HOA Insights: Common Sense for Common Areas

068 | Is Your HOA Board Dysfunctional? Find Out!

Hosts: Robert Nordlund, Kevin Davis, Julie Adamen Season 1 Episode 68

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Is your HOA board showing signs of dysfunction? Learn how to identify and address common issues that affect community associations!
 ✅ Is a Reserve Study right for you? 👉 https://www.reservestudy.com/

Julie Adamen and Robert Nordlund share from their past years of HOA experience the telltale signs of a dysfunctional HOA board. Learn about the importance of board members fulfilling their duties, such as maintaining community assets and finances, and the impact of internal political factions, stagnant dues, high board member turnover, and poor communication. See how you can turn your dysfunctional HOA community around with the benefits of strategic planning, forming committees, and maintaining good relationships with service providers! 

Chapters From This Week's Episode:

00:00 Does Your HOA Community Have This Sign of Dysfunction?
03:25 What Does a Dysfunctional HOA Board Look Like?
05:18 Major Board Dysfunction #1 - Having Silos in Your Community 
08:42 Major Board Dysfunction #2 - HOA Dues That Haven’t Changed in Years
11:42 Major Board Dysfunction #3 - High HOA Board Turnover (And Also the Opposite) 
17:46 Major Board Dysfunction #4 - If There’s Little to No Communication From the Board to the Community
19:44 Ad Break - Community Financials 
20:14 What Happens When You Don’t Have Open Board-to-Community Communication? 
27:46 Maintaining Good Relationships With Business Partners and Vendors 
29:28 The One Thing You Can Do to Start Eliminating Dysfunction in Your HOA 

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Julie Adamen
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Kevin Davis, CIRMS
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Robert Nordlund, PE
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Julie Adamen:

If you are a homeowner or a board member, if you're looking around thinking, oh, boy, things need fixing, and we're not doing it, that is a sign of board dysfunction. Your mission as trustees or fiduciaries is to take care of that community. It's it's assets, meaning that, you know, the hard assets, like the asphalt and rough and everything we're talking about that way, and then the fungible things, the monies that you are collecting, right and your budgeting if you are not looking at what your true duty is as a board member, that's dysfunction, even if all you agree on it.

Announcer: HOA Insights:

Common Sense for Common Areas, exists to help all 2 million volunteer board members nationwide have the right information at the right time to make the right decisions for their future. This podcast is sponsored by for companies that care about board members, association insights and marketplace, association reserves, community financials, and Kevin Davis Insurance Services. You'll find links to their websites and social media in the show notes.

Robert Nordlund:

Hi, I'm Robert Nordlund of association reserves,

Julie Adamen:

and I'm Julie Adamen of Adamen Inc. And this is HOA Insights, where we promote common sense for

Robert Nordlund:

common areas. Well, welcome to episode 68 where we're again speaking with management consultant and regular co host, Julie Adamen. Today we'll be discussing the topic of dysfunction, but this time with some specific ideas about what this function looks like, and if a lot of those characteristics apply to your association, we'll also share some specific ideas about how to begin fixing the problem well. This is in follow up to episode 67 with regular co host Kevin Davis, who shared more wise counsel and insights about how to manage insurance issues successfully at your association if you missed that episode or any other prior episode, take a moment after today's program to listen from our podcast website, which I hope you know is HOAinsights.org or watch from our YouTube channel, and, better yet, subscribe from any of the major podcast platforms, so you don't miss any future episodes. And those of you watching on YouTube can see my HOA insights mug here that I have, that I got from our merch store, which you can browse through from our HOAinsights.org web page. And also there's a link to it in the show notes. And this is a favorite of mine. It's got a little cartoon on it that can I show you, talks about budgets. Of course, that's my area of interest. Celebrates volunteer board members. And you can find we have some more specialty items like this. And we also have what I think might be our most popular thing as our free board member zoom backgrounds and as a treat, all give this mug away to our 10th person to email podcast@reservestudy.com mentioning something close to Episode 68 mug giveaway, We enjoy hearing from you responding to the issues you have and that you're facing at your association. So if you have a hot topic, a crazy story, or a question you'd like us to address, you can contact us at 805-203-3130, or email us again at podcast@reservestudy.com one of those listener questions prompted today's episode, and it was Ellen from Baltimore who said, or who asked, What do you mean by dysfunctional that sometimes we need to have our monthly financial reports corrected, and sometimes our meeting Minutes need correction. Julie, can you help us respond to Ellen?

