Can windows be cleaned on a condo balcony?

Neither Chapter 718's definitions nor its maintenance section, 718.113, mentions balconies. What the chapter does is define three categories of condominium property, and the declaration of condominium decides which one a given balcony and its glass fall into.

The middle row needs the closest reading. Limited common elements are still common elements under 718.103(22); they are simply reserved to one unit or a few. That is why a flat statement that balcony glass is the association's job, or the owner's, cannot be right as a rule. The declaration is the document that says.

Section 718.113(1) starts from a general rule: “Maintenance of the common elements is the responsibility of the association, except for any maintenance responsibility for limited common elements assigned to the unit owner by the declaration.” The association then provides for the maintenance, repair and replacement of the property it bears responsibility for “pursuant to the declaration of condominium.”

For limited common elements, the same subsection lets the declaration pick one of three arrangements:

• the limited common elements are maintained by those entitled to use them;
• the association maintains them as a common expense; or
• the association maintains them, with the cost shared only by those entitled to use them.

A declaration that puts a balcony in the first arrangement points toward the unit owner arranging its upkeep. A declaration that uses either of the other two points toward the association. Neither Chapter 718 nor this page says whether routine glass cleaning counts as maintenance under a particular declaration; the statute speaks of maintenance in general, and the reading of that word in a given building is the declaration's and the association's.

Where a balcony's sliders or windows are impact-rated, Chapter 718 has a definition that reaches them. Under 718.103(19), hurricane protection includes hurricane shutters, “impact glass,” code-compliant windows or doors and other code-compliant hurricane protection products.

Section 718.113(5)(a) then says a unit-owner vote on hurricane protection is not required if its installation, maintenance, repair and replacement, “or any exterior windows, doors, or other apertures protected by the hurricane protection, is the responsibility of the association pursuant to the declaration of condominium.” The statute contemplates that exterior windows behind hurricane protection may be the association's to maintain, and it ties that to the declaration. It says nothing about who cleans them.

Paragraph (5)(c) of the same section lets a board require a unit owner “to adhere to an existing unified building scheme regarding the external appearance of the condominium.” That sentence sits in the hurricane protection subsection and is about installing it, not about cleaning glass. How responsibility for exterior windows runs across a whole building, rather than one balcony, is answered on who cleans exterior windows in a condo.

Where balcony glass sits below a roof that gets cleaned, a chemistry question comes with it. The National Glass Association's cleaning paper, FB01-00 (2023), says that for laminated glass, or windows and doors containing laminated glass, “do not use anything that is corrosive such as solvents, acids, bases or other chemicals.” Its list of examples of materials that may cause harm includes “Bleach (or other solutions containing sodium hypochlorite).”

The link to impact glass comes from the makers, not from NGA. PGT says its own hurricane windows and doors are made with laminated glass, and Cardinal calls its Sea-Storm product impact-rated laminated glass. Impact windows are built with laminated glass, then, and overspray from a roof wash above is a technical problem for that glass, not a cosmetic one. What an exterior cleaner has to know about impact, Low-E and tempered panes is set out in the glass types section of the window cleaning page, and a particular window's own care instructions come from its maker.

How a cleaner reaches upper glass is a trade question, taken up on whether second-story windows can be cleaned from the ground. A balcony adds a building question on top of it. Section 718.113(3) says: “A unit owner shall not do anything within his or her unit or on the common elements which would adversely affect the safety or soundness of the common elements or any portion of the association property or condominium property which is to be maintained by the association.” Whether anything done on or from a balcony touches that sentence is for the condominium association and its counsel to judge.

Where the declaration leaves balcony glass with the association, the work is ordered by its board, or by a manager acting for it. The window cleaning page quotes the same 718.113(1) sentence in its section on storefronts, condominiums and single-family homes. An owner whose unit is under contract has a separate question, taken up on whether a house under contract can be cleaned.