New Jersey condo board meeting notice rules explained

Who this page applies to

This page explains board meeting notice and open meeting rules for New Jersey condominiums governed by the New Jersey Condominium Act, N.J.S.A. 46:8B-1 et seq., specifically N.J.S.A. 46:8B-13 (bylaws and board meeting procedures).

It does not cover:

• New Jersey HOAs / planned real estate developments, which follow nearly identical rules under N.J.S.A. 45:22A-46 of the Planned Real Estate Development Full Disclosure Act.
• Cooperatives, which are governed under separate New Jersey statutes.

The rule in ordinary language

New Jersey condo board meeting notice combines a specific 48-hour advance window with a dual physical notice requirement — posting on the property and filing with the business office — that is unique in the mid-Atlantic region.

48 hours advance written notice. Under N.J.S.A. 46:8B-13, advance notice of any meeting at which a binding vote will be taken must be in writing, provided at least 48 hours before the meeting, and must include the time, date, location, and to the extent known, the agenda.

Dual notice: posting plus filing. In addition to any notice required by the bylaws, the written notice must be: (i) posted prominently in at least one place on the property that is accessible to all unit owners at all times, and (ii) filed with the person responsible for administering the business office of the association. Both requirements apply. A notice posted on the common-area bulletin board that is never filed with the business office does not comply. A notice filed with the business office but not physically posted does not comply.

Bylaws may add to this. The association’s bylaws may prescribe additional or alternative notice methods that provide a greater probability that unit owners will receive notice. The 48-hour posting-plus-filing requirement is a floor, not a ceiling.

Open meetings required for binding-vote meetings. Meetings at which binding votes will be taken must be open to all unit owners. “Conference or working sessions at which no binding votes are to be taken” are excluded from the open meeting requirement — and from the notice obligation.

Executive sessions permitted for limited topics. The board may close portions of meetings for: (i) individual privacy concerns; (ii) pending or anticipated litigation or contract negotiations; (iii) attorney-client privilege matters.

Owner participation is at the board’s discretion. N.J.S.A. 46:8B-13 states that owner participation in proceedings is at the discretion of the executive board. There is no statutory mandate for an owner comment period at condo board meetings.

Minutes are required and must be distributed. Minutes of all open meetings must be taken and made available to all unit owners before the next open meeting.

What is actually different about New Jersey condos

The dual notice requirement is unique. No other state in this group requires both physical property posting and a business office filing. This creates a practical risk: if either leg of the dual requirement fails — the bulletin board comes down, the building manager does not receive the notice — the statutory requirement is not met even if the other leg was completed. For boards, this means notice is not a one-step task.

48 hours is an explicit hour count, not a day count. Most states use “days” as their unit of measurement; New Jersey’s 48-hour standard is anchored to hours. A meeting scheduled for 7:00 p.m. Thursday requires notice posted and filed by 7:00 p.m. Tuesday, not just any time on Tuesday. For associations that hold late-week meetings, this timing has real operational consequences.

Owner comment is discretionary here too. As with the NJ HOA act, owner participation in condominium board meetings is at the board’s discretion under N.J.S.A. 46:8B-13. Maryland, Virginia, and Delaware all require a designated comment period; New Jersey does not for either regime.

The conference/working session carve-out is the same as the HOA act. The ability to label a meeting as a “working session” and exclude it from the open meeting requirement and 48-hour notice obligation applies identically to condominiums and HOAs in New Jersey.

The Radburn Law 7-day notice layer applies to PREDFDA communities, not directly to condominiums. N.J.A.C. 5:26-8.12 — the DCA administrative regulations implementing the Radburn Law — imposes a 7-day advance notice requirement on top of the statutory 48-hour floor, with three permitted delivery methods. Those regulations were issued under PREDFDA (N.J.S.A. 45:22A-21 et seq.) and expressly govern planned real estate developments. Whether they extend by application to condominiums under 46:8B is not resolved by the regulations themselves. Condominium boards should review their governing documents and consult the current N.J.A.C. to determine whether 5:26-8.12 reaches their community.

Operational questions to ask

If you are on a board:

• Is your 48-hour notice always: (a) in writing, (b) posted physically on the property in an accessible location, and (c) filed with the business office administrator? All three elements are required. Delegating just one or two is non-compliance.
• When you hold an informal planning or budget-review session labeled as a “working session,” are you genuinely taking no binding votes? If a vote happens at a working session, the session is subject to the same notice and openness requirements as any other meeting.
• Does your most recent meeting notice reference the agenda items that will be voted on? For binding votes on assessments or rule changes, the agenda must be included to the extent known.

If you are an owner:

• New Jersey condominium law gives you a statutory right to attend meetings at which binding votes are taken — but working sessions are outside that right. Know which type of meeting you are dealing with.
• Your right to speak at a board meeting is not statutory; it is at the board’s discretion. Your governing documents may provide more. Review your bylaws.
• If you believe a meeting was improperly noticed — for example, no posting occurred or the business office was not notified — document what notice you did or did not receive before the meeting date. That contemporaneous record is important in any subsequent challenge.
• Minutes must be available before the next open meeting. If you are not receiving them, that is a procedural violation of N.J.S.A. 46:8B-13.

What to do next

Verify the current text of N.J.S.A. 46:8B-13 at njleg.state.nj.us or through the NJ DCA’s full Condominium Act PDF at nj.gov/dca. The NJ DCA also publishes a homeowner packet at nj.gov/dca/codes/forms that explains association governance basics in plain language.

This page is the explainer layer, not a legal memo. Confirm current statute text at the source link before relying on specific procedural details.