What an HOA Can Require When You Replace Your Roof

• Common area: the association repairs, replaces and maintains it.
• Your separate interest: you repair, replace and maintain it.
• Exclusive-use common area (part of the common area set aside for one owner): you maintain it, and the association repairs and replaces it.

So if your roof is common area, the re-roof is the association's project, and the place to start is a written request to the association, not a roofer. If it's part of your separate interest, the job is yours, and the association's role is approval. The declaration's maintenance section says which applies to your building.

For roofs, those rules can cover material, color and, on tile, even the profile. MBK Chapman, a California law firm that represents homeowners in disputes with their associations, describes requiring similar roofing materials or color palettes as the kind of consistency an association can lawfully regulate. The statute adds that any change to the exterior appearance of a separate interest has to follow the governing documents (Civil Code §4760). Choosing among materials on their merits is covered in choosing a roofing material for Southern California.

1. A procedure on paper. The association must have a fair, reasonable and expeditious procedure, written into its governing documents, with prompt deadlines and a maximum time to respond to an application or to a request for reconsideration.
2. Good faith. A decision must be made in good faith and can't be unreasonable, arbitrary or capricious.
3. Within the law. Whatever the governing documents say, a decision can't violate the law, including fair housing law and building codes or other laws on land use and public safety.
4. In writing. The decision must be written. A disapproval must explain why and describe how to ask the board to reconsider.
5. Reconsideration. If the answer is no, you're entitled to have the board reconsider at an open board meeting, unless the decision was already made by the board at such a meeting.
6. Annual notice. Every year the association has to tell members what kinds of changes need approval and include a copy of its procedure. If you can't find it, ask for it.

The statute doesn't set a number of days for a roof decision; it requires the procedure to set one. Some governing documents go further and say that an application not answered within a set time is deemed approved, and MBK Chapman notes that courts generally enforce such clauses as written, so check yours. The one deadline written into state law is for solar, below.

In practice, the wait is usually the board's calendar. On a solar job of ours in Santa Clarita in 2022, the owner filed the architectural application with the neighbors' signatures, the property manager took it to the board, and the approval letter arrived on April 11, ahead of the board's April 22 deadline; the drawings, the permit and the utility application moved at the same time, and the whole project took five weeks. In Porter Ranch in 2019, the board met once a month and the utility, LADWP, wouldn't take the next step until the association's written approval was in its record, so the owner went to the meeting and came away with a decision that night.

A roof that breaks the fire-retardant roofing law. No association may require you to install or repair a roof in violation of Health and Safety Code §13132.7, the state's fire-retardant roofing law (Civil Code §4720(a)). That law sets minimum fire classes for new and replacement roofs: at least Class C in most places, higher in fire hazard areas, and Class A in Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zones under its main rule. The installer also has to give the owner a certificate of the roof covering's class. In a Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone, the association's governing documents have to allow at least one type of fire-retardant roof covering that meets that law (§4720(b)). Local rules can go further. In the City of Los Angeles, wood shake and wood shingle roofs aren't allowed anywhere in the city, fire-retardant-treated or not (Los Angeles Building Code 91.1505.1), so an old CC&R that calls for shakes can't be followed there. What fire zones require of a roof is in California's WUI roofing requirements and fire-resistant roofs in Los Angeles.

A roof that breaks a building code. Under §4765, a decision can't violate a building code, whatever the governing documents say. California's Energy Code, with its cool-roof rule for re-roofs, is part of the state's building standards. If the association's color list and the cool-roof rule seem to collide, look at the rule's alternatives for pitched roofs, explained in the cool-roof rule on a re-roof, before assuming you have to pick between the two.

On a roof shared by several owners, such as a condominium building, Civil Code §4746 adds conditions: the applicant notifies the other owners in the building, keeps liability insurance and gives the association a certificate within 14 days of approval and every year after, and the association may require a solar site survey by a licensed contractor that divides the usable roof fairly among the owners.

On our solar jobs inside associations, what saved time was filing early and in parallel. In Simi Valley the association's written approval came three days after the plan set was finished and before anything went to the city. If the roof needs replacing first, see whether to replace the roof before solar.

1. The product: manufacturer, product line, profile and color name, with a sample or color board if the guidelines ask for one.
2. The fire class, and in a fire zone the Class A listing the roof will be built to; the installer's certificate of class follows the job.
3. The cool-roof rating of the color, where the Energy Code's re-roof rule applies.
4. The contractor's license, which you can check as described in choosing a roofing contractor in California.
5. Solar drawings, if panels are going on, from the same plan set the permit uses, so both approvals describe the same array.
6. Neighbor signatures or notices, if the procedure asks for them.

If the answer is no, the written decision has to say why and how to ask for reconsideration at an open board meeting. Beyond that, the Act requires an in-house dispute resolution procedure that a member can start with a written request, with prompt deadlines and no fee to the member (Civil Code §5910). Past that point, talk to an attorney.

Code sections, rules and figures on this page come from the primary sources below. Codes, local requirements and product terms change; each was verified October 6, 2026.

1. California Civil Code §714 (solar energy systems)
2. California Civil Code §4100 (common interest development)
3. California Civil Code §§4350, 4355, 4360 and 4365 (operating rules)
4. California Civil Code §4720 (fire-retardant roof covering)
5. California Civil Code §4746 (solar on a shared common-area roof)
6. California Civil Code §4760 (modifying a separate interest)
7. California Civil Code §4765 (approval of physical changes)
8. California Civil Code §4775 (maintenance responsibility)
9. California Civil Code §§5900 and 5910 (dispute resolution within the association)
10. California Health and Safety Code §13132.7 (fire-retardant roof covering)
11. Los Angeles Building Code 2026, Chapter 15, 91.1505.1 (UpCodes)
12. MBK Chapman, California HOA Architectural Guidelines: What Boards Can and Can't Control
13. MBK Chapman, HOA Architectural Review Committees in California: Civil Code 4765 and Owner Rights