Texas HOA’s six-year vendetta against homeowner over tiny backyard office ends in spectacular $153,000 defeat

A Texas homeowner has won a six-year legal battle against her homeowners association after it tried to block her from building a tiny backyard office – leaving the HOA facing a bill of more than $153,000.

Masha Davis, who lives in the Davis Spring subdivision in Austin, fought the association for years after it rejected plans for her 160-square-foot backyard office in 2020, the New York Post reported. 

But the association’s architectural review committee rejected her proposal, citing concerns about the building’s height and whether it could be used as a separate dwelling.

The proposed office measured just 10 feet by 16 feet and stood 9 feet, 6 inches tall. It would have electricity and air conditioning but no plumbing, and Davis said it would not have been visible from the street.

The homeowner, who had retired, wanted to use the space for consulting work and as a separate area where family members could isolate during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Davis argued that the HOA was enforcing a height restriction that was not included in the architectural guidelines legally in effect when she submitted her application.

She sued the association in January 2021, beginning a lengthy legal fight that would eventually see the courts side with her.

In August 2022, a Williamson County district court ruled that the applicable architectural guidelines contained no height restriction preventing the project and that the committee did not have the authority to reject it on those grounds.

A second ruling in January 2024 found that no restrictive covenant prohibited Davis from building the office as proposed.

The court subsequently awarded her $100,000 in attorney’s fees, although Davis said her legal expenses had reached around $150,000.

The HOA appealed the attorney’s fee award rather than the rulings allowing the office to be built.

But on September 29, 2026, the Texas Third Court of Appeals unanimously upheld the award, including an additional $30,000 in conditional appellate attorney’s fees.

As of November 5, the association owed approximately $153,264 in attorney’s fees, court costs and interest, according to calculations provided by Davis’s attorney.

The amount is continuing to grow, with interest accruing at around $34 a day.

The association represents approximately 570 homes, and Davis said residents have yet to receive a clear explanation of how the judgment will be paid.

She said the HOA had agreed to pay the judgment and that an attorney had begun collection efforts to recover the money.

Davis also questioned whether the association’s insurer, which had covered its legal defense, would pay the judgment or whether the money would have to come from the association’s own funds.

At a November 3 board meeting, a former HOA president raised questions about the financial consequences of the lawsuit, but Davis said the board did not provide a clear answer.

The homeowner previously served as vice president of the HOA board before resigning in July 2020.

She is now pushing for changes to Texas HOA laws, including stronger accountability requirements for association directors and limits on how much of their legal defense expenses can be covered by insurance.

‘I kept going because I believed the HOA was wrong, and I didn’t want them to be able to win just by making the process too expensive for me,’ Davis told the Post.

‘An HOA should have to follow the rules it expects its homeowners to follow. That shouldn’t be a controversial idea.’