Nevada’s HOA dispute resolution system was built on a well-intentioned premise: most conflicts between homeowners and associations are ill-suited for civil litigation. Court cases are expensive, slow, and risky, particularly for individual homeowners challenging boards that operate with assessment-funded counsel, fee-shifting provisions, and institutional deference under Nevada law.
These structural concerns are not unique to Nevada. As the Restatement (Third) of Property: Servitudes explains, “T[t]he stakes of association members are generally much higher than those of shareholders in business corporations. The member’s investment in the member’s home, which is often the largest single asset the member owns and which has personal and social significance far beyond the monetary value of the asset, makes the consequences of improper management and decision making by community associations particularly severe.” [1]
To address this, Nevada created an innovative two-track dispute framework for Common-Interest Communities (CICs)—administrative enforcement under NRS 116 for statutory violations, and an ADR process for disputes arising from governing documents such as CC&Rs and bylaws. In theory, this structure was meant to provide homeowners with accessible, low-cost remedies while keeping most disputes out of court.
But on implementation Nevada’s HOA dispute system is heavy on procedure and light on intended outcomes.
No Reliable Path to a Determination
As an NVHOAReform policy paper Reforming Nevada CICs Dispute Resolution Systems explains, neither track reliably --albeit for differing reason--produces a neutral determination unless the homeowner assumes the prohibitive cost and risk of litigation—precisely the result lawmakers sought to avoid.
On the administrative side, NRED investigates alleged statutory violations, but most matters are closed without a hearing and without any meaningful explanation. There is no appeal, limited transparency, and no practical mechanism for owners—or policymakers—to assess whether enforcement is consistent or effective.
On the governance-dispute side, the problem is structural. Although Nevada law nominally requires ADR before litigation, either party may unilaterally block any ADR process capable of issuing a decision. When arbitration or the referee program is refused—as it often is—the dispute defaults to mediation, which cannot decide the merits. At that point, the only remaining path to clarity is court.
This is not a failure of participation. It is a failure of design.
Procedure Without Outcomes: How ADR Fails Homeowners
Nevada’s ADR system is frequently described as “mandatory,” but that description is misleading. (Read the post Nevada Supreme Court Ignores the Law on HOA Disputes—Become Policy Makers In Robes for more) In practice, it is mandatory only in the sense that homeowners must attempt it, not in the sense that it produces outcomes.
Even statutory mechanisms intended to force early engagement, such as NRS 116.31087, suffer from the same structural defect: they require procedure but do not require a substantive response. Read more here on this topic as a reform effort before the CIC Task Force.
The system allows the responding party—typically the HOA—to veto arbitration and the referee process, leaving mediation as the default. Mediation is useful for voluntary compromise, but it cannot determine who is right or wrong. When mediation fails, the homeowner is left where they started, except now with additional delay and expense.
The predictable result is abandonment. Legitimate disputes are dropped not because they lack merit, but because the system provides no affordable path to a neutral decision.
Why “Just Go to Court” Is Not a Real Remedy
Industry stakeholders often respond to these critiques by arguing that HOA disputes belong in civil court as private contract matters. That framing ignores reality.
CC&Rs are adhesive instruments, not negotiated contracts. Prevailing-party attorney-fee provisions turn routine disputes into high-stakes gambles. Boards litigate using funds collected from the very owners challenging them, while individual homeowners bear asymmetric risk.
Legislative history tells a consistent story: homeowners abandon valid claims not because courts are unavailable, but because the system makes neutrality financially inaccessible. Courts see only the disputes that survive this gauntlet, creating the illusion that the system works.
It doesn’t.
The Fix Nevada Considered—and Abandoned
The NVHOAReform policy paper does not call for expanding NRED’s jurisdiction or replacing the courts. Instead, it proposes a single, narrow structural correction—one that Nevada lawmakers seriously considered in 2013.
If informal resolution fails and the parties do not mutually agree to arbitration or litigation, governance disputes should default to the existing referee process.
The referee program already exists in Nevada law. It is nonbinding, low-cost, limited in scope, and incapable of awarding attorney’s fees. What is missing is a pathway into it that cannot be vetoed by the responding party.
A referee determination would not close the courthouse doors. But it would finally ensure that every dispute receives a neutral merits assessment before litigation becomes the only option.
Why This Matters Now
Recent court decisions have rendered Nevada’s “mandatory” ADR requirements effectively waivable, making the current system even easier to bypass. Without legislative correction, any future reform remains vulnerable to procedural gamesmanship.
At the same time, the CIC Task Force has been revived and is actively discussing dispute-resolution issues—often at a granular level that risks missing the structural problem altogether. That makes it especially important to keep the focus where it belongs: on whether Nevada’s system actually delivers determinations, not just procedures.
Read the Policy Paper
The full NVHOAReform policy paper documents the history, failures, and proposed fix in detail, with statutory analysis and legislative context. It is written for policymakers, regulators, and informed homeowners who want more than incremental tweaks.
If Nevada is serious about finishing the work it began in 2003, the question is no longer whether reform is needed—but whether lawmakers are willing to correct a system that fails precisely where neutrality matters most.
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[1] Restatement (Third) of Property: Servitudes § 6.13 cmt. b. pg 237 (Am. L. Inst. 2000).
