What the condo questionnaire actually asks

One form, two numbers

The official Condominium Project Questionnaire is Fannie Mae Form 1076, and Freddie Mac Form 476 is the same document. The form's own footer reads March 2016, with an addendum added December 2021. That addendum is the building safety section, and it is the part most often returned blank.

Using the published form is optional for the lender. The requirements behind it are not. Many lenders send their own version, and a few send a short internal sheet, but every version is collecting the same underwriting facts in a different order. If you can answer the official form completely, you can answer any of them.

One version is no longer in play. The short-form questionnaire that went with Limited Review has no application for loans dated on or after August 3, 2026, because Limited Review and Streamlined Review were retired on that date. A short form arriving today is usually a template nobody has updated, and the file will need the full one.

One detail is widely reported the wrong way round, and it decides whether a small community is affected at all. The same letter that retired Limited Review also widened the review waiver, from projects of four or fewer units to projects of ten or fewer, where the project is not part of a larger development or a master association. So the step change lands on projects of eleven or more units. Below that line, more projects avoid a review now than did before, which is the opposite of the summary that says every condominium now needs a full review.

Sources: Fannie Mae Lender Letter LL-2026-03 and Freddie Mac Bulletin 2026-C, both issued March 18, 2026; the Condo Project Manager FAQ of July 2026; and the form itself.

The seven sections, and what each one is for

I. Basic project information

Asks for the legal project name, the property address, the association and management addresses, tax identification numbers for the association and the management company, and any master or umbrella association. Then a row of checkboxes: hotel, motel or resort activity and rental pooling, whether mandatory or voluntary; occupancy restrictions; deed or resale restrictions; manufactured homes; mandatory fee-based memberships; non-incidental business income; and supportive or continuing care.

What the lender does with it: those checkboxes decide eligibility before any arithmetic happens. A tick against hotel activity or rental pooling moves the project toward condotel territory, and condotel status is decided by the services the project runs rather than by how many owners rent. Mandatory fee-based memberships and non-incidental business income each carry their own limit.

The answers live in: the declaration and bylaws, the rental policy, and the association's own filings. Answer the operations questions literally. Permission to rent short term is not a rental pool, and the two answers land very differently.

II. Project completion

Asks whether the project is complete including all phases, whether any right of further phasing or annexation survives, how many phases are complete and planned, the total planned units, whether the amenities are finished, and whether control has passed from the developer, with the date.

What the lender does with it: this decides whether the project is established or new, and that changes the whole review. Established means at least 90% of units conveyed to unit purchasers, the project complete, no further phasing, and control turned over to the owners. A developer may hold up to 20% of units as rentals and the project can still be established, provided the fees on those units are current and there is no active or pending special assessment.

The answers live in: the declaration and its amendments, and the minutes recording turnover.

III. Newly converted or rehabilitated projects

Asks whether the building was converted in the last three years from apartment, hotel, retail or industrial use, the year built and the year converted, whether the work was a full gut rehabilitation, whether an engineer reported on structural soundness and remaining useful life, whether safety-related repairs are complete, and whether reserves were allocated for the improvements.

What the lender does with it: a recent conversion routes the file differently and puts the engineer's report into it. Most established communities pass straight through this section, and marking it as not applicable is an answer. Leaving it empty is not.

IV. Financial information

Asks how many unit owners are 60 or more days delinquent on common expense assessments, how many months of delinquent assessments a lender would inherit after foreclosure, and whether the association is party to any active or pending litigation, with the attorney's name and telephone number and the documentation attached.

What the lender does with it: the delinquency count is tested as a share of total units, counted in units and never in dollars, against a 15% limit. The foreclosure question feeds the lien priority arithmetic. Litigation is a yes or a no on the form and the whole decision is made in the attachment, which is why a bare yes is the single most expensive answer on the page.

The answers live in: the aged delinquency report and the attorney's status letter.

Worth knowing: this section covers regular assessments only. Delinquency on a special assessment is tested as well, and the count for it has to come out of the delinquency report because the form never asks for it.

V. Ownership and other information

Asks for a unit table covering the whole project and the subject legal phase, split into total, sold and closed, under bona fide contract, owner occupant, second home, investor, developer rented and association owned. Then a table of every party holding more than one unit, with the count, the share of the project, and whether those units are leased at market rent or under rent control. Then whether any single party owns the amenities, and a commercial use table with square footage.

What the lender does with it: the single-entity test is computed out of the second table, and it is a percentage the form never asks for. At 21 or more units the limit is 20% for Fannie Mae and 25% for Freddie Mac. In smaller projects it is expressed in units rather than as a share, at 2. Commercial space is tested by square footage against 35% of the total, and rental apartment and hotel space counts on the commercial side.

The answers live in: the ownership roster, the rent roll, and the site plan or a measured schedule of square footage.

Worth knowing: the single-entity count aggregates everything one holder owns, leased units and developer-retained rentals included. Counting only the units an investor lives in is the most common way this section produces a number the reviewer disagrees with.

VI. Insurance information and financial controls

Asks whether the project is in a flood zone and on what basis it is covered, then carrier, agent, telephone number and policy number for hazard, liability, fidelity and flood coverage. The form says in terms not to write "contact agent". Financial controls are a short checklist: separate operating and reserve accounts with access controls, bank statements going directly to the association, two board signatures on reserve withdrawals, records and accounts kept per association at the management company, and no management-company authority to draw on reserves.

What the lender does with it: this is where questionnaires stall most often, because the form asks for identifiers and the review needs amounts. Deductibles do not appear on the form at all. The per occurrence limit of 5% of the face amount, and the per unit cap of $50,000 for applications dated on or after July 1, 2026, are both read off the evidence of insurance. So is the coverage amount against a replacement cost source, and the policy form. General liability coverage of at least $1,000,000 per occurrence and fidelity or crime coverage at 21 or more units are separate requirements again.

