Assessments & Collections · Governance Discipline · Texas
The Texas HOA Delinquency Notice: § 209.0064 and the 45-Day Cure Period
Before a Texas property owners’ association may pass collection costs to a delinquent owner, one letter has to be right: the § 209.0064 notice. What it must say, how it must travel, and why the cure period is 45 days — not the 30 days many templates still recite.
The Bottom Line
Texas Property Code § 209.0064 governs the notice a property owners’ association must send before a delinquent owner can be held liable for the fees of a collection agent. The notice must be in writing and sent by certified mail. It must specify each delinquent amount and the total payment required to bring the account current, describe the owner’s options to avoid referral to a collection agent — including the availability of a payment plan under § 209.0062 — and give the owner at least 45 days to cure the delinquency before further collection action is taken. The 45-day floor comes from SB 1588 (87th Legislature, 2021), which replaced the prior 30-day period; templates and policies that still recite 30 days are out of date. The statute also polices the collection relationship itself: owners are not liable for collection-agent fees under contingency-style fee agreements, collection agreements may not cut owners off from the board or manager, and associations may not sell their accounts receivable except as loan collateral. A companion provision, § 209.0063, dictates the order in which every payment must be applied — delinquent assessments first, fines near last. Defects at this stage do not punish the owner; they weaken the association’s own position at every later step.
Where § 209.0064 Sits in the Collection Sequence
Chapter 209 of the Texas Property Code — the Texas Residential Property Owners Protection Act — builds a graduated statutory sequence around assessment delinquency. The obligation to pay assessments is a covenant running with the land, and the authority to bill and collect flows from the recorded declaration (see where Texas assessment authority comes from). The legislature has conditioned the association’s escalation tools on a series of owner protections, and § 209.0064 is the gate between the internal ledger and the outside collection apparatus.
The sequence runs: internal delinquency and courtesy touches; the § 209.0064 certified-mail notice with its 45-day cure window; the § 209.0062 payment plan opportunity; pre-lien notices under § 209.0094; and, for the small minority of accounts that go the distance, the pre-foreclosure and judicial-foreclosure machinery of §§ 209.0091–209.0092. The full arc is mapped in the CIC-SC companion article on the Texas assessment delinquency process; this article focuses on the single most consequential letter in that arc.
The stakes are asymmetric. A defective notice does not excuse the owner from paying assessments — but it generally defeats the association’s ability to hold the owner liable for collection-agent fees, and it hands the owner a procedural objection that shadows every subsequent enforcement step.
What the Notice Must Contain
Under § 209.0064(b), an owner may not be held liable for fees of a collection agent retained by the association unless the association first provides written notice of the total amount of the delinquency by certified mail, and the notice:
- Specifies each delinquent amount and the total amount of payment required to make the account current. This is an itemization requirement. A single unexplained balance does not satisfy it; the notice should break out assessments, late fees, interest, and other charges so the owner can see what is owed and why.
- Describes the options the owner has to avoid having the account turned over to a collection agent — including information about the availability of a payment plan through the association’s § 209.0062 alternative payment schedule guidelines, where those apply.
- Provides a period of at least 45 days for the owner to cure the delinquency before further collection action is taken.
Each element is load-bearing. The itemization requirement is why ledger accuracy is the most important operational input into collections: if the ledger is wrong, the notice is wrong. And the cure period is a floor — an association may give more than 45 days; it may not give less.
The Certified Mail Requirement
The statute requires the notice to travel by certified mail. In practice, well-run associations send it certified mail, return receipt requested, retain the mailing receipt and tracking record, and keep a copy of the notice in the owner file — a discipline that pairs naturally with a sound records retention policy. Email, portal messages, and first-class courtesy copies help reach the owner, but they supplement the certified-mail notice; they do not replace it.
Timing runs from the mailing. The 45-day cure clock is measured from the notice, so the collection calendar should anchor every downstream step — referral, attorney escalation, lien preparation — to a date no earlier than the expiration of the cure window.
