Can an Arkansas HOA Foreclose Over Unpaid Dues?

The threat of losing a home over unpaid HOA dues is the kind of thing that keeps people up at night. In Arkansas, the answer depends on whether your community is under the Horizontal Property Act and what the declaration says about collection and liens. For your specific situation, a licensed Arkansas attorney is the right resource. This is general information, not legal advice.

Does Arkansas's Horizontal Property Act give my HOA a lien?

No. For communities under the Horizontal Property Act, none of Ark. Code §§ 18-13-101 to 18-13-120 creates an assessment lien or sets out a foreclosure procedure. Whether the association has a lien at all, and how it could be enforced, turns on the master deed, bylaws and declaration and on other Arkansas law.

For communities under the Horizontal Property Act (a recorded master deed under § 18-13-103), the Act addresses who owes assessments and what happens at a sale.

What it does say:

• Duty to pay. Co-owners "are bound to pay according to the percentages established by a master deed" toward common expenses (§ 18-13-116(a)(1)).
• Collection is left to the bylaws. The recorded bylaws must provide for the "Manner of collecting from the co-owners for the payment of the common expenses" (§ 18-13-108(b)(4)).
• Payment at a sale. When a unit is sold, unpaid assessments "shall first be paid out of the sales price or by the acquirer in preference over any other assessments or charges of whatever nature," except past-due taxes and payments due under recorded mortgages (§ 18-13-116(c)).
• Buyer and seller both liable. "The purchaser of an apartment or unit shall be jointly and severally liable with the seller for the amounts owing by the seller under subsection (a) of this section up to the time of the conveyance" (§ 18-13-116(d)).

That wording is the current text, as amended by Act 516 of 2025, which "is applicable to a horizontal property regime organized on and after September 1, 2025." Older regimes stay under the earlier wording unless they elect in (Act 516, § 9). The sale-payment and buyer-liability rules read substantially the same in the earlier wording. The provision that a past-due assessment "may bear interest at a lawful rate established by the association" (§ 18-13-116(b)(4)) arrived with Act 516.

So for an HPA community, whether the association has a lien at all, and how it could be enforced, turns on the master deed, bylaws and declaration and on Arkansas law outside the HPA.

Can an Arkansas HOA outside the HPA foreclose on my home?

It depends on the declaration. For a community outside the Horizontal Property Act, the framework is the declaration plus general Arkansas law, along with nonprofit corporation law (Act 1147 of 1993, Ark. Code § 4-33-101 et seq.) if the HOA is incorporated. Whether it can record a lien, and how it could enforce one, depends on those sources.

Whether a community opted in is covered in Did Your HOA Opt In to the Horizontal Property Act?. A licensed Arkansas attorney can say how it applies to a specific community.

What homeowners commonly do

Because the documents do so much of the work in Arkansas, a few steps are typical for people facing collection:

• Confirming which framework applies (HPA opt-in or not)
• Pulling the recorded declaration or master deed, and any recorded bylaws, from the county recorder
• A request for the full ledger and any rule or fine schedule supporting the charges. Depending on the community, the HPA's expense book, a 1963-Act inspection right or the bylaws may reach those documents (see records).
• A careful look at the declaration's specific lien and collection language

Old debt and Arkansas's five-year clock

Arkansas's general statute of limitations for written obligations, Ark. Code § 16-56-111, sets a five-year window:

"Actions to enforce written obligations, duties, or rights, except those to which § 4-4-111 is applicable, shall be commenced within five (5) years after the cause of action shall accrue." — Ark. Code § 16-56-111(a)

The next subsection adds that "partial payment or written acknowledgment of default shall toll this statute of limitations" (§ 16-56-111(b)). In an HPA community, the duty to pay traces to the recorded master deed's percentages (§ 18-13-116(a)(1)); elsewhere, to the recorded declaration. Whether and how the five-year period applies to a specific account, and what effect a payment or written acknowledgment has, are questions for a licensed Arkansas attorney.

Why the distinction matters

For an Arkansas homeowner, the practical takeaways:

• A collection letter or a recorded claim is not the same as losing the home. The HPA itself provides no foreclosure procedure, so any enforcement has to rest on the declaration or master deed and other Arkansas law.
• Whether the HPA applies changes the legal frame, but in either case the governing documents control most of what the association can actually do.
• The amounts, interest, and fees the association adds can be checked against the documents and, for a regime under Act 516, against § 18-13-116(b)(4)'s "lawful rate" language.

For anything approaching actual enforcement, the timeline and defenses are the kind of question a licensed Arkansas attorney evaluates.

Sources

• Arkansas Code Annotated — official public access (§§ 18-13-101 to 18-13-120; § 16-56-111)
• Act 516 of 2025 — amendments to Ark. Code §§ 18-13-102 to 18-13-104, 18-13-112 and 18-13-116 (applicability, § 9)
• Act 1147 of 1993 — Arkansas Nonprofit Corporation Act of 1993 (Ark. Code § 4-33-101 et seq.)