Board Recall Response Checklist: What the Board Does in the Five Business Days After a Recall Arrives

Jason Hamilton Mikes, JD, MBA
Founder & Managing Shareholder

• Checklist
• Published September 26, 2026
• Reviewed by Jason Hamilton Mikes, JD, MBA, September 26, 2026
• Florida Statutes as of July 1, 2026
• Applies to: Condominiums · HOAs · Cooperatives

A recall gives the board five full business days and almost no room to improvise. The board's job in that window is narrow: notice a board meeting, decide whether the recall is facially valid, and record the decision. It is not to decide whether the recall is a good idea. Boards that treat it as a referendum on their own performance are the boards that pay the fees.

Read the chapter that governs your association before you do anything else. The three chapters agree on the standard and on the five-business-day window, and then they diverge sharply on who has to file if the board does not certify, and on how long a recalled director has to hand back the records.

Nothing in this checklist should be worked without counsel. Recall is the one governance event where the board's own seats are on the table, and every step the board takes is read later as either neutral administration or self-interested delay. See our note on board recall procedures.

The hour the recall arrives

• Date-stamp and time-stamp everything received, and make a complete copy before anything is circulated.The five-business-day clock runs from service of the written agreement or from the adjournment of the unit owner meeting. Get the start date right on the first day.
• Identify which route the recall took: a written agreement or written ballots served on the board, or a vote taken at a special members' meeting.§ 718.112(2)(l); § 719.106(1)(f); § 720.303(10)(b), (10)(c)
• Fix the deadline on the calendar and circulate it to every director the same day.Condominium: a board meeting within 5 full business days after adjournment of the unit owner meeting, or after service of the written agreement. HOA: within 5 full business days after receipt of the written agreement or written ballots. Cooperative: within 5 full business days after adjournment of the unit owner meeting.§ 718.112(2)(l); § 719.106(1)(f); § 720.303(10)(b)
• Call counsel the same day, and instruct every director in writing not to contact the signers or the unit owner representative about withdrawing a signature.
• Put a litigation hold on the association's records touching the recall, including e-mails and text messages among directors.See our guidance on a litigation hold and record preservation. Board text messages about a recall are among the first things a petitioner asks for.

If the recall came by written agreement or ballots

• Verify that the agreement or ballots are signed by owners representing a majority of ALL the voting interests, not a majority of those who returned something.§ 718.112(2)(l); § 719.106(1)(f); § 720.303(10)(a)
• Check each signature against the current ownership roster and the voting certificate file, unit by unit or parcel by parcel, flagging duplicate signatures for the same unit or parcel and signatures by anyone who is not the owner of record.
• Check that the instrument names the director or directors sought to be recalled.
• Check service on the board: who served it, on whom, and by what method.
• Confirm whether the association's own bylaws add any step, and confirm the bylaws are not being used to add a step the statute does not permit.

If the recall came at a members' meeting

• Verify the special meeting was called by at least 10 percent of the voting interests.§ 718.112(2)(l); § 719.106(1)(f); § 720.303(10)(c)
• Verify the notice of the meeting stated the purpose and was given as required for a meeting of the members.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• Condominium: confirm the notice was not given by electronic transmission. Electronic notice is not available for a unit owner meeting called to recall board members.This is a defect boards actually find, and it is one the association did not create.§ 718.112(2)(d)7.
• Verify the vote count and the sign-in record from the meeting against the roster.
• Fix the date of adjournment of the members' meeting, because that is when the five-business-day clock started.

The board meeting that decides it

• Duly notice the board meeting like any other board meeting, and hold it inside the five full business days.If the board fails to notice and hold the meeting, the recall is deemed effective in all three chapters. Missing the meeting is not a way to slow the recall down; it is a way to lose it outright.§ 718.112(2)(l); § 720.303(10)(f)
• Limit the board's review to facial validity: service on the board and the face of the written agreement or ballots. Nothing else is before the board.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• Do not consider whether the recall is fair, whether the allegations are true, or whether the timing is inconvenient. None of that is a ground.A board may reject a recall only on a defect visible on its face: too few signatures, signatures by non-owners, duplicate signatures for one unit, an unnamed director, or defective service or notice.
• Have each director with a personal stake state it on the record, and take counsel's advice on whether a director who is himself the subject of the recall should vote.The statute does not disqualify a director from voting on his own recall. Whether he should is a separate question, and how it looks afterward is a third.
• If the recall is facially valid, certify it. In a condominium the recalled member or members are recalled effective immediately upon conclusion of the board meeting.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• If the board does not certify, record in the minutes the specific reason for every rejected vote.In an HOA the minutes must identify the parcel number and the specific reason for each rejection. Write the condominium and cooperative minutes to the same standard.§ 720.303(10)(i)
• Keep the minutes of this meeting as an official record and expect them to be the first document produced in any proceeding that follows.

