Records - who owns the originals?

Does your property management agreement have a provision about who receives and owns records?

I'd say that you could certainly ask for the records.

Unfortunately, I can see an argument each way and would defer to the contract.

You may need to involve an attorney if the contract isn't clear or if the MC is reluctant in providing the info.

First, you should have already read the contract you have with the management company to see how the contract is supposed to be terminated - that language should also include how transfer of the records is to be handled. If you and your board haven't read it, I strongly suggest you do that immediately - You shouldn't have to guess how this works. Review the contract with your association attorney who should guide you through the transition.

I have a hunch you haven't made a transition plan either, so while you're going about getting the records, you'll need to prepare one in a hurry.. Self management can be effective if you have people who are willing and able to do the job. You can hire contractors to do things like bookkeeping, but if you've left everything to the property manager until now, you may be in for a surprise - and I don't mean a pleasant one.

You were asked basic information about you community, so start there. That will give you some sort of idea as to what documents should be there. It may also help to get someone to organize what you get before you begin to review them to see if the record keeping makes sense - and where the holes are.

By the way, you want to pick up the documents using a bunch of boxes. Do you have any idea how you will preserve these records? Do you know what needs to be preserved forever vs. a year or two? This is the type of thing that's addressed in a documentation policy - do you have one? If not, that's another task for you.

Your entire board and perhaps some others will need to work together to see where you are before you start the self management route. I'm not saying not to do it but sometimes people think they can easily take over what the property manager did without thinking the thing all the way through. Happy New Years and saddle up - you're in for a long strange trip.

Thanks for the great ideas everyone. I should clarify that we probably aren't truly "self-managing." We have two full-time staff people who are each going to take on some new responsibilities plus we have a law firm and accountant on retainer for items when they come up. One of the full-time staff people was just hired and he will coordinate most repairs, maintenance, outside contractors and work orders. The other full-time person is very willing and able to take on billing owners and depositing HOAs. We're going to give it a try and see how it goes. If we decide we want to add a management company again, at least we will have a better understanding of their systems.