Congratulations on being elected to your condominium associations board. As a board member, you’ll play a crucial role in fostering a sense of community within your association. By organizing social events, addressing residents' concerns, and promoting open communication, you contribute to creating a welcoming and harmonious environment where everyone feels valued and connected. Perhaps most
Read more The Importance of Serving on a Condo Board: Why You Should Get Involved!
Category: Reserve Fund Best Practices
Reserve Best Practices
Hey there, fellow condo owners! Have you ever wondered about the financial health of your HOA? I sure didn’t, until I learned a valuable lesson about the importance of having adequate reserves on-hand. Let me share my personal experience with you and shed some light on why every HOA should prioritize this crucial task. A few years back, our community was hit with a major unexpected expense when
Read more Why Your HOA Needs a Reserve Study: Lessons from My Experience
Underfunded reserves are one of the most critical issues facing condominium associations today. While there are a million and one reasons why this problem is so pervasive across the country, ultimately the root cause comes back to a condo board’s overly optimistic or poorly informed view of what it costs to maintain the common elements of their community. Case in point. When talking to other
Read more The Hidden Risk of Using Fannie Mae's "10% Rule" for Funding Condo Reserves
Here’s a question that most condominium owners would prefer to never have to answer. How adequate is your association’s reserve fund? Can it meet it’s repair and replacement obligations? On the one hand, you probably don’t want to know because there is a high probability the answer is not good. On the other hand, you better find out. Quickly. Underfunded reserves can have a significant
Read more How adequate are your HOA's reserves?
When it comes to reserve fund planning there are a lot of interesting rule of thumb approaches many of us have heard over the years. “Set aside an amount equal to 10% of the annual operating budget”, “Do a special assessment of $100K to add a reserve buffer”, are just a few of the less than analytical approaches to reserve fund planning out there. Generally, what these approaches say is
Read more What if your HOA is "Over-Reserving" for future expenses?