New Prez, Voting formalities

I recently moved to a small community of 6 units. I was on the Board of my last community and immediantly saw a need here for leadership and a HOA overhaul! They had one meeting last year and it was not even an Annual Meeting, just a "List of Concerns." They think everyone is a Board Member and everyone should be able to vote on everything!!! We do have a Treasurer and I am the acting President. We are required to have 3 Board members but there are only two of us right now, which, according to the Bylaws, is enough to make decisions. I have an Annual Meeting planned for next month. The Treasurer and I met with and hired a manager that I had worked with from my last community, as we desperately needed someone to help straighten everything out. Now this sleepy little community has woken up and is up in arms that we hired a manager! Hense my question... According to what I can disern from the Decs it is a decision of the Board to hire a manager. Is this not true?! Also, what decisions are to be presented to the owners to make and what decisions are made independently by the Board? It is my understanding that the owners elect the Board members and approve the Budget. Owners can participate in discussions regarding other decisions but ultimately the Board members are the decision makers. Any clarification would be greatly appreciated!

one reason i can see to NOT hire a MC is that the cost has to be divided by 6. An MC for 600 units, even 60 units, might be doable, but to divide the "monthly service fees" by 6 might likely mean a huge increase in dues. I know the MC we once hired had a $1500/month minimum fee, plus expenses. That's a lot of money for 6 people to pay.

As for what the board should do versus members: the board should run the daily/monthly operations of the business. they can make decisions to hire, fire, get into contracts with vendors, set the budget, pay bills, engage insurances, speak to city officials, etc. The board approves business requests (or denies), helps define/interpret and enforce the CC&Rs, send notices, collects monies, etc.. The owners typically vote on major changes to the rules, and for new board members.

there should be a bit more definition of the duties in your by-laws.

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Good Luck
JoeK

Thanks everyone for your encouragement and information! Much appreciated!

Linda

I would just surmise a guess to that: building an "arm's length" distance between neighbors. By that I mean, the property management company gives the board a "face" for the good-cop-bad-cop routine, especially given the limited number of neighbors and the greater possibility that they are or might be "friends." So if the PM sends a violation notice, it's one-step removed from "Joe, who is my neighbor, sending me a wrist slap."

For $75 a month, I would take them up on it!

The MC takes care of the bills, collects the HOA pmts, does our monthly financial reports, budget, attends our meetings, takes minutes, handles owner complaints and violations, finds contractors and gets bids. When you are small it is a big advantage to have a management company on your side as contractors many times won't give you the time of day if you are a small community. It helps to be part of a larger "management family." This manager manages a lot of smaller communities and is very familiar with what we need to remain in compliance. She already saved us a small bundle by getting another bid for our insurance through a company she works with. As for our community, we are all of working age. Two of our owners travel for their jobs. One owner lives out of state and one has so many violations we can't possibly trust him to be on the Board. It's just pretty slim pickings when there are only 6 owners! Just feel it is a great advantage to have the MC, at least initially, until we are back in compliance. I'm planning on her being our manager for the long haul though! It's not that the Board cannot do these things, it's that we work and have other obligations that do not allow the time or resources to manage the HOA effectively.

Robert... Can't speak for this case, but my guess is that with only 6 owners, and you can't fill three seats on the board, the "other" four owners aren't really all that concered with what the two who are running the board are doing.

IMFHOA, we had 40 units, and I couldn't fill a three person board, and it was all apathy and "hey, the guys running it seem to be doing fine. My dues are being raised, what do I care?"

Apathy rears it's ugly head.

We did call a "special meeting" of the Board to make this decision. I followed this with a note to our owners informing them of the decision. We will finalize our decision and sign a contract at our Annual meeting next month.

Not confusing at all.

Best of luck to you and congratulations on having helped out your former HOA.

LindaC10: Since you are a community of only 6-units/6-owners, and you are hearing some negative response to your decision on hiring a Prop. Mgr., I would suggest you invite the Mgr. to your annual meeting next month. It is well for the entire membership to understand the role & duties this person will be assuming on behalf of the 6-association owners.

It may offset some concerns and negativity further down the road. It may even work out that once the Prop. Mgr. gets things in order the Board may not see the need for their services and can manage 6-owners themselves. It is important to sign the contract annually, so as not to lock yourself in for a lengthy period with no clause to terminate should the need arise.

You may find that, once things calm down and all is working as well as can be expected, you may want to negotiate the fee for services next year because of a need for fewer responsibilities for the Mgr. to assume.