Julie Adamen:

Well, I can. Thanks for the question or the comments. Ellen, really appreciate it, because you know, as Robert and I have been in this industry for so long, when we talk about dysfunction, we have a really good idea what we're talking about. And I think most people that have lived in a homeowner's association or sat on a board certainly have experienced a certain level of dysfunction. So when Robert said, let's talk about this dysfunction issue, I sat down and put together some things that that are major dysfunctions that we could actually, literally talk about for probably days. Would you think, Robert, yeah,

Robert Nordlund:

yeah. Now, yeah. Well, that's a question, major function, major dysfunction or minor? Because we're all humans, and board members are volunteers, and board members came into this without any specific training. Some states have some specific training. You offer some specific training, but largely we're talking about an untrained set of leaders of multi million dollar real estate corporations. So there are going to be some bumps in the road, so let's not worry about the little bumps in the road. What does dysfunction look like?

Julie Adamen:

Exactly? Dysfunction isn't, well, you know, there's something wrong on the GL code on a line item. Dysfunction is not we need to, oh, correct the minutes. A little bit dysfunction as we define it in our business. Is pretty much the bigger picture things. And I put together a list of some of the major dysfunctions. And again, we could go on and on for hours, and there's plenty more of them, but I put them in a few categories. Now, one of the big signs of dysfunction, a sign of dysfunction in your board and your Well, if the board is dysfunctional, typically the community is dysfunctional, at least to a point, is that there are very specific factions or camps within your board and oftentimes within the community, and they're always going at it with each other. These guys aren't going to budge on this. These folks aren't going to budge on that. I just talked to an association in the Phoenix area, and he was telling me that there's, it's a five member board, and two of the five members are just dead set on turning their community into more of a country club. And, you know, everything's a high end, and we don't want to have everything's like this. But the three are recognizing that the community actually is a family based community, so lots of kids, you know, working parents, that type of thing. And usually those 20 don't meet, but neither one will budge. And so even, and they've sent it out to the owners to vote on it, that type of thing, they've all voted it down. They don't want that, but these two will not give up, which is telling me there is a certain dysfunction, not just with those two, but there's probably some other dysfunction going on with the remainder of the board. And based on another conversation additional I had with that gentleman, yeah, for sure, there was. But when you see that kind of political factions going back and forth, I mean, look at our

Robert Nordlund:

own country, right? Well, that's what I was gonna say. Can we use the word silo?

Julie Adamen:

We could. It's siloed Exactly. And I mean, our own country does this. You're either on this side or that side, and you're wrong and I'm right or, you know, whatever. It's that way. So if you see that a community association among the board members, that is what I would consider heavy dysfunction. Because from there, it, you know, starts at the top. It just bleeds right into the community.

Robert Nordlund:

When a board is, I mean, I won't slow you down there, because, yeah, the last word you said was community. Because when the community is first, then I think the differences get smaller when it's when you understand what the community is. Because I have some clients that are tennis and equestrian and the tennis are the they have clean shoes. The equestrians have boots. I have other clients that have a marina golf course, and they have a question also, and different camps, but at least they're having board meetings. They're discussing it. Yeah, they are not dividing. They may be fighting over who gets the lion's share of the budget, but when it's three to two or five to four, at least, that's the way it's going to be until the next election. To some degree, I think there is some good things going on when, when they are meeting regularly, they're discussing and they're not tearing the association apart. But right, yeah, but yeah,

Julie Adamen:

when I talk about the factions, I am talking about that tearing the association apart due to their own political agendas. Got it. And of course, for all you board members out there, what you have to understand is you have to put put forward a a united front. I mean, if you're three, two, or, you know, four, three, whatever size your board is, if you have that, if you're on the losing end of that, that doesn't mean you go around and backbite the other board members behind their back, or you don't start talking about them in the community. You have to pull forward a united front. And so if you're if you homeowners, ask you, Hey, Bob, I thought we weren't going to do that. And Bob like, well, I voted against it. I disagree with it, but we're doing it, so we're moving forward and let go of that. You got to let go of that. That's the only way you're going to have any kind of functionality. So that was one of the things I was talking about, factions and camps and in the community. Another, of course, Robert, this is going to sing to you, is if your dues have remained stagnant for years, meaning, 3458, 10. And this is not unusual, that is a sign of dysfunction. Because, number one, if you don't have enough dues, you cannot take care of the infrastructure, so one follows the other. Not enough money, deteriorating infrastructure. If you have that in your community, it's probably a sign of dysfunction. And I'm gonna let you riff on that, Robert, that's you.

