Board members preforming maintenance and getting paid

Yes, Sandy. However, the Board should get sealed competative bids from independent contractors (which the President as an individual would qualify) and require insurance. The President should recuse themself from all activities related to getting the bids and selecting the contractor. IOW have very "clean hands" when hiring a contractor who is a Board member. I would require the President to resign from the Board as a condition of awarding him the contract if the decision is to accept his bid.

While I understand the concern some have posted I don't feel the President in this case would need to resign from his position due to this matter.

In some cases hiring him will in the end prove most beneficial to the property rather then hiring an outsider with no knowledge of the property or interest in the property.

I would permit this person to do minor work at say an hourly rate but avoid Bidding on major projects as a private contractor.

If the hourly rate you were to pay him was LESS then that of an outside contracotr what would be the problem?

In my expierence I have met several Board members both Board Presidents
who did maintenance work on the property along with supervising work in the interest of the property and were paid in this capacity.

I would feel lucky if the property had such a person willing to be involved and with the time to make this sort of effort.

Many BYLAWS forbid payment as Board members but in this case.

This goes above and beyond normal Board membership.

No one watches your investments better then YOU or in this case another member of the Board.

I would favor operating in the best possible interest of the property.
On the property in which I live at one time we paid for minor repairs at the rate of $35 per hour no matter what the work.

So changing a light bulb cost us $37.50.

Now we have a part time person hired by the property directly not a maintenance company who does work for the property at $20 per hour along with one Board member who oversees the work done and when possible does some of the work too.

So now we get two people working for the price of one.

It is possible even in today's world to act in a manner above board and not open to questions of inappropriate actions. If you have a Board member with the time and willingness to lend a hand I would suggest you take advantage.

Like any other contractor if the work is not up to standards then you could easily discontinue the service provided. What if the work was superior lets be the glass is half full for a moment.

I've seen this a number of times over the years. They always start good and end bad. Before you consider this, do the following: have your attorney brief the board on the potential legal problems, including conflicts of interest. Will the association insure him in case he damages a unit, since the association will be the employer. Ask your insurance agent what additional coverage will be needed and if this will impact any of your existing policies, i.e. workers comp.

The other problems will come slowly. Some have been mentioned, but sooner or later he will tee off enough people to create serious problems (not doing the work up to the owner's expectations, being late on a work request, working on someone's unit and then all of a sudden, a violation notice shows up, etc.)

It's still a bad idea, but some associations just have to go through it before they learn.

Joe

I did a search of the topics and found this so maybe ya all can help----In our community we have a VERY OLD mobile home that is in very bad shape.... Our BOD had voted at the last meeting to seek bids to remove the trailer from the property.... At our past Sunday meeting we were told that the Exective Commitee had given permission to spend upwards to $1200.00 to have A BOARD MEMBER who is in the construction business to remove sections of the flooring and interior walls to determine how much work would be involved to repair the mobile home.... I feel this is a conflict of interest as the contractor is a BOARD MEMBER and of course they will be doing the work and getting paid for it.. Should this have been put out for a third disinterested party to do ???? Thanks bunches LindaC

Simple put it out to bid and you might just find that price is not all that bad.

Tearing it down might be the easy part disposing of the debris that might run you some $$$$.

What would you think a fair price ?

What frustrates all of us here is at our last BOD meeting the management was instructed to get bids to remove the trailer....Make it disappear....Now all of a sudden a BOARD MEMBER is being paid $1200.00 to "see" how much will it cost to repair it !!!! I went to our local building dept yesterday and they informed me that because of the AGE of the mobile home- permits are required to repair-- HOWEVER because of the AGE of the mobile home permits will not be granted and the mobile home needs tobe removed from the property....Now you would have thought that these folks would have checked that FIRST before paying a BOARD member $1200.00 to lookk at it........LindaC