Hurricane Preparation Checklist: What a Board Does Before the Season and Before a Named Storm

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

Almost everything a board wishes it had done before a storm takes an hour and costs nothing. The records are off site or they are not. The deductible number is known or it is a surprise. The photographs exist or the adjuster decides what the damage was. This checklist covers the work done once a season, and the work done in the seventy-two hours after a storm is named.

Work the first four sections in May or June. Work the last four when a named storm enters the basin. The citation under an item tells you where the requirement comes from, so a manager can check it against your own declaration and bylaws, which may be stricter than the statute and in a few places may limit what the board may do at all.

The chapters are not identical here. The emergency powers an HOA board holds under section 720.316 are a shorter list than the powers a condominium or cooperative board holds. Items that differ by chapter are labeled. For the longer treatment see our condominium emergency powers guide and the board resource on hurricane preparation.

The off-site records package

• Store a complete copy of the declaration, articles, bylaws and every recorded amendment off site, in a form you can open without power.This is not housekeeping. The emergency powers apply only to the extent the governing documents do not specifically prohibit them, so the documents decide what the board may do.§ 718.1265(1); § 719.128(1); § 720.316(1)
• Add the full insurance policy, every endorsement, the current declarations page, and the agent's and carrier's after-hours numbers.
• Add the owner roster with mailing addresses, telephone numbers, and the e-mail addresses of owners who have consented to electronic notice.
• Add the milestone inspection report, the structural integrity reserve study, and any engineer's report on the roof or building envelope.§ 553.899 (milestone inspections); § 718.112(2)(g) (structural integrity reserve study)
• Keep the package in two places: a cloud folder at least two directors and the manager can reach independently, and one physical copy outside the evacuation zone.A folder only the manager can open is not an off-site records package. Managers evacuate too.
• Confirm the association's online account with the Division is current, including the contact e-mail the state will actually use.Condominium and cooperative associations only. Chapter 720 has no Division account requirement.§ 718.501(3); § 719.501(3)

The insurance review, and what to put to the agent in writing

• Confirm the replacement cost the policy is written on, and the date of the appraisal behind it.An insured value set five years ago against today's construction cost is how an association ends up coinsured on its own loss.Condominium replacement cost must be determined at least once every 3 years by independent appraisal or by an update of a prior appraisal. § 718.111(11)(a)
• Ask the agent in writing whether the hurricane deductible applies separately to each hurricane or on an annual basis across the calendar year, and get the answer in writing.This is the single most expensive assumption boards make. The calendar-year hurricane deductible that personal lines residential policies receive does not automatically apply to an association master policy; a commercial residential policy may be written either way. Two storms in one season can mean two full deductibles.§ 627.701(5)(a) (personal lines, annual basis); § 627.701(5)(b) (commercial residential, annual basis or separately as to each hurricane)
• Calculate the hurricane deductible in dollars against the current insured value, and put that number in front of the board.A 5 percent deductible on a $40 million insured value is $2 million. The board should know the figure before the storm, not while reading a denial letter.
• Confirm the deductible amounts the board has established were set at a properly noticed board meeting, and that the minutes show it.Condominium deductibles are established by the board at a meeting held in the manner set forth in § 718.112(2)(e), and must be consistent with industry standards for comparable communities. § 718.111(11)(c)
• Confirm flood coverage separately. Flood is not part of the windstorm policy, and storm surge is flood.
• Read the post-loss duties in the policy and write them on one page: the notice requirement, the duty to protect the property from further damage, the proof of loss, and the examination under oath.These are policy conditions, not statutes. Failing them is a coverage argument the carrier will make before it argues about the damage.
• Send owners a written reminder before the season that the association's policy does not cover what the statute leaves with them, and that they need their own unit owner policy.For condominiums the statute puts floor, wall and ceiling coverings, electrical fixtures, appliances, water heaters, water filters, built-in cabinets and countertops, and window treatments on the owner. Cooperative and HOA allocation is different and turns on the documents.§ 718.111(11)(f)

Board authority settled before the storm, not after

• Read the declaration and bylaws for any provision that specifically prohibits the board from exercising a statutory emergency power, and list what is prohibited.The powers run only "to the extent allowed by law, unless specifically prohibited by" the governing documents. § 718.1265(1); § 719.128(1); § 720.316(1)
• Adopt a board resolution now that names who may activate the association's storm plan, what that person may commit without a further vote, and the dollar ceiling on it.The statute gives the powers to the board as a body. It does not name a person. A resolution adopted in June is what keeps a $300,000 emergency contract signed at 6 a.m. from being attacked as unauthorized.
• Confirm which emergency powers your chapter actually gives you, because the HOA list is shorter and lettered differently.Chapters 718 and 719 run (a) through (m). Chapter 720 runs (a) through (k) and has no power to require evacuation and no power to contract on behalf of individual owners for items they are otherwise responsible for. An HOA board that does either is acting outside the statute.§ 718.1265(1)(a)-(m); § 719.128(1)(a)-(m); § 720.316(1)(a)-(k)
• Note where the special assessment and borrowing powers sit in your chapter before you need to cite them.Special assessment without an owner vote and borrowing against association assets are § 718.1265(1)(l) and (m) and § 719.128(1)(l) and (m), but § 720.316(1)(j) and (k)
• Confirm the mechanism for adding an emergency item to a board agenda, and note that one chapter does not have one.An emergency item may be added on a vote of a majority plus one and must be noticed and ratified at the next regular board meeting under § 718.112(2)(c)1. and § 719.106(1)(c). Chapter 720 has no equivalent provision.
• Decide now how the board will meet when members are scattered, and what notice method you will use when the usual one is impossible.The board may conduct meetings by telephone, videoconference or other real-time electronic means, with notice given in any practicable manner. § 718.1265(1)(a); § 719.128(1)(a); § 720.316(1)(a)

