California · Davis-Stirling Act

What you may put on your door, in your window and on your lawn.

Three sections protect display and one protects the sale sign. All four are narrower than they first look, because each of them defines the thing it protects — and the definitions exclude the decorative version.

The flag of the United States

§ 4705(a): except as required to protect public health or safety, no governing document may limit or prohibit — or be construed to limit or prohibit — a member displaying the flag of the United States on or in their separate interest or within their exclusive use common area.

§ 4705(b) then says what a flag is for this purpose: one made of fabric, cloth or paper, displayed from a staff or pole or in a window. It is expressly not a depiction or emblem made of lights, paint, roofing, siding, paving materials, flora or balloons, or any similar building, landscaping or decorative component. A painted garage door is not a protected flag; a cloth one on a pole is.

§ 4705(c) awards reasonable attorney's fees and costs to the prevailing party — both ways, like § 5975(c).

Religious items on the entry door

§ 4706(a), added in 2020: no governing document may limit or prohibit the display of one or more religious items on the entry door or entry door frame of a member's separate interest. The only qualification in the subdivision is a cross-reference to § 1940.5, the landlord-tenant provision.

§ 4706(b) handles the practical collision. Where the association is maintaining, repairing or replacing the door or frame, the member may be required to take the item down for the duration of the work — and may put it back afterwards. The association must give individual notice about the temporary removal. Not a rule change, not a standing restriction: a notice, and the item returns.

Noncommercial signs, posters, flags and banners

§ 4710(a) is the broad one. The governing documents may not prohibit posting or displaying noncommercial signs, posters, flags or banners on or in a member's separate interest — except where required to protect public health or safety, or where the display would break a local, state or federal law.

§ 4710(b) sets both the materials and the places. Paper, cardboard, cloth, plastic or fabric; from the yard, window, door, balcony or outside wall. The same exclusion list as the flag section applies, with one addition: it does not include painting architectural surfaces.

And the sign that says it is for sale

§ 4730(a): any provision of a governing document that arbitrarily or unreasonably restricts an owner's ability to market their interest is void. § 4730(c) defines marketing broadly — listing, advertising, or obtaining or providing access to show the property.

§ 4730(b) then forbids two specific arrangements outright:

1. A fee or assessment connected with marketing that exceeds the association's actual or direct costs. The section deems such a charge to violate the limit in § 5600(b), which is the general rule against charging more than the expense requires.
2. An exclusive relationship with a real estate broker through which sales in the development must occur. The association may still use one for interests it owns itself, or for common area it is selling.

§ 4730(d) carves out real estate signs, which are governed by Civil Code §§ 712 and 713 instead — two of the outside provisions § 4700 points at.