The 45-Day Cure Period — and the 30-Day Myth
Before September 1, 2021, § 209.0064 required a 30-day cure period. SB 1588 (87th Legislature, 2021) amended subsection (b)(3) to require at least 45 days. The change is nearly five years old, yet 30-day language survives in a remarkable number of collection policies and form letters still circulating in Texas — each one understating the owner’s statutory cure right by two weeks.
| Element | Pre-SB 1588 (before 9/1/2021) | Current law |
|---|---|---|
| Cure period in the § 209.0064 notice | At least 30 days | At least 45 days |
| Delivery method | Certified mail | Certified mail |
| Itemization and payment-plan disclosure | Required | Required |
During the cure window, the owner has a protected period to pay in full, dispute the ledger, or request a payment plan. “Further collection action” — most significantly, turning the account over to a collection agent whose fees will be charged back to the owner — waits until the window runs. An association that refers the account on day 20 and later attempts to recover the agent’s fees has generally forfeited that recovery.
What the Statute Says About Collection Agents
Section 209.0064 regulates more than the notice. It reaches into the association’s contract with its collection agent — defined by reference to the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act — in three ways:
- Contingency-fee pass-throughs are barred. Under subsection (c), an owner is not liable for fees of a collection agent if the agreement between the association and the agent makes the agent’s fees contingent on amounts recovered, or does not require the association to pay the agent’s fees in full regardless of recovery. “No-cost-to-the-association” arrangements that load the agent’s compensation onto the owner’s ledger generally cannot produce owner liability for those fees.
- The owner’s line to the board stays open. Subsection (d) provides that the collection agreement may not prohibit the owner from contacting the board or the managing agent.
- Receivables may not be sold. Subsection (e) prohibits the association from selling or otherwise transferring its accounts receivable, except as collateral for a loan. Texas associations do not hand delinquent accounts to debt buyers.
Boards evaluating a collection vendor should read the fee structure against subsection (c) before signing. The arrangement that looks cheapest on paper is often the one the statute prevents from being charged to owners at all.
§ 209.0063: The Payment Application Waterfall
The delinquency notice is half of the due-process pairing; the other half is how the association posts the money that comes in. Section 209.0063(a) requires a payment received from an owner to be applied in this order of priority:
- Any delinquent assessment;
- Any current assessment;
- Attorney’s fees or third-party collection costs incurred solely in connection with assessments or other charges that could provide the basis for foreclosure;
- Other attorney’s fees incurred by the association;
- Any fine assessed by the association;
- Any other amount owed to the association.
The design principle is visible on the face of the list: money reduces the foreclosure-relevant debt first and reaches fines almost last. Posting a partial payment against fines or collection fees ahead of assessments misapplies the payment as a matter of law, and the misapplication can be raised against later enforcement. One exception: under subsection (b), if the owner is in default under a payment plan, the association is not required to apply payments in the statutory order — but even then, a fine may not be given priority over any other amount owed.
Fines sit at the bottom of the waterfall, cannot support foreclosure by themselves under § 209.009, and carry their own due-process prerequisites — see hearing rights under § 209.007 for the notice-and-hearing framework that precedes any enforceable fine.
Before the Lien: § 209.0094’s Two-Notice Rule
If the delinquency persists and the association moves toward recording an assessment lien instrument, a newer provision adds a second notice layer. Section 209.0094, added by HB 886 (88th Legislature, 2023, effective September 1, 2023), generally requires the association, before filing an assessment lien, to have given the owner two notices of the delinquency: a first notice by first-class mail or email, and a second notice by certified mail sent no earlier than 30 days after the first. The lien may not be filed until at least the 90th day after the second notice is sent. The requirement does not apply to an association that provides the owner the protections of the federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act.
