Florida HOA/Condo Recall Election Calculator

How this calculator works

Florida community-association recall is one of the few mid-term mechanisms available to owners who want a director out. The statute does not require "cause" — owners do not have to prove misconduct, breach of fiduciary duty, or anything else. The statute requires a number: affirmative support from a majority of all voting interests. That number is the single hardest part of a Florida recall to clear, and it is the reason most informal recall efforts stall before they reach the board's desk.

This calculator walks the recall through three statutory checkpoints:

1. The threshold check. Does the vote count clear a majority of all voting interests under F.S. § 718.112(2)(j) (condo) or F.S. § 720.303(10) (HOA)?
2. The board response check. Has the board called and held a certification meeting within 5 business days of service of the recall agreement?
3. The procedural posture. Is the director recalled, retained, pending board action, or in the arbitration pipeline?

The calculator is scoped to one director at a time. To model recall of multiple directors on a single agreement, run the calculator once per director — each director's recall stands or falls on its own threshold check.

When recall is the right remedy

The Florida statute does not enumerate grounds. In practice, recall efforts succeed where the underlying dispute has mobilized a broad cross-section of owners: persistent fiduciary breaches, financial mismanagement (assessments diverted, reserves drained, vendor self-dealing), a board's persistent indifference to maintenance or compliance obligations, or a director's overt conflict of interest. Recall efforts almost always fail where the dispute is between a vocal minority and a board majority that retains broad ownership support — the threshold math is unforgiving, and the calculator returns "retained" the instant the vote count falls short.

The alternative remedies for a problematic director are (1) waiting out the term and running a candidate at the next election, (2) seeking automatic removal under F.S. § 718.112(2)(d)10 / § 720.306(9)(b) for delinquency or other governing-document grounds, and (3) seeking injunctive relief in circuit court for a specific breach of fiduciary duty. Recall is the broadest of the four — no specific grounds required — and the procedurally hardest because of the threshold math.

Two recall pathways

F.S. § 718.112(2)(j) and § 720.303(10) provide two routes to a valid recall.

Written agreement. Petitioners draft a written recall agreement that names the targeted director(s) and circulates it for signature among record-title owners. Signatures are collected one by one; there is no meeting, no quorum, no notice. When the signatures of a majority of all voting interests are gathered, the executed agreement is delivered to the board (typically via certified mail or hand-delivery to the registered agent) and the board's 5-business-day response clock begins.

Meeting recall. Petitioners call a unit-owner meeting noticed for the purpose of the recall. Notice tracks the standard meeting-notice rules of F.S. § 718.112(2)(c) (condo) or § 720.303(2) (HOA) — typically 14 days for a special meeting, with the recall agenda explicitly stated in the notice. At the meeting, the recall is voted on; if a majority of all voting interests vote yes, the certified vote is delivered to the board for the same 5-business-day certification process.

The written agreement is the more common pathway. It avoids the meeting-notice procedural overhead, lets petitioners control the pace of signature-gathering, and (importantly) does not require a meeting room or a notice-eligible quorum at the door. The downside is signature verification: every signature must be from a record-title owner at the date of signing, and the board may challenge specific signatures during its 5-BD review window.

The "majority of all voting interests" rule

Read carefully: majority of all voting interests, not majority of those present, not majority of those who sign, not majority of votes cast.

The denominator is the FULL membership of the association. If the declaration allocates one voting interest per unit and there are 100 units, the denominator is 100 and the threshold is 51 — the smallest integer that is a strict majority. If there are 99 units, the threshold is 50. If there are 200 units, the threshold is 101.

Abstentions and non-votes do not reduce the denominator. An owner who declines to sign, declines to vote, or never returns the ballot is effectively a no vote for the purposes of the threshold. This is the single biggest reason informal recall efforts fail: organizers tally enthusiastic owners and conclude the vote is in hand, then discover at the certification meeting that the threshold runs against total voting interests and they are short by twenty signatures.

Worked example. A 100-unit Florida condominium has two directors under recall — Director Smith and Director Jones. Petitioners circulate a written recall agreement and gather:

• 51 signatures in favor of recalling Director Smith
• 49 signatures in favor of recalling Director Jones

The calculator (run twice, once per director) returns:

• Director Smith: recall succeeds on the merits — 51 meets the 51-signature threshold for a 100-unit association.
• Director Jones: retained — 49 falls short by 2 signatures; the recall fails on the merits, regardless of board action.

The board has 5 business days from delivery to certify Director Smith's recall; the Director Jones effort is over. A new recall against Director Jones requires a fresh signature-gathering effort and a fresh procedural cycle.

The 5-business-day board response window

F.S. § 718.112(2)(j)(5)(c) (condo) and § 720.303(10)(b) (HOA) give the board 5 business days from delivery of the recall agreement (or certification of the recall-meeting vote) to call and hold a duly-noticed board meeting to certify or reject the recall.

