HOA and condo assessment liens: six-month priority and foreclosure thresholds

Which statute applies turns on when the community was created. WUCIOA, chapter 64.90 RCW, governs every common interest community created on or after July 1, 2018, and any older one that amends its declaration to opt in. RCW 64.90.360(2) says so in terms, and RCW 64.90.365(1) lists the handful of WUCIOA sections that reach back to pre-2018 communities. The lien section, RCW 64.90.485, is not on that list. So a 1998 condominium still runs on RCW 64.34.364 and a 2005 plat subdivision still runs on RCW 64.38.100, at least until January 1, 2028, when 2024 c 321 repeals chapters 58.19, 64.32, 64.34 and 64.38 RCW and folds everything into WUCIOA.

The practical gap between those regimes is real. RCW 64.90.485(1) creates a statutory lien automatically, perfected by the recording of the declaration, with no separate claim of lien required. RCW 64.38.100 does not create a lien at all: it opens each operative subsection with the condition "If the governing documents of an association provide for a lien on the lot of any owner for unpaid assessments," so a pre-2018 Washington homeowners association only has a lien if its own declaration granted one.

The six-month priority is measured differently under each act. WUCIOA counts the six months immediately preceding the institution of proceedings, defined in RCW 64.90.485(3)(b)(i) as the recording of a notice of trustee's sale, the commencement of a judicial foreclosure action by either the association or the lender, or the recording of a notice of intention to forfeit a real estate contract. The 1989 Condominium Act counts back from the sale itself, and RCW 64.34.364(4) shaves up to three months off that priority where an eligible mortgagee asked for notice of delinquency and did not get it. Neither act gives capital improvement assessments priority, and RCW 64.90.485(3)(c) blocks the workaround of loading fines, late charges, interest or collection fees into the periodic budget so they ride along in the priority amount.

A lender can buy its way out. Under RCW 64.90.485(3)(a)(iv), once the holder of the security interest pays the six months of assessments and the capped fee amount, the association's priority lien is fully subordinated to that lender. And under RCW 64.90.485(6), an association that forecloses nonjudicially under chapter 61.24 RCW gives up the priority entirely and takes on the deed of trust act's deficiency limits, which is why associations pursuing the priority amount go the judicial route under chapter 61.12 RCW instead.

Collection charges before foreclosure are capped by statute. In the 15 days after the first notice of delinquency, RCW 64.90.485(21)(b) lets the association recover only the actual printing and mailing cost, an administrative fee of no more than $10, and a single late fee of no more than $50 or five percent of the unpaid assessment, whichever is less. RCW 64.38.100(1)(b) imposes the identical cap on pre-2018 homeowners associations. Both notices must go out in English and in any other language the owner has named as a correspondence preference, and by email where the association knows the owner's address.

The owner's protection is procedural and it bites. 485(22) has commenced an action it was barred from commencing, and subsection (23) requires that every aspect of a collection, foreclosure, sale or other conveyance, including method, advertising, time, date, place and terms, be commercially reasonable. 485(22)(d) then stops the foreclosure until the mediator's certification issues or until 10 days after it was due. In that mediation the association has 23 days from the Department of Commerce referral notice to produce its ledger, its recorded liens and its current governing documents.

364(8) for older condominiums is only three years. 485(19) lets the association recover costs and reasonable attorneys' fees for collection whether or not suit is filed, so an owner who lets the account run is paying for the collection either way. If a judicial foreclosure does go through and the association expressly waived any deficiency judgment in its complaint, the redemption period is eight months.