Here’s where you’ll find recent articles about FirstService Residential, as well as our impact on the areas we serve.
Living in a high-rise, condominium or co-op certainly has its perks. You get the convenient location, the dramatic views, attentive concierge services and a range of amenities. However, vertical living also means added challenges when it comes to fire safety. Fortunately, there are measures that both your association board and residents can take to improve safety.
Part of your job as a board member is ensuring the safety of residents in your community association. To that end, it’s important to educate homeowners about possible fire risks and the steps they can take to prevent fire hazards in their homes. Chances are that fire safety isn’t top of mind for residents. However, home fires are more common than most people realize.
As communities in Texas and Florida discovered in 2017, hurricanes can be devastating, even if your community takes all the proper precautions to reduce your association’s risk. Read how a property management company should assist your community after a storm passes.
No community association ever wants to find itself in the midst of an emergency, but it can happen anytime and anywhere. Whether you face an earthquake, a hurricane, a fire, a shooting or a flood, the impact of any devastating event can be minimized if your community has prepared for it. No doubt, your board meetings are already chock full of agenda items, but it’s important to make emergency preparedness a priority.
Your community or condominium association is there to protect the interests of all of its members. However, there may be situations when one or more residents don’t believe that the association is on their side. Hopefully, everyone involved can come to a reasonable solution, but if you can’t, it’s possible that your association – and even your board members – could become the target of a lawsuit.
Tornadoes are fearsome because of their unpredictable nature. Although there are certain weather conditions that make tornadoes more likely, such as severe summer thunderstorms, tornadoes can also be created by snowstorms and blizzards. They can strike at any time of year and almost any place, even forming on the water and moving onto land.
As unpredictable as earthquakes can be, your community association should be prepared in case you ever feel the unmistakable rumble of a tremor. Here’s what you need to know.
2016 saw the United States swamped in a record year of flooding, the most since record keeping began in 1980. Devastating flooding swept Louisiana, West Virginia, Texas and Maryland, costing billions in damage. In Canada, about half of all natural disaster costs are incurred from flooding, reaching into the billions of dollars in recent years.
Floods are one of the most common types of natural disasters. They can also be the most detrimental for high-rise buildings. The nature of these buildings makes them particularly vulnerable to flooding caused by severe storms. It may be instinct to think “but I’m several stories above the ground – I’m not at risk for flooding!” However, many of the critical systems in high-rise buildings, including boilers, elevators, generators and water pumps, are located underground, sometimes several levels underground, and the risk to those systems in a flood is high.
Wildfires continue to be a constant and deadly threat across North America, and the risk intensifies with soaring annual temperatures, strong winds and severe drought conditions. More than 78,000 wildfires scorch over 12.4 million acres across the United States and Canada each year. Fanned by high winds and feeding on parched grass, trees and shrubs for tinder, these fires put thousands of homes at risk each year, or destroy them outright.
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