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HOA Spy reports 10,296 foreclosure suits brought by Florida associations against their own members and 460,412 association claims of lien recorded against homes. The figures come from court and county records, but they count filings—not homes lost—and do not by themselves establish how much associations contribute to the state’s housing crisis.
Florida homeowner and condominium associations have brought 10,296 foreclosure suits against their own members, while recording 460,412 claims of lien against homes, according to a new compilation by HOA Spy. The records document legal actions that can put owners under pressure and complicate sales or refinancing, but the counts are filings, not a tally of homes lost or proof that associations are driving the state’s housing crisis.
HOA Spy says it indexes 104,659 Florida associations. Of the 27,377 with a unit count on file, its records list 1,518,436 homes. The report counts 10,296 association-filed foreclosure suits from 2,695 communities, as well as 460,412 claims of lien and 277,047 notices of lis pendens recorded against homes. It also reports 48,999 court records naming an association and 6,661 associations whose corporations have lapsed or fallen out of standing.
The report says Florida law allows homeowners’ associations and condominium associations to place liens on homes for unpaid assessments and, under specified statutes, seek foreclosure. HOA Spy notes that the amount initially owed can be small, while interest, late charges, collection costs and attorneys’ fees may add to the debt. The report’s figures do not show how much was owed in each case or how many suits ultimately resulted in a forced sale.
HOA Spy says association-filed foreclosure suits peaked at 875 in 2009. It records 599 in 2025, described as the last full year in the source, and 667 so far in 2026; that latest figure is partial-year data. The report says 1,629 lender foreclosure suits merely named an association, distinguishing those cases from suits in which the association itself was the foreclosing party.
How Liens Can Stall Home Sales
The report’s housing-crisis argument is that association enforcement can affect both a household’s ability to remain in its home and a property’s movement through the market. HOA Spy says an unresolved lien can obstruct a sale because a title company may not close while it remains on the record, and can complicate refinancing. A homeowner facing a foreclosure suit may also have to resolve the debt, fees and legal costs under the pressure of a court process.
Those mechanisms matter to owners and prospective buyers, but the available numbers do not measure the broader effect on Florida’s housing supply or affordability. A lien filing is not necessarily a home removed from the market, and a foreclosure suit does not establish that a household was evicted or that a property was permanently lost. The report offers a count of recorded legal actions, not a direct estimate of housing units made unavailable or of their effect on prices.
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What the Filing Counts Show
HOA Spy says the figures were drawn from official court dockets and county records, including recorder indexes in Broward and Miami-Dade counties. The site also says each community named in its report links to its own record. Its association and unit totals are based on its index, and the unit count is available for only a portion of the indexed associations.
The report distinguishes association foreclosure suits from lender cases that name an association, and recorded liens from foreclosure outcomes. It says 73% of the nation’s association foreclosure suits are in Florida, but the supplied material does not provide the underlying national count or methodology for that comparison. The figure should therefore be understood as HOA Spy’s reported comparison, not an independently verified measure of the state’s share of all housing-related foreclosures.
“A housing crisis has three parts: what a home costs, how many are for sale, and whether the people in them get to stay.”
— HOA Spy report
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What the Records Cannot Establish
The report does not state how many of the 10,296 suits ended in foreclosure, how many were dismissed or resolved through payment, or how many homes were sold under court deadlines. It also does not quantify how often liens prevented a sale or refinance, how long they remained in place, or whether owners successfully disputed the amounts claimed.
The counts may include multiple filings connected to a property or case; the source does not provide a property-level breakdown that would establish a one-to-one relationship between filings and homes. HOA Spy describes its records as drawn from official sources, but the supplied material does not include an independent audit or a detailed account of how records were matched and duplicates handled. The partial 2026 figures also cannot be compared directly with full-year totals.
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Further Records Needed to Measure Impact
The report provides no announced policy action or next official review. To measure the housing effects it describes, readers would need outcome data showing how many association suits led to completed foreclosures, how debts were resolved, and how many liens delayed or prevented transactions. A fuller assessment would also compare these outcomes with housing sales, refinancing and affordability data over the same periods.
HOA Spy says community reports link to individual records, offering a way to inspect cases behind the aggregate totals. Until outcomes and methods are independently checked, the figures are best read as a record of filings and a basis for further scrutiny—not as a final count of homes lost or a measure of the associations’ overall contribution to Florida’s housing crisis.
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Key Questions
How many foreclosure suits did Florida associations bring?
HOA Spy counts 10,296 suits brought by Florida associations against their own members, from 2,695 communities. The figure counts suits, not completed foreclosures.
How many association liens does the report list?
The report lists 460,412 claims of lien recorded against homes. It does not establish that each filing represents a separate home or that every lien blocked a sale.
Does a foreclosure suit mean the owner lost the home?
No. HOA Spy says a foreclosure suit is not the same as a lost home and reports that many cases end when an owner or lender pays. The source does not provide a final outcome count for all suits.
What do the 2026 figures cover?
The report lists 667 association-filed suits so far in 2026, but identifies 2026 as partial-year data. It should not be compared with a complete annual total as if both covered the same time period.
Source: hn
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