Using online on-demand staffing services

Seems like there is an on-demand online staffing solution for just about everything from cutting grass to handyman work to hanging christmas decorations, planting flower beds, etc. Some of these apps have liability insurance buildt in and others you need to pay more for it. I'm gonna use fictious names cause I dont' understand why admins block some posts. Lawncare gurus, starterlawn, taskBunny, fingerTack, etc, all seem pretty popular. they are brokers that get a bunch of service providers together to do this stuff less expensive than pros.

I'd rather pay someone 50% less to cut HOA grass then pay current pro full price
I'd rather pay someone $100 to plant $100 worth of flowers then pay the lawn care company $350 to do the same job.
I'd rather pay $30/hr to someone to hang up xmas decorations than do it myself or try to find volunteers.
Just got a quote to paint some HOA building for $1000 to $3000. I bet with a little supervision I could get it done for a lot less by getting a handyman.

Obviously it's not that easy. you are going to get lemons, people that say they are expert painters, but make messy edges, or people that leave lawn clippings everywhere. You have to be very specific about your upfront expectations to get exactly what you want.

is this a viable way to source out HOA work, or is it a disaster waiting to happen.

If money is your only issue, you’re correct in saying you get what you pay for – and it’s not a good idea to hire vendors based solely on the price. There are dozens of discussions on this website where that sort of thing didn’t end well. As a practical matter, this is your home and since you and your neighbors spent a lot of money buying your homes and paying assessments, cheaping out the service doesn’t make sense at all. May as well do it yourself if that’s your concern – and then you can take the credit or the blame for how it works out.

On-demand handyman services are ok for one-time jobs like planting flowers at the community entrance, but the main problem is that you can’t always control who’ll be sent to do the job. You may get lucky and get decent services every time and sometimes you can ask that a specific person be sent. However, if that person isn’t available, you’ll either have to wait until they are or accept who’s sent out.

Our community didn't use a service - instead we did have a handyman who did small things for us and it worked out very well (he went on to take a regular job and that was the end of that), so you might want to consider how “small” is a small job for your community and how many you have every month and then find a handyman to do that work every time it needs to be done. You can work out the price by the job or the hours – ours would come out on certain days of the week and we’d give him a list of stuff to do. This way you’d have consistency – if the handyman wasn’t available for some reason or there was an emergency, then you can go to the on-demand services. Just be sure you do your due diligence and check out the qualifications of the work or the agency that hires them – and ask for references and check them (especially if they’ve worked for other HOAs – those are the ones you need to talk to). Good luck!

I would agree with Barbara that the HOA vendors that I have worked with do the complete job, which we pay dearly for, while the inexpensive services do one task but not all. For example, I hired a cheap service to dethatch my lawn, which they did, but they left all of the waste products on my lawn. I had to haul them to the trash can which filled my trash can and took two garbage cycles to get rid of.

That was fine with me as a homeowner, but doesn't work as an HOA. We need vendors to do the complete job.

When hiring a vendor there are the obvious things (insurance, liability, etc.) but also is the quality of and the repeatability of their work. You need vendors you know and trust meaning they will do as promised, do it well, and on time. You do not need vendors you must be constantly checking on. Even if more expensive a quality, trusted vendor is more important then price.

I probably could shop every thing in my life for cheaper but my time and trust is critical and I will pay for such.