Free HOA Budget Template for 2027 (Excel): How to Build the Budget, and Who Has to Approve It in Your State

Here is the template: hoa-budget-template-2027.xlsx — seven sheets, every subtotal a formula, no macros, free and with nothing to fill in first. It carries the operating budget, the reserve contribution, an assessment calculator that turns the budget into a monthly figure per unit, a twelve-month cash flow, and a one-page Owner Summary you can attach to the notice your state requires. This article explains the order to build it in — reserve study first, assessment last — and then answers the question boards ask second: who actually has to approve the thing, which depends entirely on the state you are in.

General information for board members, not legal advice. Check the statute and your governing documents.

What is in the template

Read Me walks through the build in eight steps, in the order below. Assumptions is where you set the fiscal year, the number of units, and the allocation basis — equal shares or by percentage — with a unit table for the allocation percentages; everything downstream reads from that sheet, so you change an assumption once.

Operating Budget is the working sheet. Income rows are Assessments, Late fees and interest, and Other income. Expense rows are Administrative, Utilities, Insurance, Maintenance and repairs, Landscaping, Contract services, Professional fees, Taxes and licenses, Reserve contribution, and Contingency. The columns are Prior-year actual, Current budget, Year-to-date actual, Annualized, Proposed 2027, Change in dollars, and Change as a percent. The annualized column is what keeps a budget honest in September: it takes what you have actually spent so far and projects the year, so the proposed column is argued against reality instead of against last year’s guess.

Reserve Contribution takes the components out of your reserve study — useful life, remaining life, current cost, funded balance, annual contribution — and computes percent funded. Assessment Calculator divides total assessments by units, or multiplies by each unit’s allocation percentage, and returns the annual and monthly figure per unit next to last year’s, with the percentage increase and a flag if that increase exceeds a cap you type in. Type your state’s cap, or your declaration’s, into that cell before you circulate anything.

Monthly Cash Flow spreads the year across twelve columns so seasonal costs — irrigation, snow removal, insurance renewal, the annual meeting — land in the month they are actually paid, with opening and closing cash. Owner Summary is the one-page version for the notice or ratification packet.

Build the budget in this order

The order matters more than the format. Budgets fall apart when they are built in the wrong sequence.

Start with the reserve study. It is the only number in the budget that is not negotiable within the year, because it is set by roofs and asphalt rather than by opinion. Take the annual contribution from the study’s funding plan, put it on the Reserve Contribution sheet, and let it flow into the operating budget as a line. If your study is more than a year old, update it before you budget; if you have never had one, the study is the first thing to buy with next year’s money.

Then the contracts you have already signed. Landscaping, pool service, elevator maintenance, trash, the management agreement. Read the renewal clause on each one and budget the escalator, not the current rate. A contract that renews at CPI in March is a known increase, not a surprise.

Then insurance. Ask the agent for a written renewal indication before you set the line — not last year’s premium plus a guess. Insurance is the line boards most often budget by habit, and the one most likely to move enough to change the assessment on its own.

Then utilities, from twelve months of bills. Not from the ledger’s annual total: pull the twelve statements, because you need the monthly shape for the cash flow sheet and because a rate change buried in month seven is invisible in an annual figure.

Then everything administrative — the audit or review if your state or documents require one, legal, the tax return, bank and payment processing fees, the state registration or annual report fee, the website, the software, the annual meeting.

The assessment falls out last. Total expenses, minus late fees, interest and other income, equals the amount you must assess. Divide by units or by allocation percentage. That number is an output.

Here is where I will be blunt, from more than twenty years of managing associations and, before that, years auditing their financial statements as a CPA. Boards build budgets backwards. They decide what owners will tolerate — “no increase this year” — and then work the expense lines until the total fits. When they do, it shows up in the same three places, and all three are visible from outside the association. The contingency line becomes a slush fund that absorbs whatever will not fit. The reserve contribution becomes the plug figure, cut to whatever is left once the operating lines are set, which is exactly the reverse of the order above. And the collection assumption disappears: the budget counts on every owner paying on time, the association collects less, and the difference comes out of operating cash.

A budget built in the right order sometimes produces an increase the board does not want to send. That is information, not a failure of the spreadsheet. Two companion pieces on the Dynamite site go deeper on the shape of the thing: the HOA master budget, and how much cash an association should keep in its operating account, which is the question the Monthly Cash Flow sheet is really asking.

