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  • Maintenance and Repairs vs. Capital Improvements – What’s the Difference?

    Maintaining your buildings’ assets is not a one-size-fits-all proposition. The common areas require a broad range of routine maintenance and repairs to keep them looking good and operating smoothly.
  • Making a Difference One Face Mask at a Time

    Learn how associates, residents and board members are making a difference in their communities, one face mask at a time, during the COVID-19 pandemic.
  • 9 tips about board of directors conflicts of interest

    It’s a term that gets tossed around quite a lot. But “conflict of interest” is a real and genuine threat to your association and its proper stewardship. Understanding what the term means – as well as how to recognize and avoid conflicts of interest– can go a long way toward ensuring the strength and stability of your community and eliminating many concerns.
  • FirstService Residential Executive Discusses Offbeat Second Home Investment Locations and Trends

    While exclusive communities like the Hamptons or Malibu will always be attractive locations for affluent vacation home buyers, several new trends are emerging in the growing second home market.
  • Promoting Fire Safety in Your Community Association

    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.
  • Property management duties: How your management company can make staff changes easier

    Sooner or later, most community associations face some kind of management change. If your community has a great manager, you probably want them to stay forever. But how realistic is that?
  • 5 Steps to the Best Reserve Study Firm

    In our guide to capital improvements , reserve studies and their relationship to capital improvements and preventive maintenance were discussed at length.
  • Seven Tips to Finding a Reserve Study Firm

    Your reserve fund is what helps your association anticipate its future– and budget for it, too. This fund gives you the power to maintain the quality of your community by allowing for projects that are both necessary and expensive (like a future roofing or paving project, for instance).
  • 5 strategies for energy conservation in community associations

    In this article, we delve into the significance of energy conservation within community associations, exploring its benefits and strategies for effective implementation.
  • Slow and Steady: 5 Surprising Benefits of Raising Dues

    It’s that time of year again – budget season is upon us. You know the steps to creating your budget, but what drives your process?
  • Socially Distant Celebration During COVID-19

    Learn how community members are making a difference in their communities with socially distant celebrations during COVID-19 spring holidays.
  • Want to Start a Neighborhood Watch Program? Here are Some Important Considerations

    Neighborhood Watch programs can provide significant benefits to communities – after all, they boost community awareness, communication and involvement, while reducing opportunities for neighborhood crimes to occur. But if you’re interested in getting started, there are many important factors to consider. Here’s an overview.
  • The 7 Secrets to Combat Committee Chaos

    Community committees are a great way to involve more residents in the activities of their homeowner association, help ensure the rules and regulations of the association are followed, and help lighten the workload of volunteer board members. Some common committees include beautification, architectural, landscaping and grievance committee. At their best, committees are finely tuned engines for getting things done in your community. When there is a breakdown or discord, they’re agents of confusion, wreaking havoc on progress and operating as the figurative wrecking balls for a few overbearing committee members.
  • The Surprising Way to Stretch Your Association's Dollars

    If you’re on the board of a condo, co-op, high-rise or HOA, you know that managing your community’s budget is a major priority. You’ve likely explored many ways to save money and get the best deals, while still maintaining a high level of service.
  • Tips for getting a mortgage

    We’ve got the scoop on how to get a mortgage loan, so read on for our top six tips to increase your chances.
  • Updating Your Community Emergency Preparedness Plan for Pandemics

    In the past, when planning for emergencies, a global pandemic was likely not on your list. While most board members did not anticipate a pandemic as something that needed a plan before COVID-19, it's now clear that communities need to develop a plan to address this and any future pandemics. Read on to learn how to build a community emergency preparedness plan with a possible resurgence of coronavirus and other potential pandemics in mind.
  • Virtual Programs for Healthy and Happy Active Lifestyle Communities

    Chances are, you joined the board at your HOA or condo because you’re extremely passionate about the community and want to improve the experience of the other residents within it. Part of adding value to residents in your community is offering classes and programs for them to participate in to get to know their neighbors and offer opportunities for them to stay happy and healthy. Read on to find some suggestions for great virtual programs for communities like yours.
  • What is an HOA fee? And what do HOA fees cover?

    Congratulations! You just bought a new home and it’s perfect for your family – just the right size, condition, location and neighborhood to meet your needs. Your new home is part of a homeowners’ association (HOA), which means you will pay HOA fees. What is an HOA fee? What do they pay for?
  • Board communication tools: Improve board member communication

    You want your community association to be successful. All board members do. You know that means watching the finances carefully and maintaining the property. But do you think about effective board communication as an ingredient in your recipe for success? It is!
  • What do HOA Board Members Really Want? 7 Top Service Issues

    Whether you're on the board of a high-rise or community association. you want to hire a property management company that will provide the best service for their community. What does that really mean?
  • Assessment Basics: What is an HOA assessment fee?

    Congratulations! You just bought a new home and it';s perfect for your family – just the right size and condition and in a location and neighborhood to meet your needs. Your new home is part of a homeowners’ association (HOA), so the landscaping, entrance and common areas always look beautiful and well-maintained.
  • HOA Balance Sheet Explained: Why you should understand them

    The chief responsibility of a community association board member is to preserve, protect and enhance the community. That includes, above all else, its financial health. But you can’t affect the financial health of your community if you don’t understand where it is when you join the board. Balance sheets are the best tool for gaining that basic understanding.
  • What Our Clients and Vendors Are Saying

    Finding a property management company to partner with your board isn’t easy. Find out how we can help you.
  • What to consider when planning an association budget

    Read on for more about how to best complete your next annual association budget, a budget that will enhance your property values and improve your residents’ lives.
Showing 97 - 120 of 761