The short answer
Yes, within limits. Once the developer has handed over control, owners holding 67 percent or more of the beneficial interest can modify the reserve requirement of section 10(i) by a vote taken each year. The vote does not stop lenders, buyers or the roof from asking what the reserve can pay for.
Every so often a Massachusetts board hears the suggestion at an annual meeting: the reserve contribution is too high, the building is in good shape, so why not vote it down? Chapter 183A does give owners a way to change the reserve rule. It is narrower than people assume, it has to be repeated, and it leaves the practical reasons for a reserve untouched.
What the statute allows
Section 10(i) is the base rule. Every condominium must keep an adequate replacement reserve fund, collected as part of the common expenses and held in an account separate from operating money.
Section 10(m) is the exception. After the declarant, usually the developer, has transferred control of the organization of unit owners, the owners may modify certain requirements of section 10. Among them, in the statute’s words, is “the reserve fund requirement of subsection (i)”. The same subsection covers how often the manager has to send written reports and the rule that reserve account checks need a board signature as well as the managing agent’s.
Two conditions apply to the vote:
- It needs owners holding sixty-seven percent or more of the beneficial interest. Beneficial interest usually follows each unit’s percentage in the master deed, not one vote per unit.
- It is an annual vote. A decision taken this year does not carry forward automatically; the owners have to make it again.
What “modify” covers in practice, and how the vote has to be held and recorded, depends on your documents and on advice from the association’s attorney. This article describes the statute; it is not a substitute for that advice.
Why the vote rarely solves the problem
Lowering or suspending the reserve requirement changes what the law demands of the association. It does not change what the buildings will need, and three groups keep asking regardless of the vote.
Lenders
When a buyer applies for a loan on a unit, the lender reviews the association’s budget. Fannie Mae’s March 2026 FAQ on project standards describes a minimum annual budgeted replacement reserve allocation of 10 percent of assessment income, with a reserve study allowed as an exception if the association’s funded reserves meet the study’s recommendation. A vote under section 10(m) does nothing to that test. An association that budgets little or nothing for reserves can find that buyers struggle to get conventional financing, which lowers what every owner can sell for.
Buyers
Buyers and their attorneys look at the budget, the reserve balance and the minutes. A recorded vote to suspend reserves is easy to find and easy to read as a warning that a large special assessment is coming.
The owners themselves
Section 6(c) gives the association a lien for unpaid common charges, and part of that lien has priority over a first mortgage: the budgeted common expenses for six months, plus enforcement costs and reasonable attorney’s fees. The priority amount does not include special assessments. If the association skips reserves and later assesses owners for a roof, the money is harder to collect from an owner in trouble than regular charges would have been.
When boards do consider it
There are honest reasons a board might look at section 10(m):
- A very small association, such as two or three units in a converted house, where owners prefer to hold their share privately and agree to pay for work as it comes.
- A year of exceptional expense, where owners would rather pause the contribution than face a special assessment on top of it.
- An association that has just finished major replacements and holds a reserve well above what a study says it needs.
Even then, the safer route is usually to change the amount rather than suspend the reserve. A reserve study gives the board a defensible figure: it lists each component, its remaining life and its cost, and shows what contribution keeps the fund ahead of the schedule. If the study shows the association is ahead, the contribution can come down without a vote under section 10(m) at all, because adequate is exactly what the study measures.
A simple test before any vote
Before owners vote to reduce or suspend reserves, the board can put three questions on the agenda:
- What does the latest study say? If there is no study, or it is more than three years old, get one first. The cost is small next to the decision.
- What would a lender see? Divide the proposed reserve line by the budgeted assessment income. Below 10 percent, buyers using conventional loans may need the lender to rely on a qualifying study instead, and the lender is not obliged to accept one.
- What happens in year five? Take the largest item due in the next five years, divide it by the owners’ percentages, and show each owner what their share would be as a special assessment.
Most associations that run that exercise decide to keep a reserve and adjust the contribution instead.
The bottom line
Massachusetts gives owners a genuine choice, renewed each year, over the reserve requirement. It is a legal permission, not a financial plan. Lenders, buyers and the buildings keep their own timetable, and a reserve study is still the clearest way to show what adequate means for your association. If you want one priced, ask for a quote and we will name a firm that covers your town.