How often have you driven through a neighborhood and wondered why everything looked so haphazard and chaotic. Then, driving through a second neighborhood, everything looks orderly, consistent, and clean? The difference in many cases is the presence of a communication association. While they go by different names, such as homeowners’ association or community association, or neighborhood association, the purpose is the same – to keep a consistent minimum level of quality in the neighborhood for everyone to benefit as well as to maintain value and quality of the community.
The Nuts & Bolts of Community Management
To make all of the above happen takes a lot of work. There are landscaping crews to manage, common facilities to take care of, representation with city and county government, community utilities to manage and accounting as well as board administration. If a community association is fully engaged to the full definition of the term, it is an active form of local government for a neighborhood with full representation and elected officials. And, behind the scenes, there is usually a professional community association management resource hard at work.
Management vs. an Association Board
The job of community association management generally falls into the category of daily administration. That frequently includes managing communication with residents, following up on committee communication and distribution of records to the neighborhood members, administering the activities of community maintenance services, managing compliance with community rules and guidelines, and supporting the community association governing board in its role and representation to the neighborhood. While this might sound simplistic in some respects, it’s often similar to actually running a medium-size company in many situations.
Aren’t Community Associations Just a Suburbia Thing? No
Community associations can be applied in a variety of different living conditions. They are not restricted to just detached home neighborhoods and are frequently included in apartments and condominium projects. Anywhere there is a standard set of expectations of how people live, work and socialize together as a group in a residential setting, there is likely going to be a community association of some sort helping to keep order and stability in the area. And there is no restriction to suburbia either. Community associations and their management support can be found in urban settings just as often as they are in tract home projects. And the most successful community associations partner with a high-quality management service that stays on top of the daily administration professionally, benefiting everyone involved.