Vendors placed under contract before the queue forms

• Put a licensed roofer, a water mitigation firm and a debris contractor under a pre-season agreement before you are the four hundredth caller.
• Verify each vendor's licence on the state licence search and record the licence number, the qualifying agent and the expiration date in the vendor file.A contract entered into by an unlicensed contractor is unenforceable in law or equity by that contractor. § 489.128
• Collect a current certificate of insurance for each vendor naming the association as an additional insured, and diary the expiration date.
• Confirm each pre-season agreement carries a rate schedule, not just a promise to respond.An open-ended time and materials mobilization signed the morning after landfall is where the price dispute starts.
• Confirm no pre-season agreement contains an assignment of insurance benefits, a direction to pay, or anything that operates as one.A policyholder may not assign post-loss benefits, in whole or in part, under a residential or commercial property insurance policy issued on or after January 1, 2023; the attempt is void and unenforceable. § 627.7152(13)
• Put the vendor list with after-hours numbers into the off-site records package.

The pre-storm photographic survey

• Photograph every building elevation and every common element, with the date preserved in the file metadata rather than written on a print.
• Photograph common interiors: lobbies, corridors, stairwells, mechanical rooms, the clubhouse and the fitness room.
• Photograph pre-existing damage deliberately, including the deferred items the board has been arguing about.Pre-existing damage you did not document is the first thing an adjuster will attribute the entire claim to. Documenting it protects the claim, it does not weaken it.
• Walk the property on video with narration naming each building, each address and each area as you pass it.
• Store the survey in the off-site folder with the records, not on the manager's phone alone.

Hardening the buildings and the grounds

• Confirm from the declaration, not from custom, who installs shutters or impact protection on each opening: the association or the individual owner.Some declarations make hurricane protection a common element the association installs and maintains; others leave it entirely with the owner. Boards routinely get this backwards and discover it with openings unprotected.
• Inventory and test the shutters, panels and hardware in April, not during a watch.
• Name in advance who secures or removes pool furniture, planters, signage, grills, trash containers and mats, and where those items go.
• Confirm the pool contractor's pre-storm instruction on water level, chemical treatment and equipment shutdown, and put it in the plan.
• Trim trees away from roofs, windows and the electrical service before the season opens.

Generator, life safety, elevators and utilities

• Run the generator under load, confirm the fuel level and the fuel supply contract, and file the test record.
• Write down what the generator actually serves: elevators, fire pump, lift station, corridor lighting, or only the lobby.Boards regularly assume the generator runs an elevator. Very often it does not.
• Confirm the fire alarm, sprinkler and fire pump inspections are current and the reports are in the official records.
• Decide in advance at what point elevators are taken out of service and parked above the expected flood level, and who gives that instruction.
• Decide in advance at what point electricity, gas and water are shut off to a building or a portion of the property, and who gives that instruction.Implementing the association's disaster plan, including shutting down elevators, electricity and water, is an express emergency power. § 718.1265(1)(g); § 719.128(1)(f); § 720.316(1)(f)

The contact tree and the resident communication plan

• Build a calling tree that starts with the board and manager and ends with a named contact for every building or street.
• Collect an emergency contact, a destination and return dates for every owner and every tenant who will be off the property.
• Confirm which owners have consented to electronic notice and that the consent is in the form your chapter requires.HOA consent must be in writing under § 720.303(2)(c). The condominium and cooperative provisions require consent but do not say it must be written.
• Choose one channel the association will use after the storm, and tell owners now which one it is.Three channels produce three versions of the facts and one very bad meeting. See post-storm communications.
• Identify residents who will need help evacuating or who rely on powered medical equipment, and confirm in the plan that the association's role is to pass information to emergency services, not to provide care.Keep the list to contact information and the fact that assistance may be needed. Do not compile diagnoses or medical records; fair housing and privacy exposure starts there.

Contact Hamilton Mikes

Hamilton Mikes helps Southwest Florida boards put the authority, the vendor agreements and the insurance review in place before the season rather than after a storm, and reviews emergency resolutions against the current statutes. Call 239-594-7227 or visit our Disaster Recovery page.