Free tool: the HOA Budget Tool. If a spreadsheet is not how your board works, the HOA Fiscal Budget Tool builds the same budget online and allocates assessments by ownership percentage. Inside HOA Fiscal, budgets and budget-vs-actual reporting are part of every plan — see plans and pricing or start a 30-day trial, no card required.

The lines self-managed boards leave out

These are the categories missing from most first-year budgets built by a board that has just taken the books in-house — the self-management guide covers the rest of that transition. Every line below is a real cash payment.

Budget line	What belongs in it	What gets left out
Administrative	Bank and merchant fees, postage and printing, website, accounting software, annual meeting costs, storage	Payment processing on owner card payments; the cost of mailing the ratification packet the statute requires
Utilities	Water and sewer, irrigation, common electric, gas, trash, stormwater	Rate increases mid-year; irrigation months budgeted at winter usage
Insurance	Property, general liability, directors and officers, umbrella, fidelity or crime coverage, workers’ compensation where required	The renewal increase; fidelity or crime coverage where the documents or the state require it
Maintenance and repairs	Routine repairs, common-area supplies, small unbudgeted fixes	A repair allowance for the things that break at 2 a.m.
Landscaping	Contract, irrigation repairs, seasonal color, tree work	Tree work, which is usually outside the mowing contract
Contract services	Pool, elevator, pest, janitorial, snow removal, security	Contract escalators; snow removal in a mild-winter budget
Professional fees	Management, audit or review, legal, reserve study, tax preparation	The reserve study itself; general legal not tied to collections
Taxes and licenses	Federal and state income tax on the association’s return, state registration or annual report fees, business licenses	The tax return — associations file one; see Form 1120-H instructions
Reserve contribution	The annual contribution from the reserve study’s funding plan	Treated as the plug figure instead of a fixed input
Contingency	A stated percentage of operating expenses for the genuinely unforeseen	Used as a slush fund with no stated basis
Collections shortfall	Not a template row — the share of assessments you will not collect on time	Ignored, so the cash flow silently assumes every owner pays

Two of those deserve a note. The contingency line should be a stated percentage of operating expenses — pick it, write it in the Assumptions sheet, and defend it — not a rounding plug. And the tax line is not optional: a homeowners association files a federal return every year, and Form 1120-H is prepared from the association’s ledger. Dynamite Management prepares it for $175 a year on the Essentials and Automate plans, and it is included on the Managed plan.

On reserves, one caution. Lenders have their own conditions — Fannie Mae’s Full Review standard, including a 15 percent reserve allocation, applies from January 4, 2027 under LL-2026-03 — and those are conditions a lender puts on a loan, not requirements your association must meet. Fund reserves to the study, not to a lender’s line. We explain why in Fannie Mae condo warrantability in 2027.

Who has to approve an HOA budget? Budget adoption rules by state (2026)

The board adopts the budget everywhere. What happens next is the part that varies: in some states the budget is not final until owners have had a meeting at which they could have rejected it, and in others the only duty is to send it out. Every row below was checked against the current text on the state’s own statute site on September 9, 2026.