Three possible outcomes at the certification meeting:

1. The board certifies. The recall is effective immediately. The recalled director ceases to be a director at the moment of certification — no further board action, no committee service, no signing authority. The recalled director must turn over all association records, funds, and property within 10 business days.
2. The board rejects. The board must record its written reasons in the meeting minutes. Common rejection grounds: signature count below threshold, invalid signatures (non-owner, duplicate, signed by tenant), procedural defect in the recall agreement, identification of a specific director who is no longer a board member. Petitioners may file for arbitration with DBPR within 60 days.
3. The board fails to act within 5 BD. Inaction is treated as a constructive rejection under the statute. Petitioners may file for arbitration with DBPR — the procedural posture is identical to an express rejection.

The calculator's deadline-countdown output makes the 5-BD clock visible. A negative day count means the deadline has passed and arbitration is available; the calculator surfaces the "Awaiting Arbitration" status automatically when the window closes without board action.

Records turnover within 10 business days of certification

Certification triggers the 10-business-day records-turnover clock. Under F.S. § 718.112(2)(j)(4) (condo) and § 720.303(10)(d) (HOA), the recalled director must turn over all association records, funds, and property within 10 business days of certification. A recalled director who refuses faces (1) injunctive relief in circuit court to compel turnover, (2) personal liability for any waste or conversion during the period of non-cooperation, and (3) potential breach-of-fiduciary-duty exposure under § 718.111(1)(d) / § 720.303(1).

A recalled director who continues to act in a director capacity after certification — signing contracts, accessing bank accounts, directing the management company — exposes both themselves and the contracting third parties to clawback. The management company that takes direction from a recalled director after certification is on notice and is exposed to indemnity claims from the association. Most management companies maintain a recall-tracker for exactly this reason.

Common pitfalls

Three patterns produce most of the avoidable Florida recall failures.

Counting present-and-voting instead of all voting interests. A petitioner tallies the recall vote at a meeting, sees a strong majority of those present, and concludes the recall succeeds. The board reviews the count at the certification meeting and rejects because the affirmative vote is below a majority of total voting interests. The calculator catches this immediately — the threshold is always measured against total, never against present.

Missing the 5-business-day deadline. Petitioners deliver the recall agreement, then assume the board will move at its own pace. The board's failure to call the meeting within 5 BD triggers the constructive-rejection rule, but petitioners then have to file for arbitration — they cannot simply declare the recall effective. The calculator surfaces the deadline-countdown and the arbitration-triggered flag so neither side loses track.

Retaliatory votes during the recall window. A board facing recall sometimes calls an emergency meeting to take adverse action against petitioners — fines, suspension of voting rights, denial of common-element access. Most of these retaliatory actions are reversible (or themselves voidable for procedural defect), but they generate ancillary litigation that complicates the recall track. The defensive move is to preserve all signature records and procedural minutes throughout the recall window so the arbitration record (if it gets that far) is clean.

What the calculator does not do

This calculator is a planning and analysis tool. It does not:

• Verify individual signatures. The board may challenge specific signatures during its 5-BD review window. The calculator takes the user's vote-for count at face value; signature-by-signature verification is a record-title research exercise.
• Account for federal or Florida state holidays. The business-day arithmetic is M–F only. A 5-BD window that crosses a federal holiday should be confirmed against the actual statutory text; the calculator's deadline output is a working estimate, not legal advice.
• Run the arbitration filing itself. When the calculator flags arbitration-triggered, petitioners' next step is to file a recall arbitration petition with DBPR DFCTMH within 60 days. The arbitration filing is a separate procedural exercise; see the linked DBPR Form RR-1 in the references.
• Opine on the merits of the underlying grievance. Florida recall does not require cause. The calculator returns whether the threshold and the procedural posture support a valid recall; whether the recall is wise on the underlying facts is an owner judgment, not a calculator output.

How this page is maintained

The recall threshold of F.S. § 718.112(2)(j) (condo) and § 720.303(10) (HOA) has been stable across decades of Florida legislative sessions. The 5-business-day board response window has not moved. The records-turnover window of 10 business days has not moved. What changes around the edges is the arbitration administration — HOA recall arbitration has been the subject of bouncing legislative attention but as of the 2026 cycle remains at DBPR DFCTMH per § 720.303(10)(b).

We monitor each Florida legislative session and re-stamp this page within the quarter after any substantive change to § 718.112(2)(j), § 720.303(10), or the arbitration administration.

Last reviewed: 2026-05-15 against F.S. § 718.112(2)(j), F.S. § 720.303(10), F.S. § 718.1255, F.S. § 720.311(2)(a), and Florida Administrative Code 61B-23.0028.