Ask five property owners in Diamondhead whether the Property Owners Association can still collect monthly dues on their street, and you may get five different answers. That is not confusion on the residents' part. It is because the answer genuinely depends on which lot you are standing on.
Diamondhead was platted in phases starting in 1970, and each phase came with its own covenant declaration; a legal document that both created the POA's authority to collect dues and set an expiration date on that authority. Some of those covenant sets are still active through as late as 2029. Others expired years ago. About ten sets were apparently written with no expiration date at all, according to the accounting laid out by the property owners who eventually sued over the issue. That patchwork is the reason a buyer or seller in Diamondhead cannot treat POA dues as a flat, predictable line item the way you might in a community with a single master declaration. The obligation is lot-specific, and in Diamondhead it has been the subject of active litigation for most of the past decade.
What the dues actually pay for
The POA is a nonprofit, incorporated in 1970, that manages roughly $15 to $20 million in community assets according to the association's own FAQ document. Membership dues fund maintenance of the two 18-hole golf courses, Pine and Cardinal, along with the marina, walking trails, playgrounds, and clubhouse amenities that include Latitude 30 Patio and Grill and The Oak Room. Members in good standing also get reduced rates on tennis, RV storage, boat slips, and rental of POA-owned meeting space.
Golf itself is not automatically included. Playing time runs through a separate membership at The Club at Diamondhead, and eligibility for the resident member rate requires a current POA Member ID card. If you are budgeting for a golf-adjacent purchase in Diamondhead, the POA dues and the golf membership are two different checks.
The lawsuit that split the community
In August 2021, a group calling itself End Diamondhead Uncertainty filed suit in Hancock County Chancery Court, arguing the POA had no legal right to keep collecting dues, or placing liens for unpaid dues, once a given lot's covenants expired. The case was transferred to circuit court, and Judge Christopher Schmidt eventually ruled in the group's favor, finding that the covenants governing the plaintiffs' lots had indeed expired on schedule and that a community vote in 2010 had not amended them. The POA asked him to reconsider. He declined, reaffirming his ruling in November 2024.
That reaffirmation came with a real dollar consequence. Hancock County's tax assessor, Jimmie Ladner, announced that under Schmidt's ruling the POA might owe county property taxes on its amenities starting in 2025, since those amenities could no longer be treated as covenant-secured community property in the same way. In a letter to property owners explaining a dues increase from $56 to $62 per month, POA Board President Nancy Sislow wrote that the "paying of the dues helps maintain the amenities, which in turn ensures your property value is maintained."
That is a reasonable argument for why dues matter. It is a separate question from whether the POA has the legal standing to compel payment on a lot whose covenants have already expired, and that is exactly what the courts have been sorting through.
A different court, a different lot, a different outcome
Here is the part that should give any buyer pause. Around the same time, a separate case, Diamondhead Country Club and Property Owners Association v. Kelvin Shulz, dealt with a lot purchased directly from the state of Mississippi in 2018. The property owner argued his covenants had also expired and that dues shouldn't apply. A judge in that case, Favre, ruled the opposite way, finding that the actions of Diamondhead property owners showed that "the members of the POA wish the covenants to be renewed."
Two courts, two lots, two conclusions. That contrast is the whole point. The general rule of thumb that circulates around Diamondhead, that covenants expiring on a set schedule means dues stop automatically, has not held up uniformly in court. The specific facts attached to a specific lot and a specific set of covenants have mattered more than any community-wide assumption.
What became final in 2025
A third case, Jane Rodriguez v. Diamondhead Country Club and Property Owners Association Inc., worked through Hancock Circuit Court, then the Mississippi Court of Appeals, which denied a motion for rehearing in August 2025. The Mississippi Supreme Court took up the petition for review and, on October 2, 2025, denied certiorari with all justices in agreement. That closes the appellate road for that case. It also confirms something the parties in the earlier EDU dispute said themselves: any final, binding answer on how Diamondhead's covenants work was always going to require the state's highest court to weigh in, because Mississippi has very little statutory law that speaks directly to HOA and POA disputes.
The practical upshot for 2026 is that this is not old news you can safely ignore. It is a body of case law that is still being built, one lot and one lawsuit at a time.
What this means if you're buying, selling, or holding
A separate 2020 Mississippi Supreme Court case adds one more wrinkle worth knowing if you are looking at a foreclosure or bank-owned lot in Diamondhead. In Diamondhead Country Club and Property Owners Association v. The Peoples Bank, the court held that a developer's exemption from paying assessments is a personal right that does not automatically travel with the title through a foreclosure sale. It has to be expressly conveyed in the deed of trust. One of two deeds of trust in that case carried language transferring the exemption; the other did not, and the bank ended up owing assessments on those lots as a result, according to the Land Title Association of Mississippi's case summary.
If you are closing on a Diamondhead property this year, a few checks are worth building into your process before you sign anything:
- Ask your title company or closing attorney to identify which covenant declaration is recorded against the specific lot, and its expiration date. Some run through 2029, some already expired, and some carry no expiration language at all.
- Confirm current dues status directly with the POA administrative office at 7610 Country Club Circle rather than relying on a general figure you've seen elsewhere, since not every lot in the community is treated the same way.
- If you're purchasing out of a foreclosure or from a lender, check whether any assessment exemption was expressly written into the deed of trust. Courts have held these exemptions are personal rights that don't pass automatically.
- Budget separately for golf. Access to Pine and Cardinal runs through The Club at Diamondhead and requires its own membership tied to a current POA Member ID, not just POA dues.
- If your purchase involves combining two lots, which is common in Diamondhead given how many properties were originally platted, the POA's lot consolidation fee is $2,500 according to the association's own FAQ.
- Ask whether the lot or its covenant phase has been part of any pending POA litigation. Outcomes so far have differed by case, and a resolved case for one property doesn't necessarily settle the question for a neighboring one.
Diamondhead's larger covenant framework was also tested in a different way in 2020, when the Mississippi Court of Appeals upheld the community's requirement that 85 percent of lot owners consent to amend restrictive covenants, rejecting an effort to lower that threshold to 60 percent. That case involved a development of nearly 7,000 properties and roughly 4,759 housing units, and it shows how deliberately difficult the original covenants were designed to be to change. That difficulty is part of why the expiration dates baked into those original documents, rather than any community vote, have driven most of the recent litigation.
Quick answers before you sign
Does every home in Diamondhead owe POA dues? No. It depends on which covenant declaration governs that specific lot and whether it has expired. Some sets run through 2029, and some appear to have no expiration date at all.
Can the POA still place a lien for unpaid dues? This is precisely what has been litigated, with different outcomes in different cases. Have your closing attorney check the recorded covenant status for the specific lot rather than assuming an answer that applies community wide.
Does paying POA dues include golf? No. Dues make you eligible for member-rate pricing at The Club at Diamondhead, but golf itself requires a separate membership tied to your current POA Member ID.
Diamondhead's covenant situation is unusual, but it is not unmanageable. It just requires someone reading the actual recorded documents for your specific lot rather than repeating what the last person heard at the clubhouse. If you're weighing a purchase or sale in Diamondhead and want a second set of eyes on what a particular property's covenant status actually means for your closing, Prosper Realty works this market street by street and can help you get the right questions in front of your title company before you're at the table.
