What the recorded documents actually say about Stonebridge Villas at Edison Lakes in Mishawaka — fences, sheds, pools, pets, parking and the rest — with the part of the document each answer comes from.
10 homes have sold here in the last four years, which is why this neighborhood was compiled early.
Before you rely on this page
The name this neighborhood is listed under is the name of a plat drawing, not the name of the document that governs. The recorded plans for this condominium are titled First Amendment and Supplement of Horizontal Property Regime, Stonebridge Villas at Edison Lakes, and that is where the amendment and supplement wording comes from. The instrument that actually governs is the Declaration of Condominium Ownership for Stonebridge Villas at Edison Lakes Condominiums, recorded with the St. Joseph County Recorder on August 23, 2007 as Instrument No. 0733909, and it is on file here in full, all 61 pages of it, including the Code of By-Laws attached to it as Exhibit C.
Almost every answer on this page comes from Article VI of those by-laws, which is where a condominium of this kind keeps its use restrictions. The by-laws have been amended by the owners since they were recorded, and the copy read here is the current one, carrying amendments dated August 18, 2018 and August 21, 2021. Where a rule was changed on one of those dates, the answer says so. Because an association can amend its rules again, ask the board or the managing agent for the current copy before you rely on any single line.
The declaration has also been amended and expanded repeatedly. On file here are the First Amendment recorded July 23, 2009 as instrument 0924609, a Fifth Supplemental Declaration and Second Amendment recorded April 19, 2010 as instrument 1010087, a Third Amendment recorded September 4, 2013 as instrument 1327289, and a Fourth Amendment recorded March 10, 2015 as instrument 1505608, along with the Second, Third and Fourth Supplemental Declarations that annexed Phases II, III and IV. Those amendments change definitions, assessments and declarant rights; none of them changes a use restriction on this page. One of them is worth a sentence of its own. The 2015 amendment gave the developer the sole right to approve improvements and alterations during what it calls the Expansion Period, shutting the association and any committee out of that decision, and it defines that period as running through December 31, 2019. On the face of the document that power has expired, which is why the approval answers above describe the association and its board.
Coverage, and the honest limit of it. This condominium was built out in phases, each added by its own recorded supplemental declaration, and each addition changes every unit's percentage interest. As of the 2010 supplement the community had eight buildings, thirty-two condominium units, two detached condominium units and the clubhouse, and the 2015 amendment cross-references a further run of supplemental declarations after that. The supplemental declarations recorded after 2010 are not in this collection, so this page cannot show the final unit count or your unit's percentage interest. The restrictions themselves apply to every unit in the regime, whichever phase it was added in. For your own unit's chain of documents and its percentage interest, the Recorder's office has them and a title company can pull them from your legal description.
Fences are named directly and need the board's prior written approval, in the same sentence as alterations, additions, walls, patios and decks. The homes here already come with patio fences, and the bylaws work around them: personal property kept in the patio area may not be visible above the patio fence, laundry may not be hung over it, and a patio gate may be installed at the owner's expense but only using the approved design and specifications. Since the ground outside the unit is common or limited area, a new fence is a board decision rather than an owner's.
No shed is named anywhere, and there is nowhere for one to go. Everything outside the unit is common area or limited area, no addition may be made to the exterior of a building without the board's prior written approval, and the bylaws separately prohibit a list of freestanding items in any common area outside a fenced patio, including swing sets and mounted hose reels. Personal property is required to be kept inside the patio or porch area or the garage. Treat outdoor storage here as garage storage.
Boats, trailers, motor homes, travel trailers, trucks larger than a three-quarter ton pickup, and any vehicle carrying commercial advertising may not be parked on any street or driveway overnight. But the bylaws then give a loading window: a recreational vehicle such as a van conversion or RV that cannot fit in a garage may park in the limited area in front of the garage for up to forty-eight hours to load and unload, so long as it is not more than twenty feet long and does not block other residents. Commercial moving vans doing contract work and commercial trucks there to perform service or repair work are an authorized exception. So storage is out, and a short loading stop is expressly allowed.
There is a community swimming pool, and it comes with a written rule set: it is for owners and their guests only, there is no lifeguard and everyone swims at their own risk, children under 18 must be with an adult owner, guests are limited to three per household and must be accompanied, the season hours are 10 in the morning until 10 at night, and animals, glass, running, diving, private pool parties, rafts and body floats and electrical devices are prohibited in the pool area. For a pool of your own: hot tubs and spas are prohibited in any common ground and any limited common ground, which includes the patio area, and any other pool would be an addition to a limited or common area needing the board's prior written approval.
