9 Tips for Community Association Managers to Run a Great HOA

Running HOAs can be a daunting and overwhelming task ⁠— especially if you handle several communities. The reason is that the essential duty of a Community Association Manager (CAM) is to assist the board in virtually every aspect of its operation. CAMs can enjoy running the HOA by delivering great resident experiences and by succeeding in establishing a successful relationship with the HOA board and its residents.

Below are 9 tips to help CAMs run a great homeowner’s association:

1. Lay Down Goals
   In order to run an HOA with great success, CAMs need to establish clear objectives and lay down goals that are aligned with the HOA board. Our Resident Experience Management platform has many features that can help implement goals. A common goal in HOAs is to increase social activities and our Quick Votes feature is popular among CAMs to help implement such a goal. This feature can help gather resident opinions and provide valuable insight for setting goals.

2. Maximize Your Staff
   Wearing too many hats is a hindrance to a proactive work environment and causes stress that eventually leads to burnouts. Instead, CAMs can create lists of tasks with our Tasks & Reminders feature and delegate these to staff members, while keeping track of them.  It is an easy way to assign oversee projects and will save the CAMs time down the line. Be sure to train your staff properly on new and existing processes.

3. Engage Everyone in the Community

   It is important for any community to convene together and bond. CAMs can increase the resident experience by increasing community engagement. One way to boost community engagement is by gathering the opinion of residents on community-related topics with our Quick Votes feature. CAMs can view immediate results on everything from landscaping, to picking a date for the summer BBQ and much more.

4. Prioritize Security

   ⁠It is in the association’s best interest to prioritize security. CAMs can suggest installing IoT devices such as cameras, sensors, detectors, and locks to enhance the security of the community. Today’s IoT devices have components that use net ties to meet PCB design requirements, allowing them to seamlessly connect to hubs and other IoT devices. This should make it easier to track the gadgets used and the data it extracts — so that CAMs can put in the necessary security measures. In addition, they can use technology platforms that provide guest authorization and customizable access to outsiders. ⁠To keep track of visitors in the vicinity, our Visitor Parking Management solution can help.

5. Be Efficient in Board Meetings

   When facilitating board meetings, CAMs should ensure that there is a structure in place to avoid disorganized and extended sessions. Failing to hold efficient board meetings is a clear sign that the homeowner’s association is not running as smoothly as it should. Prior to the board meeting, managers should send out a meeting agenda to residents and board members, via our Announcements feature. This will give the board ample time to prepare and to keep the discussion in line with the agenda.

6. Highlight Transparency

   Transparency is a crucial element when providing a superior resident experience. CAMs should always be transparent with every activity and action the association engages in ⁠— especially those that concern finances. The association budget plan should be created with balance and fairness in mind, and the only way to achieve that is by making sure that every community member knows where their fees are going and how much is allotted for every project. ⁠Every resident should receive a copy of the budget and our Media Library feature is a popular feature where such documents can be stored securely and shared with residents. ⁠

7. Effectively Enforce Policies

   There are plenty of reasons why certain rules and policies are imposed on a homeowner’s associations. For one, it ensures that every member of the association is treated fairly. Second, it is what holds the community together. Without enforcing community policies effectively, one cannot foster accountability in any association. When enforcing association policies, keep in mind that not all rules should be followed blindly. As such, make sure that the policies are regularly updated to keep up with the changing times. ⁠To make it easier for residents to access policies, use our Residents’ Guide ⁠feature, which is a searchable database.

8. Simplify Payments

   All modern residents want a simplified process for paying their fees. Unfortunately, payment processes are still prone to outdated and slow systems. Our Rent & HOA Payment module allow residents to pay their rent or HOA fees online, using their credit card. Residents can see a history of their ledger (outstanding balance, transaction history) and decide if they want to make a payment (one time) or set up recurring payments.

9. Use a Resident Experience Management Platform

   Running HOAs with outdated manual processes is ineffective and increases the likelihood of errors. Furthermore, manual processes are time consuming and prevents CAMs from working proactively. Also, residents are either already tech-savvy or will become tech-savvy in the near future as people’s relationship with technology has deepened due to the pandemic. The ‘new norm’ has caused a vast majority of people to rely more on digital technology for work, education, daily commercial transactions, and social interactions. Our Resident Experience Management platform is an ideal solution to the many challenges HOAs face on a daily basis. There are over 30 modules in Concierge Plus encompassing hundreds of features designed specifically to manage the operations of any HOA. Furthermore, you can access every feature on any smartphone, tablet, laptop, or desktop computer.

You can now sign up for a 30 day free trial and, if you’d like, you can also have one of our Product Experts provide you with pricing as well as a live, one-on-one Online Demo at a time that’s convenient to you.

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Article exclusively submitted to conciergeplus.com

Written by Rita June

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