Robert Nordlund:

Yeah, a friend of actually, it was college roommate of my wife, knows what business we're in and called her just a couple of months that's probably more than a couple months ago, about her mother is elderly, and she went down to take care of her mother, clean out her condo in Florida classic. And my wife's college roommate said, you know, the front gate isn't working, the asphalt's crumbling. The building needs painting, and I understand there's roof leaks now, that isn't good, is it? And you know, just the unaware that this place has just been falling apart for years, and that comes back to their focused on the wrong thing, where they're focused on more. Minimizing homeowner assessments, but they're missing the big picture, because a little bit more spent on homeowner assessments would leverage multiple returns in home values, because that condo is now going to sell at a fire sale price, it's going to look lousy, and that's just a foolish decision. But to your point, we're talking about dysfunction. So what does that mean? It means not doing what the association needs to do, not operating in a sustainable way. Okay, that's not exactly right. It and inflation is real. Can't go up, yeah, and your job as a board member is to maintain the assets of the association, the physical and financial assets. So it's a moving target. Every year, things get a little more expensive, the pool service, the janitorial the roof that you thought was going to cost$100,000 last time you got a proposal a couple years ago, and it's now going to be 140,000

Julie Adamen:

at least. At least. Yeah, yeah, exactly right. And so that is a if you are a homeowner or a board member, if you're looking around thinking, oh, boy, things need fixing, and we're not doing it, that is a sign of board dysfunction. Even though all those board members, all five of them, may be right on board with that dysfunction, you may be all voting, well, we're not going to raise assessments. That's dysfunction. Your mission as trustees or fiduciaries is to take care of that community. It's it's assets, meaning that, you know, the hard assets, like the asphalt and the roof and everything we're talking about that way, and then that, the fungible things, the monies that you are collecting, right, and your budget. So you have to understand that is, if you are not looking at what your true duty is as a board member, that's dysfunction, even if all five, if you agree on it, or all seven. But let's see, I put also down here, and this goes kind of to political and staffing, was high board member turnover. If you have high board member turnover, that is usually a sign of dysfunction, because there's probably factions, there's probably disorganization, I mean, and we've talked about this several times, Robert, is that for all you board members out there, think about it. If you want to get off the board because you've been on it for five or six, seven years, you're you need to bring people up. And if your board meetings are contentious, or they're hardly ever held, or they're hardly ever held, and contentious, and they go on for four or five hours and you have 200 units, I mean, that is just, that's dysfunction right there. And where do homeowners and potential board members see you guys in action? They see you at a board meeting, and if it's four or five hours, that's something they do not want to be a part of. So you're not attracting new people on that. So that's I use that staffing is a volunteer staffing. That's what I meant by that. But so that is another sign of of dysfunction for a board is the opposite true? Yes, the opposite can be true, because we just touched on that a little while ago. We were off camera and talking about this, is it so? Okay, let's say you have had the same three board members, five board members for the last 20 years. That probably is not a sign of a good, functioning community canopy. Yes, sometimes it works really well, but for the most part, if the same people are running the community year after year after year, there is no obviously, we all say we need new blood. There is no new blood. And new blood really brings a lot to the table, people with new ideas, and also they may be representative of how the community has changed. So let's say we have five board members, and everybody is bought in 30 years ago. Maybe they retired in the last 20 years, and their life is completely different, and now whole new group of people are moving in, and they've got kids, yeah, so they have a whole different aspect of of the living within that building or within that community. So new blood is a good thing, and you existing board members should always be okay to bring in some new blood. So that's another one. You were gonna say something about that. I

Robert Nordlund:

think Robert, yeah, I was thinking, they have kids. They have dogs. Yeah, they bought at $400,000 and that's very different from the president who bought 25 years ago and it was $75,000 they have just a whole different view of what the association is. These families bought there for a very different reason, and they are not burdened or saddled with the baggage of remembering back when the monthly assessments were$100 a month, because we don't live in that reality anymore. The reality is they're 252 75 and they probably need to go up to 350 or 375 so having too much institutional knowledge sometimes can be dangerous.

Julie Adamen:

Yeah, as long as you're holding on to it like it's got to be this way forever. But you see that a lot. I mean, that's real common in our business, our industry, is so difficult for people who manage as managers or as service providers like Robert and I, are, I used to be a manager as well. Is that, you know, we deal with people's finances and their living arrangements, and there's not really anything more personal than those two things.

