Creating a Pet Policy for the HOA

An important issue for homeowner associations is creating and managing policies for pets. This can be a challenge for many reasons, including the fact that service animals and therapy animals are likely to become an important part of your HOA members lives, if they aren’t already.

Homeowners associations can develop their own rules for what kinds of pets HOA members can have, for example, as well as whether pets need to be “fixed” (spayed/neutered), the size or weight of animals allowed, whether pets must be leashed at all times, and more.

Here are some sample HOA pet policy ideas:

• Allow only certain types of pets. (ex. only cats or only cats and dogs)
• Limit the number of pets allowed in a home.
• Require pets to be spayed or neutered.
• Require pets to be up-to-date on rabies shots and other vaccinations.
• Require all pets to be supervised.
• Set rules for waste disposal. Dog waste in an Arizona HOA can lead to numerous problems, read 5 Facts About Uncollected Dog Waste in the HOA.

Service Animals

By definition, service animals are animals that work, provide assistance, or perform tasks for the benefit of a person with a disability, or provide emotional support that alleviates one or more identified symptoms or effects of a person’s disability.

As an HOA leader, it is important to understand the laws surrounding service animals, pet policies and your community, as well as the consequences of not accommodating residents according to law.

Assistance animals perform many disability-related functions, including but not limited to:

• Guiding individuals who are blind or have low vision,
• Alerting individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing to sounds,
• Providing protection or rescue assistance,
• Pulling a wheelchair, fetching items,
• Alerting persons to impending seizures, or
• Providing emotional support to persons with disabilities who have a disability-related need for such support

Creating a pet or service animal policy for your association can be a simple matter of establishing rules that allow human and animal members to exist together in peace… The above ideas are a great start!

If you haven’t already, we strongly recommend consulting legal counsel and creating a sample pet policy before the issue of pets in your HOA needs to be addressed, especially regarding service animals.