Nebraska · Homeowners’ law guide
Every Nebraska HOA law, in one place.
Nebraska never enacted a homeowners’ association act. What it has is a condominium law split at 1984 — with the newer act reaching back into the older half — one very good lien statute doing the work an HOA act would do, and a few single sections filed where nobody would look. Seven statutes hosted in full, plus the scattered provisions summarized. This guide is the map.
The tab, page by page
Ordered by how much they are likely to matter to an owner, not by chapter number. If you read one page, read the first.
01
The Nebraska HOA assessment lien (§ 52-2001)Neb. Rev. Stat. § 52-2001, one section. Start here. Nebraska has no homeowners' association act, and for a non-condominium community this single section does most of the work: what the association may lien, that a recorded notice is half the trigger, where the lien ranks (behind a first mortgage recorded before that notice), that it is extinguished after three years if nobody enforces it, and that on written request you must be given a recordable statement of what you owe within ten business days which then binds the association. Also the escrow for purchases since September 2013 — capped at six months of assessments, except that subsection (10)(e) lets a declaration require more.
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02
Nebraska Condominium ActCh. 76, art. 8, 71 live sections, §§ 76-825 to 76-894. The modern condominium law, governing regimes created after January 1, 1984 (§ 76-826(a)) — and reaching back to older ones through a named list of sections that includes § 76-874, the lien for assessments. Carries the condominium lien and its priority, the three-year enforcement limit, the ten-business-day statement duty, and mandatory costs and attorney's fees for the prevailing party.
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03
Condominium Property ActCh. 76, art. 8, 25 live sections, §§ 76-801 to 76-823, with §§ 76-824 and 76-824.01. The older condominium law. Note the enacted name — § 76-801 calls it the Condominium Property Act, without “Nebraska”. A regime is established under § 76-803 by recording a master deed containing the particulars in § 76-809. It has an assessment lien of its own: § 76-817 makes unpaid common expenses a recorded lien on the co-owner's interest, § 76-818 has them paid out of the sale price, and § 76-819 makes the purchaser jointly liable with the seller. Read it alongside § 76-826, which excludes post-1984 condominiums from this act and applies part of the newer act to pre-1984 ones, and § 76-824.01, which says the same from this act's side.
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04
Nebraska Nonprofit Corporation ActCh. 21, art. 19, 177 sections, all in force, §§ 21-1901 to 21-19,177. The corporate rulebook for an incorporated association: members, meetings, notice, directors, records and dissolution. The parts an owner reaches for are § 21-1947 (no expulsion or suspension except by a fair and reasonable procedure — a 15-day/5-day bylaw safe harbour or, alternatively, a procedure that weighs all the circumstances), the records sections at §§ 21-19,165 to 21-19,168 with their five business days' notice and court-ordered inspection — the board's minutes and the accounting records sitting in the second tier, which needs a good-faith proper purpose — § 21-19,170 on annual financial statements furnished on written demand, and § 21-19,138 on administrative dissolution.
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05
Nebraska Fair Housing ActCh. 20, art. 3, 44 live sections, §§ 20-301 to 20-344. Nebraska's protected list runs to race, color, religion, national origin, disability, familial status, sex, and military or veteran status, with § 20-317 adding creed and ancestry for restrictive covenants. § 20-318 carries the unlawful practices, including discrimination in the terms, conditions or privileges of a sale or rental and in the provision of services or facilities, which is the limb an association's rules fall under; § 20-319(2) carries the two duties boards meet, reasonable modifications at the owner's expense and reasonable accommodations in rules and policies. § 20-322 exempts housing for older persons from the familial-status rules. Enforced by the Equal Opportunity Commission, with one year to complain to it and two years to sue.
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06
Municipal Custodianship for Dissolved Homeowners Associations ActCh. 18, art. 31, 5 sections, §§ 18-3101 to 18-3105 (2015). What happens to the common areas when an association is administratively dissolved under § 21-19,138 and nobody reinstates it: any municipality may sue to be appointed custodian of the association's affairs (§ 18-3103), with the appointment, powers, compensation, lien and termination in § 18-3104. Reinstatement through the Secretary of State is one section of the Act (§ 18-3105) — and it is the owners' remedy: three or more members may call a special meeting at any time after dissolution, three are a quorum, and reinstatement relates back to the date of dissolution. Read § 18-3104(1)(d) first: the members have six months after the municipality's demand to reinstate before a court may appoint. The custodian's compensation and costs become a lien on each and all of the lots, foreclosable like a mortgage (§ 18-3104(4), (5)). The definitions are narrow — the association must be incorporated and its covenanted property within city limits.
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07
Solar and wind energy accessCh. 66, art. 9, 19 live sections, §§ 66-901 to 66-914. A way to acquire a right to sunlight or wind from a neighbour by written, recorded agreement — § 66-909 defines a solar agreement as a right in a deed, will or other instrument executed by a person to insure adequate access of a solar energy system to solar energy. It is not a statute that voids a covenant banning solar panels, and none of the thirty-two chapters behind this tab contains one. What it does give you against the public side is § 66-914, under which a county or city may grant a variance where a zoning rule would prevent or unduly restrict a solar or wind system.
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08
Related & miscellaneous Nebraska lawsThe single sections that never got an act of their own: § 39-1405(3), under which a county of sixty thousand or more may contract with an incorporated association of at least fifty housing units for road maintenance or snow removal on nonpublic roads; § 18-1758, under which a municipality may not prohibit short-term rentals — a limit on cities, which § 18-1758(7) says in terms does not affect a homeowners association's own rules; the Private Transfer Fee Obligation Act at §§ 76-3101 to 76-3112, which voids a transfer fee written into a covenant while expressly carving out ordinary HOA dues and estoppel fees; and the Collection Agency Act at §§ 45-601 to 45-622. Plus the myth-busters: no HOA act, no solar-access override, no public-records right against your association, and why both condominium acts can reach the same building.
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General information, not legal advice. Statutory text throughout this tab is reproduced from the Nebraska Revised Statutes as published by the Nebraska Legislature and may not reflect the most recent amendments. The “no such law” statements on the related-laws page were tested by full-text search against the thirty-two chapters behind this tab — thirty-two of Nebraska’s eighty-nine — not against the whole statutes.