State	Act / who it covers	What the board must send owners, and when	Can owners reject or veto?	Assessment-increase cap	Cite
Washington	WUCIOA, ch. 64.90 RCW — communities created after June 30, 2018; RCW 64.90.365(1) extends this section to older associations	A copy of the budget to all owners within 30 days after adoption, with a ratification meeting set 14–50 days later	Yes — ratified unless owners of units holding a majority of all votes reject it, whether or not a quorum is present	None in the section	RCW 64.90.525
Arizona (condo)	A.R.S. Title 33, ch. 9 — condominiums	A summary of the budget within 30 days after adoption; ratification meeting 14–30 days after mailing	Yes — ratified unless a majority of all unit owners reject it, quorum or not; not required if the declaration expressly authorizes the board to adopt budgets	None in §33-1255	A.R.S. 33-1243(D)
Arizona (planned community)	A.R.S. Title 33, ch. 16, §§33-1801–33-1820	Nothing for the budget itself — the chapter has no budget section	No ratification meeting	No regular assessment more than 20% greater than the immediately preceding fiscal year’s without approval of a majority of the members — a lower limit in the community documents controls	A.R.S. 33-1803(A)
California	Davis-Stirling, all common interest developments	An annual budget report distributed 30 to 90 days before the end of the fiscal year	No	No regular assessment more than 20% above the prior year, and no special assessments aggregating more than 5% of budgeted gross expenses, without approval of a majority of a quorum	Civ. Code 5300(a); 5605(b)
Colorado	CCIOA — communities created on or after July 1, 1992; §303(4)(a) also reaches pre-1992 communities for events on or after July 1, 2017	A summary of the budget within 90 days after adoption, mailed, delivered or posted on the association website, plus a meeting date	Yes — deemed approved absent a veto by a majority of all owners at the noticed meeting, whether or not a quorum is present	None in §38-33.3-303	C.R.S. 38-33.3-303(4)(a)
Florida (condo)	Ch. 718 — condominiums	Notice of the budget meeting and a copy of the proposed budget at least 14 days before the meeting; the board adopts the budget at least 14 days before the fiscal year starts	Only on the 115% test — if proposed assessments exceed 115% of the prior year, the board must simultaneously propose a substitute budget, and owners may adopt it by a majority of all voting interests	No cap on an owner-controlled board in §718.112(2)(e); while the developer controls the board, assessments may not exceed 115% of the prior year unless approved by a majority of all voting interests	Fla. Stat. 718.112(2)(e), (2)(f)
Florida (HOA)	Ch. 720 — homeowners’ associations	A copy of the annual budget, or written notice that a copy is available free on request, on the §720.303(5) records clock — 10 business days after a written request	No	None in §720.303	Fla. Stat. 720.303(6)
Illinois (condo)	Condominium Property Act	The proposed budget to every owner at least 25 days before the board adopts it, plus membership-style notice of the adoption meeting	Only on the 115% test — owners with 20% of the votes may petition within 21 days; the board calls a meeting within 30 days; ratified unless a majority of all votes are cast to reject	None; the 115% figure is a petition trigger, not a cap	765 ILCS 605/18(a)(6), (a)(8)
Illinois (CICAA)	Common Interest Community Association Act — non-condominium associations	The proposed budget 30 to 60 days before the board adopts it	Same 115% test, but the petition window is 14 days	None; the 115% figure is a petition trigger, not a cap	765 ILCS 160/1-45(a), ©
Nevada	NRS ch. 116 — all common-interest communities	Operating and reserve budgets, or summaries, 30–60 days before the fiscal year begins; then a summary of the proposed budget within 60 days after adoption and a meeting 14–30 days after mailing	Yes — ratified unless a majority of all owners reject it, whether or not a quorum is present	None in the section	NRS 116.31151
North Carolina	Planned Community Act — communities created on or after January 1, 1999 (§47F-3-103© does not reach pre-1999 communities)	A summary of the budget within 30 days after adoption, with a meeting 10–60 days after mailing	Yes — ratified unless a majority of all lot owners reject it; no quorum required	None in the section	G.S. 47F-3-103©
Oregon	Planned Community Act / Condominium Act	A summary of the budget within 30 days after the board adopts it — nothing in advance	No	None in these sections	ORS 94.645(3); ORS 100.483(3)
Texas	Residential Property Owners Protection Act, ch. 209 — residential subdivisions, not condominiums	Nothing specific to the budget, but the budget may be approved only in an open meeting for which owner notice was given	No	None in ch. 209	Tex. Prop. Code 209.0051(h)(11)
Virginia	Property Owners’ Association Act	The annual budget, or a summary of it, made available to owners before the fiscal year begins	No	None in §55.1-1826	Va. Code 55.1-1826(A)

The words that decide it

Where owners can stop a budget, the statute turns on two things: who has to vote, and whether anyone has to show up. Washington is the clearest version.

Unless at that meeting the unit owners of units to which a majority of the votes in the association are allocated or any larger percentage specified in the declaration reject the budget, the budget and the assessments against the units included in the budget are ratified, whether or not a quorum is present.

— RCW 64.90.525(1)(a)

Read that twice. The vote needed to kill the budget is a majority of all the votes in the association, not a majority of those at the meeting, and no quorum is required for ratification. Silence ratifies. Nevada says the same thing in its own words — the summary goes out “[w]ithin 60 days after adoption of any proposed budget,” the meeting comes “not less than 14 days or more than 30 days after the mailing of the summaries,” and “[u]nless at that meeting a majority of all units’ owners, or any larger vote specified in the declaration, reject the proposed budget, the proposed budget is ratified, whether or not a quorum is present” (NRS 116.31151(3)). Arizona’s condominium statute uses the same structure at 14 to 30 days (A.R.S. 33-1243(D)), and North Carolina at 10 to 60 days: “The budget is ratified unless at that meeting a majority of all the lot owners in the association or any larger vote specified in the declaration rejects the budget” (G.S. 47F-3-103©).