The paper trail from first delinquency to recorded lien now spans multiple mandatory notices across multiple channels, each with its own clock. Associations that audit their written collection policy annually against current statute absorb changes like § 209.0094 as routine updates; associations that run collections from memory discover them mid-dispute. The CIC-SC Texas association compliance checklist treats the collection-notice suite as a standing annual review item.
Why Precision Here Protects the Association
It is tempting to read § 209.0064 as friction — a delay imposed on an association that is owed money. The better reading, consistent with the governance posture in Compliance Before Conflict, is that the notice is the association’s own foundation document:
- It preserves cost recovery. Collection-agent fees can reach the owner only on the far side of a compliant notice; a botched notice converts those costs into association expenses borne by every paying owner.
- It cleans the ledger early. The itemization requirement forces a ledger review at day one of escalation, when errors are cheap to fix.
- It resolves most accounts. A clear, itemized, certified letter naming the cure amount, the deadline, and the payment-plan option is the step at which a large share of delinquencies end. The statutory floor doubles as sound collections technique.
- It documents good faith. If the account escalates, the notice and its mailing record are the first exhibits showing a process run by the book.
Common Mistakes & Pitfalls
Frequently Asked Questions
How long is the cure period in a Texas HOA delinquency notice?
At least 45 days. Section 209.0064(b)(3) of the Texas Property Code requires the delinquency notice to give the owner a period of at least 45 days to cure the delinquency before further collection action is taken. The 45-day floor was set by SB 1588 in 2021, which replaced the earlier 30-day period. References to a 30-day cure window reflect pre-2021 law and are no longer accurate.
Does a Texas HOA delinquency notice have to be sent by certified mail?
Yes. Section 209.0064 requires the association to give the owner written notice of the delinquency by certified mail before the owner may be held liable for the fees of a collection agent. Ordinary first-class mail, email, or a door hanger does not satisfy this requirement, although associations commonly send courtesy copies through those channels in addition to the certified-mail notice.
What must a Texas HOA delinquency notice include?
The statute requires the notice to specify each delinquent amount and the total amount of payment required to make the account current, describe the options the owner has to avoid having the account turned over to a collection agent, including information about the availability of a payment plan under Section 209.0062, and provide a period of at least 45 days for the owner to cure the delinquency before further collection action is taken.
Can a Texas HOA charge collection agency fees to an owner without sending the notice?
No. Under Section 209.0064, an owner may not be held liable for fees of a collection agent retained by the association unless the association first gives the owner the required written notice by certified mail and the notice contains the statutorily required content, including the 45-day cure period. A defective or missing notice generally defeats the association’s ability to pass collection-agent fees through to the owner.
How must a Texas HOA apply a partial payment from a delinquent owner?
Section 209.0063 sets a mandatory order: delinquent assessments first, then current assessments, then attorney’s fees and collection costs connected to assessments or other foreclosure-basis charges, then other attorney’s fees, then fines, then any other amounts owed. If the owner is in default under a payment plan, the association is not required to follow that order, except that a fine still may not be given priority over any other amount owed.
Can a Texas HOA sell its delinquent accounts to a debt buyer?
No. Section 209.0064(e) provides that a property owners’ association may not sell or otherwise transfer its accounts receivable, except as collateral for a loan to the association. The delinquent account remains the association’s own obligation to administer, subject to the notice, cure, and payment-application rules of Chapter 209.
Related CIC-SC Resources
This article is part of the CIC-SC Texas governance library. For the operational standards that turn statutory floors like § 209.0064 into board-level discipline, see the CIC-BOS governance standards.
Disclaimer. This article is published by the Common Interest Community Standards Council for educational and informational purposes only. It is not legal advice and does not establish an attorney-client relationship. Statutory references and operational frameworks are intended to support informed governance, not to substitute for advice from qualified legal counsel. Board members and managers should consult their association’s attorney about the application of any statute, governing-document provision, or enforcement decision to their specific circumstances. CIC-SC, its authors, and its members assume no liability for actions taken in reliance on this content.