Informational only. Not legal advice. No attorney-client relationship is created by reading this post. Consult a licensed attorney in your jurisdiction.
Bulk service contracts — arrangements under which a condominium association or HOA enters into a community-wide agreement with a cable, internet, or video provider and passes the cost to every owner as a common expense — are ubiquitous in Florida community associations. They are also a persistent source of litigation. Owners who do not use the service, cannot afford the added common expense, or feel they are overpaying for a provider they did not choose challenge these contracts on grounds ranging from statutory authority to procedural validity. Boards that enter these contracts without following the applicable statutory framework face exposure to mandatory cancellation, restitution, and fee claims. Understanding the two relevant statutes — Fla. Stat. § 718.115(1)(d) for condominiums and Fla. Stat. § 720.309(2) for HOAs — is essential groundwork.
Doctrinal Framing
The legal architecture of a bulk service contract in Florida community associations involves three overlapping bodies of law: (1) the association's statutory authority to enter the contract and treat it as a common or operating expense; (2) the specific procedural requirements and cancellation rights imposed by statute; and (3) the FCC's federal regulatory framework for cable franchise agreements, which coexists with — but does not displace — Florida law on the contract-formation side.
The core statutory mechanism is the same in both the Condominium Act (Ch. 718) and the HOA Act (Ch. 720): the legislature authorized boards to enter bulk service contracts even without explicit authority in the declaration, while simultaneously giving owners a short cancellation window after the contract is formed. This structure reflects a legislative compromise: boards can negotiate community-wide pricing advantages, but owners retain a democratic check.
Condominium Bulk Service Authority: § 718.115(1)(d)
Section 718.115(1)(d) authorizes a condominium association to treat bulk communications services as a common expense in two alternative ways:
- If the declaration provides for it: "If provided in the declaration, the cost of communications services as defined in chapter 202, information services, or Internet services obtained pursuant to a bulk contract is a common expense."
- If the declaration does not provide for it: "If the declaration does not provide for the cost of such services as a common expense, the board may enter into such a contract, and the cost of the service will be a common expense."
The second alternative — board authority without declaration authorization — is significant because it allows the board to commit all unit owners to a multi-year expense without an owner vote. The statute requires that the contract be "for at least 2 years," which means a unit owner challenging a bulk cable contract cannot simply argue that the board lacked authority absent declaration authorization; the statute itself provides that authority.
Per-Unit vs. Percentage Allocation
Section 718.115(1)(d) also permits the cost of bulk services to be "allocated on a per-unit basis rather than a percentage basis" even when the declaration provides for other than equal sharing of common expenses. This is an exception to the general principle that common expense allocation tracks ownership interest; it acknowledges that cable and internet service delivers equal value regardless of unit size or ownership share.
The Owner-Cancellation Right
The most operationally significant provision in § 718.115(1)(d) is the cancellation right: any bulk contract "made by the board on or after July 1, 1998, may be canceled by a majority of the voting interests present at the next regular or special meeting of the association." Any member may make a motion to cancel. If no motion is made — or if a cancellation motion fails to achieve a majority of voting interests present — the contract is "deemed ratified for the term therein expressed."
This means the window to challenge a board-approved bulk contract is the next regular or special meeting of the association after the contract is entered. A membership that does not act at that meeting has ratified the contract by inaction. Counsel advising dissenting unit owners who learn of a new bulk contract must move quickly: get the item on the agenda of the next meeting, mobilize proxies, and ensure a majority of voting interests present will vote to cancel.
Hardship and Disability Exemptions
Section 718.115(1)(d)(2) contains a mandatory hardship provision that is frequently overlooked: the contract must provide — and is "deemed to provide" even if it does not — that:
- A hearing-impaired or legally blind unit owner who does not occupy the unit with a non-hearing-impaired or sighted person;
- A unit owner receiving supplemental security income under Title XVI of the Social Security Act; or
- A unit owner receiving food assistance under Fla. Stat. § 414.31
may discontinue the service without incurring disconnect fees, penalties, or subsequent service charges, and may not be required to pay any common-expenses charge related to such service. This protection is self-executing: it is "deemed to provide" whether or not the contract with the provider includes the language. Associations that have assessed these owners for bulk service costs they are statutorily exempt from are vulnerable to restitution claims.
HOA Bulk Service Authority: § 720.309(2)
Section 720.309(2) provides parallel authority for homeowners' associations. The structure mirrors the condo statute:
- If governing documents provide for communications services as a common expense, bulk-contract costs are an operating expense;
- If the governing documents do not provide for such services, "the board may contract for the services, and the cost shall be deemed an operating expense of the association."
In both scenarios, costs must be allocated on a per-parcel basis rather than a percentage basis, notwithstanding any governing-document provision providing for other than equal sharing of operating expenses.
HOA Cancellation Right
Like the condo statute, § 720.309(2)(a) provides that any bulk contract entered by the board "may be canceled by a majority of the voting interests present at the next regular or special meeting of the association." If no cancellation motion is made or succeeds, the contract is ratified for its expressed term. The identical short-window structure applies: next meeting after contract formation is the key deadline.
