not demand from an owner-occupant, all disappear from the section on July 1, 2026.

Short-term rentals are governed separately and were never inside this fight. Subsection 2 preserves an association's power to enforce leasing provisions found elsewhere in chapter 116 or in other federal, state or local law, naming the county short-term-rental provisions at NRS 244.35351 to 244.35359 and the city provisions at NRS 268.09791 to 268.09799. Inside a planned community, NRS 116.340 controls: an owner may put a residentially restricted unit to transient commercial use only if the governing documents of the association and of any master association do not prohibit it, the executive board of each approves, and the unit is properly zoned with any local license obtained. NRS 116.340(4)(b) defines transient commercial use as use for remuneration as a hostel, hotel, inn, motel, resort, vacation rental or other transient lodging where the occupancy runs less than 30 consecutive calendar days, and subsection 3 lets the association charge additional fees tied to the added services or costs such use creates.

An association enforces a leasing rule the ordinary way, through NRS 116.31031, and NRS 116.31065(6) makes that explicit: a rule may be enforced by fine only if the association complies with NRS 116.31031. That means written notice of the governing-document provision at least 30 days before the alleged violation, then a written notice specifying the violation, the proposed cure, the fine amount and the hearing date, time and location, with a clear and detailed photograph where the violation is one that can be photographed, and a hearing unless the owner pays, waives it in writing or fails to appear. An unauthorized lease will not pose an imminent threat to health, safety or welfare, so the fine is capped at $100 per violation and $1,000 per hearing, with a further fine of no more than the original amount for each 7-day period once the violation has run 14 days uncured. Under NRS 116.31162(6) the association may not foreclose its lien by sale on that kind of fine.

An owner challenging a rental rule has three moves. First, uniformity: NRS 116.31065(5) provides that a rule not uniformly enforced under the same or similar circumstances may not be enforced against any owner, so documented selective enforcement defeats the rule community-wide, not just in one case. Second, the underwriting limit in NRS 116.335(1): ask the board in writing to identify the institutional lender or insurance company requirement the rule is reasonably related to, because a rule with no such tether exceeds the grant. Third, the hardship waiver in NRS 116.335(3)(a) when the community's cap is full. Procedurally, NRS 38.310 bars a civil action over the interpretation, application or enforcement of CC&Rs or rules until the association's internal procedures are exhausted and the claim has been submitted to mediation under NRS 38.300 to 38.360, and directs the court to dismiss anything filed without that step; the claim goes to the Real Estate Division with a $50 filing fee under NRS 38.320. An affidavit may also be filed with the Division under NRS 116.760 within one year of discovering the violation, after certified-mail notice to the board specifying the violation, the damages and the corrective action sought. The Ombudsman for Owners in Common-Interest Communities and Condominium Hotels, established inside the Division by NRS 116.625, investigates such disputes.