Colorado flips the verb but not the arithmetic:

Unless the declaration requires otherwise, the budget proposed by the executive board does not require approval from the unit owners and it will be deemed approved by the unit owners in the absence of a veto at the noticed meeting by a majority of all unit owners… whether or not a quorum is present.

— C.R.S. 38-33.3-303(4)(a)(II)(A)

Colorado also gives boards 90 days rather than 30 to get the summary out, and exempts a pre-July 1992 community whose declaration caps the assessment or the annual budget increase, where the proposed budget stays inside that cap.

Illinois and Florida condominiums are different in kind: owners get a say only when the budget crosses a number. In Illinois, if the adopted budget and any separate assessments “would result in the sum of all regular and separate assessments payable in the current fiscal year exceeding 115% of the sum of all regular and separate assessments payable during the preceding fiscal year,” owners holding 20 percent of the votes may petition within 21 days, the board must call a meeting within 30 days, and “unless a majority of the total votes of the unit owners are cast at the meeting to reject the budget or separate assessment, it is ratified” (765 ILCS 605/18(a)(8)). The same 115 percent test runs the Common Interest Community Association Act, with a 14-day petition window (765 ILCS 160/1-45©). In Florida condominiums the trigger is the same 115 percent, but the burden is on the board: it must simultaneously propose a substitute budget without discretionary spending, and “[a] substitute budget is adopted if approved by a majority of all voting interests” (Fla. Stat. 718.112(2)(e)2.a.).

California gives owners no vote on the budget itself and a hard limit on the assessment instead:

the board may not impose a regular assessment that is more than 20 percent greater than the regular assessment for the association’s preceding fiscal year or impose special assessments which in the aggregate exceed 5 percent of the budgeted gross expenses of the association for that fiscal year without the approval of a majority of a quorum of members

— Civ. Code 5605(b)

Arizona planned communities work the same way: the association “shall not impose a regular assessment that is more than twenty percent greater than the immediately preceding fiscal year’s assessment without the approval of the majority of the members of the association,” and a lower limit in the community documents controls (A.R.S. 33-1803(A)).

Two families, and what the Owner Summary sheet is for

The rows sort into two families. In the ratification and veto states — Washington, Colorado, North Carolina, Nevada, Arizona condominiums, and Illinois and Florida condominiums once the 115 percent line is crossed — the budget is not finished when the board votes. There is a document to send, a clock to meet, and a meeting to hold, and the budget is ratified by owners doing nothing. That is the easy case to get wrong: miss the mailing and the ratification never happened. In Washington, RCW 64.90.525(1)(b) says the last ratified budget continues “[i]f the proposed budget is rejected or the required notice is not given.”

In the notice-only states — California, Florida homeowners’ associations, Oregon, Virginia and Texas — owners get information, not a vote, and the pressure moves to the assessment cap or, in Texas, to the rule that the budget may be approved only in a noticed open meeting. Arizona planned communities are the outlier: the chapter requires no budget document at all, and the 20 percent cap is the only statutory brake. Where the act says nothing about the budget, the declaration and bylaws are the whole procedure, so read them before assuming a default applies.

The Owner Summary sheet is built for both. In a ratification state it is the summary you mail: one page, income and expenses by category, the reserve contribution, the assessment per unit before and after, and the meeting date. In a notice-only state it is the page that goes out with the annual disclosure or sits on the website. Washington actually specifies what the budget must contain — projected income and common expenses by category, the assessment per unit and its due date, the amount budgeted for reserves, whether the association has a reserve study and how far the budget departs from it, and the current reserve deficiency or surplus per unit (RCW 64.90.525(2)) — and that list is a good outline for any state. For the Washington procedure end to end, our sister site has the full walkthrough: ratifying the HOA budget in Washington.

What to do this month

1. Download the 2027 template and fill in the Assumptions sheet — fiscal year, unit count, allocation basis, and the unit table.
2. Find your reserve study. Update it if it is more than a year old, and put the funding plan’s annual contribution on the Reserve Contribution sheet before you touch anything else.
3. Pull every contract and note the renewal date and escalator; ask your insurance agent for a written renewal indication.
4. Export twelve months of utility bills and enter them by month on the Monthly Cash Flow sheet.
5. Enter year-to-date actuals in the Operating Budget so the annualized column can argue with your proposed column.
6. Read your state’s row in the table above, then read the statute it cites and your declaration. Put the assessment cap — statutory or documentary — into the Assessment Calculator flag cell.
7. Work backward from the deadline: if you are in a ratification state, the board vote has to happen far enough ahead that the summary and the meeting fit before the fiscal year starts.
8. Adopt the budget in a properly noticed open meeting, send the Owner Summary on your state’s clock, and hold the meeting even if you expect no one to come.