No alteration or addition may be made to the exterior surface of a building, and no tree or shrub may be planted, transplanted or removed, without the board's prior written approval. Two changes are pre-approved in form only: a patio gate may be installed at the owner's expense using only the approved design and specifications, and a storm door may be added at the owner's expense using only the approved design and colour. Nothing may be affixed to or placed on any part of the common or limited area, including the exterior walls, doors, fences, patio or roof, without the board's prior written approval. Holiday decorations are allowed on building exteriors provided they do not damage the limited areas, building, gutters or siding, but Christmas decorations may not go up before Thanksgiving and must be down by January 7, and other holiday decorations may be up no more than a week either side of the holiday.
Satellite dishes and antennae are named, and neither may be affixed to or placed upon any part of the common area or limited area, including the exterior walls, doors, fences, patio or roof, without the board's prior written approval. That is a permission requirement rather than a ban, but it covers every surface a dish would normally be mounted on in a condominium of this kind. Ask the board where it will allow one and get the answer in writing.
Solar is not mentioned in the declaration or the bylaws, so nothing is written specifically for panels. The rule that reaches them is the one barring any device or ornament from being affixed to or placed upon any part of the common area or limited area, including the exterior walls and the roof, without the board's prior written approval. In this condominium the roof and the building exterior are common area maintained and insured by the association, not the owner's to alter, so the board's approval is the whole question.
The association handles the flowers, plant material, grass and other landscaping, the irrigation system and the yard lighting as common area. What an owner may do is closely scripted. Flowers may be planted inside the patio fence, or directly outside the patio fence or screened porch in the existing mulched area, but not around any tree, and only annuals that will not grow above the height of the patio fence. The owner maintains them, dead annuals must come out at the end of the season, and annuals left unmaintained during the growing season will be removed with the cost billed to the owner. Any new shrub outside the patio area needs the board's prior written approval on a variance request form, must be a species already used in the community, must not exceed the patio fence height at maturity, and any new bed is size-limited by the board and must be mulched with matching hardwood. New plants become the property of the association, which then mulches, prunes and fertilizes them, but if one dies the owner replaces it. No tree or shrub may be planted, transplanted or removed without prior written board approval.
Mailboxes are an association item here. The bylaws put them on the list of common area things the board is responsible for maintaining, repairing, keeping up and replacing, alongside the streets, signage, landscaping, irrigation, yard lighting, the swimming pool and the clubhouse. So the box is not the owner's to choose or change, and anything affixed to or placed on a common area needs the board's prior written approval.
Pets are limited more tightly here than in most of the county. No more than one household domestic pet may be kept in a unit, it may not be bred or kept for commercial purposes, and pets are limited to dogs or cats. An owner who already had more than one pet when moving in may keep up to two if they comply with the declaration. Outdoors, an animal must be on a leash no more than eight feet long and supervised by a responsible person at all times, and that person must clean up after it immediately. No pet may be tethered outside in the lawn or a common area, or tied to any patio fence. The bylaws set fines of $10.00 for a first offence and $25.00 for each additional one, and the board may require a pet that becomes a nuisance to be removed.
Renting your unit out is allowed with conditions. The whole unit must be leased, not part of it, and the lease has to run at least twelve months, a figure the association raised from six months by an amendment in August 2018. The lease must be in writing, must state that it is subject to the declaration, the bylaws and the board's rules, and must make a tenant's failure to follow those documents a default under the lease. A copy of the lease has to be delivered to the association or its managing agent. Separately, a for rent sign may only be displayed from inside a window, and no real estate sign is permitted in any common area.
A basketball hoop is not named, but there is nowhere permitted to put one. Swing sets are on the list of items strictly prohibited in any common area outside a fenced patio, and that list is written to catch other such items as well. A hoop fixed to the building would be a device affixed to the exterior, which needs the board's prior written approval, and the driveway and lawn are limited and common area rather than the owner's own ground. Parking rules also treat the drive apron in front of the garage as shared space.
