Austrian condominium annual statement: the 30 June deadline

The 30th of June is not circled in anyone's diary, yet it is the day the previous year's accounts fall due in Austrian condominium communities. Let it pass without a proper annual statement in hand and you risk more than a few irritated neighbours: any single owner can then force the accounts through the courts. That is because § 34 WEG 2002 requires the annual statement to be presented within six months of the end of the accounting period, for the usual calendar year, that means by 30 June of the following year.

One clarification before we go further. Everything here refers to the Austrian Wohnungseigentumsgesetz 2002, the condominium law of Austria, not the German WEG, which runs on a different clock. Six months sounds generous. In practice the deadline lasts exactly as long as it takes for someone to start hunting for the receipts. What the statement must contain, what rights you hold as an owner and what actually happens when the manager (or the self-managing community) misses the date: one thing at a time.

By when must the annual statement be ready in Austria?

The cut-off is not a matter of habit but of law.

The accounts must be presented within six months of the end of the accounting period. Because the vast majority of communities account by the calendar year, the period ends on 31 December and the clock starts running from there. The last compliant day is 30 June of the following year. Who owes the statement matters just as much as when. It is not only an appointed property manager who is on the hook, but every community that manages itself. The duty attaches to the Eigentümergemeinschaft as a whole, not to a nameplate reading "management". Whether a licensed professional or an owner with a spreadsheet pulls the figures together, the deadline does not move.

And the deadline runs regardless of when the next owners' meeting takes place. That is the trap self-managed buildings fall into most often: they hold the accounts back for the autumn assembly and sail straight past 30 June. The veteran's habit is unglamorous, receipts are filed all year round, not fished out of shoeboxes in June. Start in January and there are no summer night shifts.

What belongs in a proper annual statement?

An account is more than a single figure at the bottom. It has to be built so that an average owner can follow it without an accounting course, orderly, complete and comparable period to period. Without that traceability the statement is not formally proper, even if the totals happen to be correct.

Concretely, a clean annual statement contains at least:

• Every income and expense of the property during the accounting period, grouped into intelligible items
• The allocation of those costs to individual units by co-ownership share, as § 32 WEG 2002 prescribes
• The movement of the reserve (Rücklage): what was paid in, what was drawn and the balance at period end
• The result per owner (credit or additional payment) traceable back to the receipts

One line deserves special attention in 2026: the reserve. From 1 January 2026, the legal minimum contribution rose to 1.12 euros per square metre of usable floor space per month. That change has to show up in every statement covering 2026, if the reserve line is unchanged, that is a reason to look closer. We have broken the figure down in a separate piece on the new minimum reserve fund.

Inspecting the receipts: your right to look behind the numbers

An account you cannot check is no account at all. That is why every owner is entitled to inspect the underlying documents: the invoices, bank statements and contracts that sit behind the figures. Without that right the statement would be an assertion; with it, the statement becomes verifiable.

Here is where many owners make the rookie mistake of signing off the summary without having seen a single receipt. Yet the real control lies in that inspection. An owner who reconciles the three largest items (usually heating, insurance and major repairs) against their invoices finds errors faster than any auditor, because they know their own building.

Practical tip: request the inspection in writing and agree a firm appointment. A manager who delays or obstructs access to the receipts hands you, almost as a bonus, a strong argument for the next meeting.

What happens if the statement never comes?

If the accounts fail to appear after the deadline, the owner is not powerless. The right to a proper account is enforceable in the non-contentious housing proceedings at the district court under § 52 WEG 2002. No expensive civil suit and no compulsory lawyer are required, a single owner can set the procedure in motion.

The court can do more than order the account: it can put weight behind the order with a coercive penalty of up to 6,000 euros, which it may impose repeatedly until a proper statement is delivered. That is not a symbolic sum but a tangible lever against any refusal to cooperate.

One detail should not be slept on, though. The right to an account lapses after three years. If you are annoyed about past years, do not wait forever, after three years an old statement becomes difficult to compel.

Can owners produce the statement themselves?

Yes, and often it is the obvious route. The law requires no trade licence to draw up the accounts; a self-managing community may present them itself, so long as it meets the formal requirements of § 34 WEG 2002. The effort lies less in the arithmetic than in the order: collect every receipt, apply the allocation key correctly, keep the reserve cleanly.

That organisational part is precisely where self-management used to fail most often. A community-management software such as Vecinly takes over the bookkeeping, the cost allocation by share and the filing of receipts, and turns them into a traceable statement, exactly what § 34 demands and what the right of inspection is meant to test.

Owners who do not produce the statement but merely check it benefit from the same discipline: the same items, the same deadline, the same receipt control. Whether you generate the numbers or scrutinise them, the yardstick is identical.

The 30th of June is not a formality but the legal test of a functioning community. An owner who knows what belongs in the statement, uses the right of inspection and keeps the deadline in view need neither rely on the manager's goodwill nor head to court. And if nothing arrives at all, the route through the district court (with a real penalty behind it) is open to every single owner.

Information updated. This article is for information only and does not constitute legal advice.