Records Retention Checklist: An Annual Review of What You Keep, For How Long, and What You May Destroy

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

Associations lose records two ways. They throw out something the statute required them to keep, or they keep everything forever in a storage unit nobody can search, which is the same as keeping nothing. Once a year the board should look at the whole inventory, confirm the periods, and dispose of what has aged out in a documented way. This checklist is that review.

The retention rules are not the same by chapter, and the difference is larger than most boards expect. Chapter 718 makes six categories permanent from the inception of the association. Chapter 720 designates none. Read the items marked for your chapter and ignore the rest. Background is in our pages on condominium records retention and HOA official records requirements.

Set the review up

• Fix an annual date for this review and put it on the board calendar, ideally right after the fiscal year closes.
• Identify which chapter governs the association — 718, 719 or 720 — and pull that chapter's records list.Applying the condominium rules to an HOA will make you keep some things longer than required and destroy others far too soon.
• Read the declaration and bylaws for a longer retention period.Chapter 720 expressly defers to governing documents that require a longer period. The documents can be stricter than the statute; they cannot be looser.§ 720.303(4)(a)
• Build one inventory of what the association actually holds, by category, medium and location: paper boxes, the management system, the association's own drive, e-mail accounts, the portal.
• Before anything is scheduled for destruction, confirm nothing in the category is subject to a litigation hold, an insurance claim, an open Division matter, an audit, or a pending records request.A hold overrides every period in this checklist. A retention period is a floor below which you may not destroy, not a date on which you must.

The permanent categories

• Condominium: confirm the six categories at § 718.111(12)(a)1.-6. are being maintained permanently from the inception of the association.§ 718.111(12)(b)
• Plans, permits, warranties and the other items delivered by the developer.§ 718.111(12)(a)1.
• The recorded declaration of condominium and every recorded amendment.
• The recorded bylaws and every amendment, the articles of incorporation and every amendment, and the current rules of the association.
• Minutes of all meetings of the unit owners and of the board, and the recordings of meetings conducted by video conference.Minutes are permanent in a condominium. The ballots behind the vote the minutes record are not.§ 718.111(12)(a)6.
• HOA: understand that Chapter 720 designates no permanent category. The list runs on a 7-year floor unless the governing documents require longer.Keep the recorded declaration, amendments, articles, bylaws and minutes permanently anyway. Destroying them because the statute allows it is how a board ends up unable to prove its own restrictions.§ 720.303(4)(a)

The seven-year default

• Treat 7 years as the floor for everything not otherwise specified, measured from creation or receipt of the record.§ 718.111(12)(b); § 719.104(2)(b); § 720.303(5)(a)
• Accounting records, invoices, bank statements, the general ledger and the assessment roll.
• Contracts, management agreements, leases and insurance policies. Run the period from expiration rather than from signature.The statute measures from the record. Running it from expiration is the conservative reading and it avoids the argument entirely.
• Correspondence, notices, agendas and the proof of posting that goes with them.
• Condominium only: records-request checklists, kept for 7 years.§ 718.111(12)(c)1.b.
• Confirm the records are maintained within the state.All three chapters say within the state. Cloud storage makes this a question most boards cannot answer without asking the vendor.§ 718.111(12)(b); § 719.104(2)(b); § 720.303(5)(a)

The one-year categories

• Bids for work to be performed or for materials, equipment or services: at least 1 year after receipt of the bid.§ 718.111(12)(b); § 719.104(2)(a); § 720.303(4)(a)9.
• Ballots, sign-in sheets, voting proxies and all other papers and electronic records relating to voting by owners: 1 year from the date of the election, vote or meeting.§ 718.111(12)(b); § 720.303(4)(a)12.
• Do not destroy election material at the one-year mark if an election challenge, arbitration, recall dispute or Division complaint is live or threatened.One year is a floor, not an instruction. Election disputes routinely surface after the year runs.
• Confirm the minutes recording the result of the vote are being kept on the right schedule even after the ballots go.Condominium minutes are permanent. HOA minutes sit on the 7-year floor. In both, the minutes are what proves the outcome once the ballots are gone.
• Keep the bid the board accepted with the contract file, not with the bids that lost.The contract file runs 7 years. Filing the winning bid with the one-year pile is how the supporting paper for a contract disappears.

Categories the chapters treat differently

• Structural integrity reserve studies: keep for at least 15 years after the study is completed.§ 718.111(12)(b)
• Milestone and other inspection reports: keep for 15 years after receipt.Confirm the cooperative period separately. Chapter 719 was amended alongside Chapter 718 and the periods track, but the text is its own.
• HOA: the 7-year floor is expressly subject to a longer period required by the governing documents. The condominium and cooperative provisions say "unless otherwise provided by general law" instead.Different escape hatches. One looks at your documents, the other looks at other statutes.§ 720.303(4)(a); § 718.111(12)(b); § 719.104(2)(b)
• Cooperative: apply the Chapter 719 list, not the condominium list, even where the community looks and operates like a condominium.§ 719.104(2)(a)
• Confirm which inspection, engineering and reserve records your insurer or lender requires you to hold longer than the statute does.

Where the records must physically be kept

• Confirm the records are maintained within this state and are available within 45 miles of the property or within the county in which the association is located.§ 718.111(12)(b); § 720.303(5)(a)
• If the management company holds the records, confirm in writing that the association owns them and can get them back on demand.Check this against the management agreement before the next renewal, not during a transition. See management agreement review.
• If a category exists only in electronic form, confirm the association controls the account and the backups and that no individual holds the only credentials.
• Confirm records held by an outgoing director or committee member were turned over.A condominium outgoing board or committee member must relinquish all official records and property of the association within 5 days.§ 718.111(12)(f); § 719.104(2)(e)

Before you destroy anything

• Put the proposed destruction on a board agenda and approve it on the record, by category and date range.
• Have counsel confirm there is no hold, claim, audit, Division matter or open records request touching the category.
• Confirm the category is not on a permanent list under your chapter and that its period has fully run.
• Confirm nothing responsive to a pending records request sits in the batch.Destroying a record after a request for it has arrived is the worst fact pattern in this area of law.
• Destroy by a method appropriate to the content: cross-cut shredding or a certificate-of-destruction vendor for anything with personal identifying information, certified wiping or physical destruction for drives.
• Keep the destruction log permanently: the categories, the date range, the date destroyed, the method, who authorized it and who carried it out.The log is the only thing that distinguishes a routine retention practice from destroying evidence. Without it, both look the same.

Contact Hamilton Mikes

Hamilton Mikes writes retention policies for Southwest Florida associations, reviews what a board may safely destroy, and steps in when records the association should have kept cannot be found. Call 239-594-7227 or visit our Official Records page.