Signs are tightly scripted. Nothing may be hung or displayed from inside the windows except professionally prepared for sale and for rent signs or security system decals, limited in size and number, and no real estate sign is permitted in any common area. A small realtor sign is allowed in the mulch or river rock bed of the yard of the home for sale, with care taken not to puncture sprinkler lines, and not in the lawn because it interferes with mowing and fertilizing. Open house signs are allowed in the lawn, but only on the day before and the day of the open house, and only in that home's own yard; they may also go near the curb outside the community entrance, which is not association property. Any type of yard sign is otherwise strictly prohibited in the common area.
Parking is allowed only in four places: inside the garage, in the limited area in front of the garage door, in the clubhouse parking spaces, or on the side drive in a way that does not block another resident's access to a garage or the street. Parking in any turn-around area is prohibited, and no vehicle may sit in the clubhouse lot more than forty-eight consecutive hours or it may be towed. The side street extensions are classed as streets by the fire marshal and may not be treated as long driveways for overnight parking. Inoperable vehicles, meaning flat tires or expired plates, and vehicles that cannot be identified as belonging to an owner or resident, may be towed at the owner's expense after forty-eight hours in a common or limited area. The community speed limit is 14 miles an hour, and parking or driving on the lawn is prohibited.
The declaration states that each unit is limited to residential use, and that is the only direct statement on the point. The bylaws add two things around the edges: solicitation by commercial enterprises is not authorised within the community, and garage sales and tag sales are specifically prohibited unless the association approves one as a planned community activity. A vehicle carrying commercial advertising may not be parked on any street or driveway overnight, and signage would run into the sign rule. Quiet work inside the unit is not addressed either way, so ask the board how it reads the residential-use limit before you count on it.
No owner may rent or lease a unit for transient or hotel purposes, and the same section requires any lease to run at least twelve months. Between the two there is no room for a nightly or weekly letting. This is the association's own recorded bylaw rather than a city ordinance, so it applies regardless of what local rules allow.
Repair work on a vehicle is not permitted in the limited areas or the common area, which in this condominium is everywhere outside the unit and its garage, with one exception written into the rule: short-term emergency work such as changing a flat tire or charging a battery is allowed. Work inside a closed garage is not addressed. Separately, an inoperable vehicle left in a common or limited area for more than forty-eight consecutive hours may be towed off the premises at the vehicle owner's expense.
Containers may not go out before 5 in the afternoon on the day before collection, and must be brought in and put away by 9 at night on collection day. Only containers with lids, or securely tied plastic bags, may be used. Trash goes out at the main street next to the driveway. When not set out, containers must be kept inside the garage. Residents are responsible for cleaning up anything that spills.
The bylaws never name a cooking grill, but they do address open flame outdoors, and they were amended on this point in August 2021. Wood-based fire pits are prohibited in any common ground and any limited common ground, which includes the patio area, for safety and insurance reasons. An owner may ask the board to approve an outdoor propane-based heater or fire pit, and must specify its size and location. There is also a gas grill at the community pool, which the bylaws say is to be operated by adult owners only and cleaned after each use. If a grill on your patio matters to you, put the question to the board in writing, since the wording that exists is about fire pits rather than grills.
Laundry poles and clotheslines are on the list of items strictly prohibited in any common area outside a fenced patio, and the bylaws add separately that laundry may not be hung over any patio fence, naming swim suits, towels and rugs. Between the two there is no outdoor place here to dry laundry. Nothing is said about drying inside the unit or the garage.
Flags are addressed in unusual detail. The American flag may be flown or displayed at any time following normal flag protocol, provided it is no bigger than three feet by five feet and is flown in a location and manner the board has approved. One yard flag or banner measuring 12 by 18 inches on a yard flag stand is allowed, but only in the mulch or river rock area of the yard, never in the lawn, because it interferes with mowing and fertilizing; the same area may hold up to two yard ornaments no more than 36 inches high. Decorative flags, along with windsocks and wind chimes, are on the prohibited list. These rules were amended in August 2018 and again in August 2021.
There is a colour rule for window coverings: draperies, blinds whether vertical or horizontal, and valances must be white, off-white, light beige or light grey on the side facing out. Nothing may be hung or displayed from inside the windows except professionally prepared for sale and for rent signs and security system decals, limited in size and number. Wreaths are on the prohibited list except on a front door. Holiday decorations are permitted on the building exterior within the seasonal windows the bylaws set.
Tell us the question and we will get you the answer from the recorded documents.