The answers live in: the evidence of insurance and the declarations pages, not the form. Transcribe them. Adjectives such as adequate or full coverage are read as an unanswered question.

VII. Contact information

Asks for the preparer's name, title, telephone number, email address, company, address and the date.

What the lender does with it: it fixes who answered and when, and the date matters more than it looks. Project review evidence goes stale: an established project's review may not be more than 365 days old at the note date, and a new project's not more than 180 days. An undated form is a return, and so is one signed by somebody without authority to answer for the association.

The addendum, added December 2021

Completed by an authorized representative of the association. Asks for the date of the last inspection by a licensed architect, engineer or inspector and what it found about safety, soundness, structural integrity and habitability; repairs completed, repairs outstanding and their completion dates; known deficiencies and the plan for them; outstanding or anticipated violations from a governing authority; the funding plan and schedule for deferred maintenance; whether a reserve study has been done in the last 3 years; the current reserve balance; current and planned special assessments with amount, terms and purpose; and any association borrowing for improvements.

What the lender does with it: this section came out of the rethink that followed 2021, and unknown is read as an answer rather than as a blank. Where repairs exist, the useful answer states the scope, the funding source and the completion status. A special assessment raised for a safety repair is judged on whether the repair is done, not on whether the money has been collected.

The answers live in: the inspection report and the board minutes. The addendum asks for both to be provided alongside it.

What the form does not ask, and the review needs anyway

This is the part that surprises managers filling one in for the first time. The questionnaire is short. The review behind it is not, and five of the tests that decide the file are not questions on the form at all.

The reserve arithmetic

There is no field for annual budgeted assessment income and no field for the replacement reserve allocation. The test of at least 10% of assessment income, rising to 15% for applications dated on or after January 4, 2027, is evidenced by the attached budget. The addendum asks only whether a study exists and what the balance is. The alternative to the percentage is a study under 3 years old funded at its highest recommended allocation, and baseline funding does not qualify.

Delinquency on special assessments

Section IV counts regular assessments. The 15% test covers regular and special assessments alike, so the special assessment count comes out of the delinquency report.

The litigation classification

The form takes a yes or a no. Whether a matter falls inside one of the published exceptions, and therefore does not stop the loan, is settled in the attachment. Naming the exception the matter sits inside is the difference between a disclosure and a decline.

Insurance amounts, forms and deductibles

The form collects carrier, policy number and telephone. The review needs the coverage amount tied to a replacement cost source, the policy form, the endorsements, and both deductibles. All of it rides on the evidence of insurance.

The single-entity percentage

Section V gives raw counts. The percentage, and which units count on each side of it, is computed by the reviewer. Affordable program units and units the association owns are treated differently from one another.

Put the other way round: most of the work in a complete package is not filling in the form. It is assembling the evidence the form points at, showing the arithmetic that the form leaves implicit, and answering in a way the reviewer does not have to interpret.

Where this comes from

• Fannie Mae Selling Guide B4-2, Project Standards, and Lender Letter LL-2026-03 of March 18, 2026.
• Freddie Mac Single-Family Seller/Servicer Guide chapter 5701, and Bulletin 2026-C of March 18, 2026.
• The Condominium Project Questionnaire itself, Fannie Mae Form 1076 and Freddie Mac Form 476, March 2016 with the December 2021 addendum.
• The Condo Project Manager frequently asked questions of July 2026.

Every threshold quoted here is also the threshold the desk grades against, and the fuller reference with the effective dates side by side is on the rules page. The ten answers that most often send a completed questionnaire back are set out separately, and the question of who completes one and whether an association has to has its own page.

Common questions about the form

Short answers to the questions that arrive most often about the questionnaire itself.

Is Fannie Mae Form 1076 the same as Freddie Mac Form 476?

Yes. It is one document with two form numbers, published jointly. The footer reads March 2016, with a building safety addendum added in December 2021. Freddie Mac refers to the addendum as Form 476A.

Does an association have to use the official form?

No. The published form is optional, and lenders often send their own version. The requirements behind it are the same either way, so an association that can answer the official form completely can answer any version of it.

Who is supposed to fill out a condo questionnaire?

An authorized representative of the association, which in practice is usually the community association manager. The form asks for the preparer's name, title, company and the date, and an unsigned or undated form is returned. The association remains the preparer and signer of record whoever assembles the answers.

How long is a completed questionnaire good for?

Project review evidence may not be more than 365 days old at the note date for an established project, or 180 days for a new one. Individual lenders often apply a shorter freshness window of their own, commonly 60 to 120 days, so the same community is frequently asked again within the year.

Is the short-form condo questionnaire still accepted?

It has no application for loans with an application date on or after August 3, 2026. Limited Review and Streamlined Review were retired on that date, and the short form existed to serve them. A short form arriving now is usually an out-of-date template.

Does the building safety addendum have to be completed?

It is part of the current form and it is completed by the association. Unknown is treated as an answer rather than as a blank, so answering it from the last inspection report and the board minutes, rather than leaving it open, is what keeps the file moving.

Where do the numbers on a questionnaire actually come from?

The budget, the aged delinquency report, the reserve study, the ownership roster, the evidence of insurance, the last inspection report, the board minutes and the attorney's status letter. Very few of the answers that matter can be given from memory, which is why a complete package is mostly assembly.

What is the difference between a questionnaire and an estoppel or resale certificate?

A lender questionnaire describes the whole project for the buyer's lender. A resale certificate describes the association and the unit for the buyer, under state law. An estoppel certificate states what a specific unit owes, for the closing agent. They are three different documents with three different requesters.