Who can live in your Miami condo besides you?

Three documents answer it. The declaration of condominium sets the use: a single family residence, who counts as an occupant, how many days a guest may stay when the owner is absent, and the minimum lease term and how many times a year a home may be leased. The rules and regulations add the register: guests and occupants are recorded, fobs and parking are issued against the record, and some buildings approve tenants and long stay occupants before they arrive. And the lease clause decides when a guest has become a tenant, which is the line where a relative staying for the season becomes a lease the association must approve. A live in caregiver or housekeeper is an occupant under most declarations and is registered as one. None of this appears in the sales gallery; all of it is in the condominium documents a buyer receives and may read before the contract becomes binding.

The use clause first. Nearly every Miami declaration restricts a home to residential use as a single family residence, and defines family and occupant for the purpose. Then the occupancy clause: whether there is a cap on permanent occupants by bedroom count, whether an owner must be present for a guest to stay, and how many consecutive days or days a year a guest may stay without the owner. A declaration that allows guests for a stated number of days in the owner's absence and no more is treating a longer stay as a lease. Read the clause with the family calendar beside it: a parent who winters in the home for three months is, under many declarations, a lessee, even without rent. Read the five sections of condominium documents for where the clause sits, and pet and guest rules at Rivage and at Cipriani for how two buildings' files frame the question.

When the declaration's definition of a lease is met, and rent is not always the test. Many declarations define a lease as any occupancy by someone other than the owner or the owner's family when the owner is not present, for longer than the guest period. Once it is a lease, the lease clause governs: the minimum term, which at some buildings is a year and at others a month or a week, the number of leases allowed in a year, the association's approval of the tenant, a fee for processing and sometimes a security deposit the association holds. Cassia in Coral Gables publishes flexible ownership with a minimum 3 day stay, which is the building's own rule; other buildings on our file publish nothing, which means the declaration decides. Read buyer and tenant approval at Cassia and at Villa Miami, Miami short term rental rules for the city's layer above the building's, and buying a condo in Miami to rent out for the owner who means to lease from the start.

As an occupant, registered with the association, under the declaration's definition. Some declarations name household employees expressly and allow them to reside in the home with the owner; others fold them into the guest or occupant count and require the owner's presence. A caregiver for a resident who needs one is a separate matter, because federal and Florida fair housing law requires an association to consider a reasonable accommodation to its rules for a resident with a disability, and that is a request made in writing to the board with counsel's help, not an assumption. The practical questions are the same at every building: which entrance and elevator the household staff use, whether staff have their own fob and parking, and where a service room sits on the plan. Ocean House Surfside publishes staff quarters with a service kitchen; the Rivage Wellness Penthouse publishes two service rooms and two laundries as drawn. Read household staff and service entry at Ocean House and at Four Seasons Grove, and older owner and ageing in place at The Perigon.

The register. Most associations keep a record of every occupant and guest, issue fobs, parking and beach or pool access against it, and require a guest to be registered before arrival, often through the owner's own account with the management. A hotel branded building may run the register through the hotel's front desk. The record is what the building uses when it enforces: Chapter 718 allows an association to fine an owner for a violation by an occupant or guest after notice and a hearing before a committee, and to suspend use of common amenities, under limits the statute sets; the declaration says what counts as a violation. An owner is responsible for their guests' conduct in most declarations, which is why a buyer who hands keys to friends reads the fine clause first. Read owner voting and records at Rivage and how to read the amenity rules before buying a Miami condo for the suites, the cabanas and the guest limits.

Five questions, answered from the documents rather than the sales team. How many days may a guest stay without the owner present, and how many days a year. What is the minimum lease term and how many leases a year, and does a family member's stay without rent count. Must occupants and tenants be approved, by whom, in how long, and for what fee. May a household employee or caregiver reside in the home, and how is that person registered. And what the fine and suspension clauses say. A buyer of a home for three generations reads these before the floor plan, because a declaration that caps occupants or guests can undo the plan. Read Edgewater and Coconut Grove condos for a multigenerational family and a Bal Harbour or Surfside condo for a multigenerational family for how the question reads in two places. Where a question turns on the words of the declaration, it goes to counsel; the desk reads the guest, lease and occupancy clauses with the buyer before the reservation and says which buildings' rules fit the family.