Financial management for associations in any state. Dynamite Management does the administrative and financial work remotely — monthly close and reconciliation, bills coded and routed for board approval, collections, the audit or CPA liaison, and budget preparation on the Managed plan. See how it works, or run the budget yourself in HOA Fiscal — plans start at $89 a month and the trial is 30 days.

Frequently asked questions

What should an HOA budget include?

Projected income by category — assessments, late fees and interest, other income — and projected expenses by category: administrative, utilities, insurance, maintenance and repairs, landscaping, contract services, professional fees, taxes and licenses, the reserve contribution, and a contingency. Add the assessment per unit and its due date. Washington puts that list in the statute for its associations, and it also requires a statement of whether the association has a reserve study and how far the budget meets or departs from it, plus the current reserve deficiency or surplus per unit (RCW 64.90.525(2)). It is a good outline in any state.

How do you calculate HOA assessments from the budget?

Total the expense side, subtract the income you expect from sources other than assessments — late fees, interest, laundry, rental income — and the remainder is what you must assess. Divide by the number of units for an equal-share community, or multiply the total by each unit’s allocation percentage where the declaration allocates by percentage, then divide by twelve for the monthly figure. The Assessment Calculator sheet does this and compares the result to the prior year. Assess after the expenses are set, never before.

Do HOA owners have to approve the budget?

It depends on the state. In Washington, Colorado, Nevada, North Carolina and for Arizona condominiums, the board adopts the budget and owners get a meeting at which they may reject it — but rejection requires a majority of all owners or votes, and the budget is ratified whether or not a quorum is present, so budgets are rarely rejected. Illinois associations and Florida condominiums give owners a say only when total assessments cross 115 percent of the prior year. In California, Oregon, Virginia, Texas and for Florida homeowners’ associations, owners receive the budget but do not vote on it.

How much should an HOA put in reserves?

The number comes from the reserve study’s funding plan, not from a rule of thumb. The study lists each major component with its useful life, remaining life and replacement cost; the funding plan converts that into an annual contribution, and percent funded is the accumulated balance divided by the fully funded balance. Some states put the study on a clock — Virginia requires one at least every five years, reviewed at least annually, with the amount recommended in the study shown next to the cash actually on hand (Va. Code 55.1-1826(B), ©). Fund to the study. Lender programs have their own reserve conditions, but those are conditions on a loan, not a budget requirement.

What is a contingency line in an HOA budget?

A stated percentage of operating expenses set aside for costs you cannot foresee — an emergency repair, a legal matter, a mid-year rate change. It is not the reserve contribution, which funds known replacements on a known schedule, and it is not a plug. Pick the percentage, write the basis into the Assumptions sheet, and leave the line alone once the budget is adopted.

When should an HOA adopt its budget?

Work backward from your state’s clock. California requires the annual budget report 30 to 90 days before the end of the fiscal year; Nevada requires the operating and reserve budgets 30 to 60 days before the fiscal year begins; a Florida condominium board must adopt the budget at least 14 days before the fiscal year starts, after a budget meeting noticed 14 days ahead with a copy of the proposed budget. In a ratification state, add the delivery and meeting windows: Washington’s ratification meeting comes 14 to 50 days after the budget is delivered, which is itself due within 30 days of adoption. Starting in September for a January fiscal year is about right.

Can an HOA increase assessments without a vote?

In most states, yes — subject to the declaration. California is the main exception: a regular assessment more than 20 percent above the prior fiscal year, or special assessments aggregating more than 5 percent of budgeted gross expenses, needs the approval of a majority of a quorum of members (Civ. Code 5605(b)). Arizona planned communities cap the regular assessment at 20 percent over the prior year without a majority of the members (A.R.S. 33-1803(A)). Illinois has no cap, but crossing 115 percent of last year’s assessments opens an owner petition window. Colorado, Nevada, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas, Virginia and Washington set no percentage in the budget and assessment sections cited in the table above — which usually makes the declaration the only limit, so read it.

Is there a free HOA budget template?

Yes — this one. It is an Excel workbook with seven sheets, all formulas and no macros, and there is nothing to sign up for. If you would rather build the budget online and have assessments allocated by ownership percentage automatically, use the free HOA Budget Tool. Boards that want budget-versus-actual reporting every month, rather than once a year, will find it in every HOA Fiscal plan.