A buyer under contract on a home in New Albany usually asks one simple question before closing: what's the HOA fee? The answer that comes back rarely fits in one line. Depending on the section, there can be a neighborhood association due, a separate community authority charge, and a master association assessment calculated off the county's own appraisal of the house. None of that shows up as a single number on a listing sheet. And one of those bills isn't fixed at all. It moves every time Franklin County revalues the property.
That last part is the piece worth understanding before you compare two New Albany homes by price alone. A house priced identically to one three streets over can carry a meaningfully different bill over the years, not because of square footage or finishes, but because of which governing bodies attach to that specific address.
The Fee That Isn't Flat
Most homeowners associations, in Ohio and nearly everywhere else, charge a flat monthly or annual due. The board sets a number, and that number changes only when the board votes to raise it. Ohio's statewide average lands around $289 a month across nearly 4,000 reported communities, and that figure holds whether the home is worth $300,000 or $900,000.
The New Albany Communities Master Association doesn't work that way. Its published formula ties the annual assessment directly to the county's appraised market value of the home: total market value, as determined by the Franklin County Auditor, multiplied by 0.055 percent. Run that math on a $700,000 home and the annual bill comes to about $385. Run it on a $1.2 million home in the same community and the bill climbs to roughly $660, with no vote required and no cap disclosed in the public assessment materials.
The mechanism matters more than the dollar amount. In a flat-fee community, your neighbors pay the same rate whether their home appraised high or low this cycle. Under NACM's model, your bill rises automatically the moment the county's number does, which happens on Franklin County's regular reappraisal schedule, not on any timeline the association controls.
How Many Bills Are Actually Attached to the Address
Depending on the section, a New Albany property can sit under as many as four separate layers of oversight, and only some of them come with a monthly bill:
- The City of New Albany's own Architectural Review Board, which issues Certificates of Appropriateness for exterior and zoning changes under the city code. This layer sets design rules but isn't a fee.
- A neighborhood-level HOA assessment, which varies by community and typically funds common-area mowing, fence repair, and shared amenities like a clubhouse or pool.
- A Community Development Charge from the New Albany Community Authority, a legally separate entity that applies only to properties inside its specific district. The Authority's own materials are explicit that this charge is distinct from ordinary homeowner assessments, which cover routine upkeep, while the Authority charge funds a different set of community facilities and equipment entirely.
- The New Albany Communities Master Association's percentage-of-value assessment, described above, which funds corridor landscaping and beautification across participating sections.
Not every home carries all four. But a buyer comparing two listings needs to ask which apply to each one, because the answer changes the real cost of ownership in a way the listing price never signals.
What This Looks Like By Section
| Section | What Governs Design and Fees | Fee Structure Notes |
|---|---|---|
| New Albany Country Club | City ARB plus the Country Club HOA's own Architectural Review Committee, which mandates Georgian design and requires builders and architects to be pre-approved through a Participating Builders & Architects Committee | Estate-level pricing; design review is stricter than the city baseline |
| New Albany Links | City ARB plus the Links' own Architectural Review Board, covering roughly 600 single-family homes along the golf course | Flat project-review fees of $25 for small projects and $50 for larger ones, plus a $500 compliance charge for unapproved footprint changes |
| New Albany Park Condominiums | Condo association handles most exterior upkeep directly | Priced roughly in the $170,000s to $270,000s, with HOA dues that bundle exterior maintenance, landscaping, sewer, snow removal, and trash rather than functioning as a separate design-review fee |
| Rocky Fork-Blacklick | More conventional suburban HOA structure | Recent listing activity in early September 2026 has clustered around the $350,000s, with dues that read closer to a typical flat suburban rate |
The pattern across this table is the same one driving the thesis: price band alone tells you almost nothing about which fee structure you're inheriting.
The Design Layer Stacks the Same Way
The city's baseline rules apply everywhere. New Albany requires four-sided architecture, meaning no blank or simplified rear elevations, and approves only classic American styles such as Georgian, Colonial Revival, and Federal. Preferred materials are brick and wood siding, and garage doors must be single-bay and set back from the front of the house.
Individual HOAs can go further than that baseline. New Albany Links' own guidelines specify that garage doors may use glass only in the upper panel, with full-glass doors prohibited outright, and that any exterior modification, no matter how small, requires written board approval before work begins. One local remodeling contractor who works across the city notes that many sections also restrict driveway material to black asphalt rather than concrete, a rule stricter than anything the city itself requires.
The layering shows up again with solar panels. Ohio's Senate Bill 61, in effect since September 2022, protects a homeowner's right to install solar equipment in a planned community and prevents an HOA from banning it outright. But the same law allows associations to impose reasonable restrictions on size, placement, and appearance, which means even a legally protected upgrade still routes through whichever architectural board governs that section, city and neighborhood both.
New Albany Links spells out the stakes plainly: municipal approval does not override the neighborhood board's approval, and starting a project before both sign off can trigger a $500 compliance fee on top of whatever the redo costs.
Why the Sticker Price Stops Being Useful
Put the pieces together and a pattern emerges that a median price can't show. Two homes at the same list price in different New Albany sections can carry different combinations of these four layers, different renovation friction, and different long-run cost trajectories. One of them might owe a fee that rises automatically with the next county reappraisal. The other might not.
Property taxes compound the same dynamic. New Albany's effective property tax rate runs around 2.2 percent, noticeably higher than Franklin County's roughly 1.8 percent average as of 2025. Because both the tax bill and the NACM master assessment key off the same county valuation, a single reappraisal cycle can move two separate bills at once, not just one.
For a buyer, the practical move is simple: before writing an offer, ask specifically which HOA or HOAs govern the section, whether a Community Authority district applies, whether the master association's percentage-based assessment is part of the picture, and what the design review process looks like for the kind of renovation you're already planning. The seller's HOA disclosure packet should answer all four questions, and it's worth reading before the inspection period closes rather than after.
A Few Questions Worth Asking Before You Sign
Does every New Albany neighborhood use the percentage-of-value assessment? No. That structure belongs specifically to the New Albany Communities Master Association's participating sections. Other neighborhoods, including condo associations like New Albany Park, charge conventional flat dues instead.
If the city approves my building permit, do I still need HOA sign-off? Yes. New Albany Links' own guidelines state directly that municipal approval does not constitute or override the neighborhood board's approval, and the reverse is true as well. Both approvals are required, and they're tracked separately.
Can these fees be negotiated at closing? Not really, since assessments are set at the association level rather than by the seller. What you can and should do is request a current assessment statement from the seller before closing so you know exactly what's owed, what's coming, and which bills the association considers current.
Reading three HOA disclosure packets to figure out which layers apply to a single address is not most buyers' idea of a good afternoon. It's exactly the kind of paperwork the Lundquist Group walks clients through before an offer goes in, section by section, so the number on the listing and the number you'll actually pay aren't a surprise months after you've moved in. If you're comparing New Albany neighborhoods and want a straight read on what each one's fee structure really means for your budget, schedule a free home consultation and we'll go through it together.
