Quick takeaway: Before buying a condo, read several months of meeting minutes. Look for recurring repairs, upcoming expenses, and unresolved issues. Ask the seller for the records early, and check what your purchase contract provides for document delivery and review.
You can walk through a renovated condo, like everything you see, and still know very little about the building. The kitchen is new, the bathrooms look good, and the unit was just painted. But what’s happening with the roof, balconies, plumbing, or association’s finances?
Meeting minutes can help answer those questions. Start by asking the seller for them. The seller, as the unit owner, has statutory rights to inspect association records. A prospective buyer generally does not have the same inspection rights. The seller can provide copies, obtain records from the association, or authorize a representative to inspect records on the seller’s behalf, subject to applicable restrictions under section 718.111(12), Florida Statutes.
Once you have the minutes, the value comes from reading several meetings together and following up. They won’t give you the entire picture, but they can point you toward things you wouldn’t notice during a showing.
Follow the issue from one meeting to the next
Imagine the January minutes mention roof leaks and a request for proposals. In March, the board discusses an engineer’s recommendation. In May, it decides to get updated pricing. Then the roof disappears from the minutes.
Was it repaired? Did the association decide against the work? Is it waiting for funding? You don’t know yet. An issue disappearing from the minutes doesn’t mean it was resolved.
Roughly a year of board and membership meeting minutes is a reasonable place to start. That’s a practical suggestion, not a legal requirement. If a major project started earlier, go back far enough to understand it. Read the minutes in order and follow significant issues through the later meetings to see what happened.
“No special assessment” may be accurate, but incomplete
A buyer asks whether there are any special assessments, and the answer is no. The minutes, however, show that the association is collecting bids for a major repair. There’s no contradiction: the association may not have decided what work to do, how much it will cost, or how to pay for it.
That doesn’t make a future assessment certain. The work could be paid from available funds, reserves, borrowing, an assessment, or a combination. The project could also change or not proceed. But a buyer should understand the difference between “no assessment has been approved” and “there are no substantial expenses under consideration.”
For the roof example, the useful questions are straightforward: What did the engineer recommend? Has the association selected a proposal or signed a contract? Has it decided how to pay? Those answers help you understand a potential expense without treating a preliminary discussion as a final bill.
Sometimes the minutes don’t tell you much
Some minutes are only a page or two. They list motions, votes, and decisions without explaining much of the discussion. An entry might say “roofing proposal approved” without explaining the concerns raised, alternatives considered, or reason for selecting that proposal.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the minutes were prepared improperly. Minutes aren’t a transcript. You may need the inspection report, approved proposal, signed contract, and funding records to understand the decision. An agenda can identify what was scheduled for consideration, but it doesn’t establish what occurred.
A recording may provide more context. Florida law requires condominium meetings conducted by video conference to be recorded and treats those recordings as official records. Other recordings made by the association or at its direction may also be available under the applicable records rules, subject to exemptions. See section 718.111(12), Florida Statutes, and Rule 61B-23.002, Florida Administrative Code.
Through the seller, you can also seek a specific written update:
“The March minutes show that the board approved a roofing proposal. Has the work been completed, and what records are available showing its current status?”
That’s more useful than asking whether the building has “any problems.” An explanation provides context, while supporting documents help you check it. A records request generally obtains existing records rather than requiring the association to create a report or reconstruct a discussion.
Even detailed minutes have limits. Approval of a contractor doesn’t establish that the work was finished, that the original price covered everything, or that the repair resolved the problem. Follow the project through to its current status.
A building with repairs isn’t automatically a bad purchase
Reading about leaks, concrete repairs, or rising expenses can be concerning. But an association discussing those things may be investigating problems, obtaining professional input, arranging funding, and completing work. That can tell you more than minutes that repeatedly say only “maintenance discussed.”
Look for progress. Did the association obtain a report, make a decision, and complete the work? If something keeps getting postponed, find out why. Waiting for a permit or contractor is different from repeatedly deferring work because funding remains unresolved.
Recurring complaints deserve context, too. Several references to water intrusion warrant attention, but they don’t establish the cause or mean the entire building has a defect. The location, findings, repair history, and current status matter. The question is how the association is handling the building’s needs and what that means for you as an owner.
What if the latest minutes haven’t been approved?
That doesn’t necessarily mean the seller has to wait. A DBPR arbitration order distinguishes draft minutes already delivered to the association, such as drafts circulated to directors, from a management employee’s personal notes and working drafts not yet delivered. Draft minutes can be available for inspection before formal board approval.
If minutes haven’t been prepared, there may be no minutes document to provide yet. That’s different from withholding an existing association record simply because it’s labeled “unapproved.” The seller or an appropriately authorized representative can seek existing draft minutes, available association recordings, and related materials. Keep drafts clearly identified because they may later be corrected.
Your purchase contract matters, too
Getting the minutes and having a contractual right to review them are different things. Minutes aren’t among the resale documents specifically listed in section 718.503(2), Florida Statutes, but the contract can create additional document-delivery and review rights.
For example, paragraph 6(b) of the Florida Realtors/Florida Bar condominium rider revised in July 2025 allows the parties to include the preceding 12 months of board and membership meeting minutes and agendas, insurance declaration pages, and specified additional records. Those provisions depend on what the parties agreed to in the completed contract. They don’t apply automatically to every condo purchase. Florida Realtors explains the provision here.
When that provision applies, the form provides a cancellation period of seven days, excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays, after receipt of all documents requested under that paragraph. The right ends at closing. The signed contract, rider, and amendments need to be read together because another form or modified provision may work differently.
Don’t assume the inspection period, financing contingency, association-approval contingency, and condominium-document review period cover the same concerns or expire together. The association approving you as a buyer doesn’t mean you’ve approved the building’s condition or finances. Likewise, the seller agreeing to email more records doesn’t, by itself, create a new review contingency or extend a deadline.
Ask for the records early enough to read them and get answers. Questions about how a particular contract provision applies should be addressed with the buyer’s independent attorney before the relevant deadline.
Before finishing your review, look back at the significant issues you found. Can you explain where each one stands, or do you only know that it was discussed? That’s the difference between having the minutes and getting something useful out of them.
Sources reviewed: October 20, 2026.