Who files next, and this is where the chapters split

• HOA: if the board does not certify, THE BOARD must, within 5 full business days after the meeting, file an action in a court of competent jurisdiction or file with the Department a petition for binding arbitration.The burden is on the association, on a short clock. A board that rejects an HOA recall and then does nothing has simply lost, and has spent association money getting there.§ 720.303(10)(d)
• Cooperative: if the board does not certify, THE BOARD must, within 5 full business days after the board meeting, file with the Division a petition for binding arbitration or an action in a court of competent jurisdiction.§ 719.106(1)(f)
• Condominium: the board does NOT file. If the board fails to hold the meeting or determines the recall is not facially valid, the unit owner representative may file a petition or court action under s. 718.1255 challenging the failure to act or the facial validity determination.This is the change that catches experienced managers. Under the current Chapter 718 the burden sits with the owners, not the association. Do not budget for an association-filed arbitration in a condominium recall without reading the paragraph first.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• Condominium: calendar the owner's deadline. The petition must be filed within 60 days after the expiration of the applicable five-full-business-day period.Until that window closes the composition of the board can still change. Do not treat a rejected condominium recall as final on day six.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• Whichever chapter applies, confirm before filing that the association is authorized to spend association funds on it, and record the authorization.

Who serves in the interim, and filling the seats

• Treat a certified recall as effective immediately. A recalled director has no authority to act, sign, or direct the manager from that moment.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• Condominium and cooperative: if fewer than a majority of the board were removed, the remaining directors may fill the vacancy by an affirmative vote of a majority of them.§ 718.112(2)(l); § 719.106(1)(f)
• Condominium: if a majority or more were removed, fill the vacancies in accordance with the procedural rules adopted by the Division rather than by board appointment.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• HOA: if a majority or more of the directors are removed, the vacancies are filled by the members voting in favor of the recall.This is the opposite of the instinct a board has, which is to appoint replacements itself. In an HOA majority recall the board does not choose.§ 720.303(10)(e)
• Confirm the officers and notify the manager, the bank, the insurer and counsel in writing of exactly who holds authority as of the date of the recall.Removing directors can leave the association without a president or a secretary, and the bank and the insurer will both ask who signs.
• Put each new director on the certification and education clock from the date of appointment or election.§ 718.112(2)(d)5.b.; § 719.106(1)(d)1.b.; § 720.3033(1)

Records turnover by a recalled director

• Send the recalled director a written demand on the day of the recall, listing the records and property to be returned and naming the deadline.Keys, fobs, association credit cards, laptops, files, and the contents of any personal e-mail account used for association business.
• Condominium: the recalled member must turn over to the board, within 10 full business days after the vote, all records and property of the association in his or her possession.Ten full business days, which is longer than the 5-day outgoing-director deadline in § 718.111(12)(f) and longer than what the other two chapters give.§ 718.112(2)(l)
• Cooperative and HOA: the recalled director must turn over all records and property within 5 full business days.§ 719.106(1)(f); § 720.303(10)
• HOA: if the board failed to hold the required meeting and the recall is therefore deemed effective, the recalled directors must immediately turn over all records and property.§ 720.303(10)(f)
• If a recalled director refuses to relinquish office, take counsel's advice on a summary proceeding in circuit court.§ 720.303(10)(h)
• Log what came back and what did not, and calendar the follow-up.

The mistakes that cost the association money

• Do not let the five-business-day meeting slip. In every chapter, failing to notice and hold it makes the recall effective.
• Do not reject a recall on a ground that is not a facial defect. Rejecting because the board disagrees with it is how an association ends up paying the other side's fees.
• Do not spend association funds defending individual directors' seats without written advice and a recorded authorization.
• Do not remove the recall from the official records, delay a pending records request, or stop posting minutes while a recall is live.
• Do not let a recalled director keep signing checks, giving the manager direction, or attending closed sessions while the association decides what to do.
• Do not send an association-funded mailing arguing against the recall without counsel reviewing it first.

Contact Hamilton Mikes

Hamilton Mikes advises Southwest Florida boards through recall petitions from the day they are served, reviews facial validity inside the five-business-day window, and handles the arbitration or court action that follows. Call 239-594-7227 or visit our Corporate Governance page.