Resident Access to Competing Providers: § 720.309(2)(c)
The HOA statute includes a provision not found in identical form in the condo statute: § 720.309(2)(c) provides that a resident "may not be denied access to available franchised, licensed, or certificated cable or video service providers if the resident pays the provider directly for services." Furthermore, the resident and the provider may not be required to "pay anything of value" to access the service except for "charges normally paid for like services by residents of single-family homes located outside the community but within the same franchised, licensed, or certificated area."
This provision addresses a persistent practice: associations or developers who attempt to monetize exclusive access to the community's infrastructure by requiring competing providers to pay access fees. Such fees violate § 720.309(2)(c) and, depending on the facts, may also implicate FCC regulations and § 628.735, Florida Statutes, regarding cable franchise area access.
Owner Challenges to Bulk Contracts
Procedural Authority Challenges
The primary owner challenge is that the board lacked authority to enter the contract. For contracts entered before the board's authority was established in the declaration, and before the statute authorized board-only action, a successful challenge can void the contract and require restitution. For contracts entered under current law, the authority exists, but the procedural question shifts to the cancellation meeting: was the next meeting properly noticed? Was the cancellation vote properly conducted? An improperly noticed meeting at which a ratification vote was taken may not constitute valid ratification.
Unreasonableness / Fair-and-Reasonable Review
Section 720.309(1) provides that any contract "made by an association before control of the association is turned over to the members other than the developer" that provides for the "operation, maintenance, or management of the association or common areas" must be "fair and reasonable." Developer-era bulk contracts that locked communities into long-term agreements with above-market pricing have been challenged under this provision. The fair-and-reasonable standard is an objective one; market comparisons and expert testimony on industry pricing are appropriate evidence.
Declaration Amendment Without Consent
In some cases, a developer amended the declaration before turnover to add bulk cable authority, without owner consent, and then immediately entered a long-term contract. These transactions have been challenged on the ground that the amendment was a developer self-dealing mechanism that triggered the fair-and-reasonable review of § 720.309(1), or that the amendment failed to follow the procedures required for declaration amendments under the existing governing documents.
Disclosure Requirements
While § 718.115(1)(d) and § 720.309(2) do not impose independent disclosure requirements beyond the contract ratification process, practitioners should examine whether the association's disclosure obligations under Fla. Stat. § 718.503 (condo) or § 720.401 (HOA) — governing pre-closing disclosures to prospective buyers — required disclosure of an existing bulk contract and its cost impact. Failure to disclose a significant recurring expense in the association's budget may give rise to claims by buyers who were not informed of the monthly cost embedded in their common expense charges.
Practice Notes
For challenging a bulk contract: Act within the next-meeting window. If the meeting has passed and the contract was ratified, assess whether the meeting was properly noticed and whether the ratification quorum and vote were correctly counted. In a condo, look for SSI or food-assistance eligible owners who may have been improperly assessed.
For hardship-exemption claims: The statutory exemption is self-executing for hearing-impaired, legally blind, SSI, and food-assistance unit owners. No separate application is required. If an association has charged these owners the bulk-service cost, seek restitution of all amounts paid, plus interest. The association's collection of these amounts may also constitute an unfair association practice under the Florida Condominium Act.
Developer-era contracts: Apply the § 720.309(1) fair-and-reasonable standard to any bulk cable or internet contract entered before developer turnover. Market comparisons and internal association communications about the contract terms are critical discovery targets.
FCC preemption: Counsel should be aware that federal cable franchise law imposes some limitations on how associations can restrict resident access to providers. The § 720.309(2)(c) protection for resident access to competing providers aligns with FCC regulations; a violation of that section may have a federal component.
Open Questions and Where the Law Is Moving
The migration from cable to fiber and streaming has created new ambiguity about whether long-term bulk contracts for legacy cable service can be terminated when the provider no longer delivers services that meet community standards. The "reasonable" quality standard implied by the contract — rather than any explicit Florida statute — will drive these disputes.
Internet services have also become more disputed as "bulk internet" contracts lock associations into single-provider arrangements for ten or more years at a time when internet speeds and technology evolve rapidly. No Florida court appears to have squarely addressed whether the statutory authority to enter multi-year bulk internet contracts includes some implied reasonableness standard on the technology delivered, but the fair-and-reasonable requirement of § 720.309(1) for pre-turnover contracts is the closest current analog.
Closing
Bulk cable and internet contracts present a recurring example of the tension between board authority and owner autonomy that runs through all of Florida's HOA and condominium law. The statutory framework gives boards real power to negotiate community-wide service agreements; it also gives owners a meaningful cancellation right that is easily forfeited by inaction. Practitioners advising dissatisfied owners need to know the contract date, the next-meeting timeline, and the composition of the ownership group — especially whether any statutorily exempt owners have been improperly assessed — before deciding on a litigation strategy.
Talk to Yates Anderson
If you are litigating a matter in this area — or weighing whether to — the working analysis above only goes so far. Request a case evaluation and a Yates Anderson attorney will respond within one business day.
Informational only. Not legal advice. No attorney-client relationship is created by reading this post. Consult a licensed attorney in your jurisdiction.