Robert Nordlund:

We could be. Preaching to them too, and that's about, yeah, the only way we can make it more sensitive, yeah,

Julie Adamen:

yeah, yeah, exactly. So, I mean, it's, it's, and as board members, you need to realize that too. That's a reason it's so difficult for people to become board members and be able to, you know, to administrate well, is because people are very ticked off, and if something happens that they don't like, because it was that way when they moved in 15 years ago. I mean literally, people saying, I don't want you to rip out that carpet, because my husband was still alive, and that's where we walked in the first time, and I just loved it, literally, is that kind of thing? Yeah, so. But So bringing in new people gives older board members, or I would say, more seasoned board members, or people who've lived in the community a long time. It gives them a new perspective. And to put a fine point on that, the association I'm in, their committee, asked me if I wanted to be on, wanted to run for the board. Interesting, because I'm, I'm, oh yeah, I'm gonna do it. Oh yeah, okay, it's me, of course. Yeah, let me,

Robert Nordlund:

let me touch on that. It takes time, but you would be an incredible asset to the board, and you bought a home there, and you care about the well being of the association, the future of the association. And when you're talking about the culture of who's there, we no longer have people who largely go to work during the day. There's just the culture of people more comfortable with technology and working from home and consulting and all these kinds of things. You represent a lot of good things.

Julie Adamen:

I mean, I'm not necessarily any younger than some of these people, but I have been I'm still working at my age, and it's older than you people think. I think Robert and I are the same age. I think we are

Robert Nordlund:

the podcast people the audio people are wondering, huh? Maybe I should check out the YouTube and see what they look like.

Julie Adamen:

Exactly. Don't, don't look too closely. Yeah. I was telling stoke like, please get me a filter, yeah, blur it, yeah. Give me the, give me the story. Sand effect, yeah, but, but I am when, well, you know, and I actually applied last year, but this association has a really good rule that you have to live here a year before you could be on the board, which is, Wow, it's really smart. And I was like, congratulations. That's great, yeah, and so, but they called, they called me and asked me if I wanted to throw my hat there. So I still work. I work out of my house. I'm very comfortable technology, and it's different than other people who've been out of the workforce for 20 years and they're still my age. I mean, there are still people who, you know, they retired at some ridiculously young age or 1012, years ago, and things have happened so quickly, technology, technology wise, and being comfortable and familiar with it that so it brings a new aspect. So back off. Back off that subject now, but the last thing I wanted to say was, let's see, do's remain, staying. Oh, oh, and this is a huge sign of dysfunction. If there is little to no communication coming from the board to the membership, and I mean regular, well thought out communication, and if there, I mean, I will say, the community I'm in, we get more communication than you could possibly imagine. It's really good, and we get an email probably some people think it's too much, but my opinion, there's never too much. Half the people delete it anyway. If your board is not communicating, that means they are lacking. And if you're these board members, you got to think it's you're you're lacking or not putting to use your managerial acumen to manage large groups of people. And make no mistake, you are managing the people as well as all the money and the projects and the infrastructure. You're managing all these other folks, one way or the other, and they have to be brought into the process of the association, right? So you need to once you bring them in through communication, they're not at the next board meeting with their torches and pitchforks wondering why the assessments have to go up 100 bucks or whatever. It doesn't matter what it is, regular communication to the owners is just imperative. And if you're not doing it, it's gonna it's gonna contribute or even begin the dysfunction that you will experience. And it's not those of you out there who have sat on dysfunctional boards or are sitting on dysfunctional boards. I'm really sorry we could. I mean that there, there is help for that. But if any of these things rings a bell for you, you need to start looking inside and going, what can we do to maybe fix that? Because we don't have x or we, you know, oh my gosh, we need maybe to recruit new people, or whatever it is, you can be fixed. It can be fixed. It takes some time, but it can be fixed. Yeah,

Robert Nordlund:

well, Julie, I'm glad you touched on that, because I have my own list here, and the communication is a big one on my list, but I want to return back to communication. But right now it's time to hear from one of our generous sponsors, after which we'll be back with more HOA insights. Is

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Robert Nordlund:

Now we're back. Well, Julie, I want to return to that idea of communication. There's a lot of different ways you can look at it. One is as a task, a good task to do, but I think there's also something that is good for the community. And can I get you to touch on what happens when you don't have communication? Is that when the rumor mill starts? No, that's

Julie Adamen:

exactly when the rumor mill starts, and it usually starts about 5pm at cocktail hour, and it grows exponentially. I'm not kidding. It's it grows exponentially. All you board members know I'm telling the truth out there about five o'clock to about 730 and that's when you don't want to answer your phone or check your text because you know somebody's gonna get on here for something. But if you don't, if you don't fill that vacuum, rumor, innuendo, outright lies, will just go right into that vacuum. You know, nature of wars, a vacuum. So you want to fill that vacuum first. And I mean this on a regular basis, even if you're like, well, there's nothing really going on in the community. I beg to differ, because there are human beings that live in that community, and something's always going on

Robert Nordlund:

with them. Things always going on. And even

Julie Adamen:

if you don't, if there's nothing giant or pressing communication coming out from the board, I'd say, via email. That's almost how everyone does it now. Or you post it on your website, or you do wherever else you have to do that. It all at least once a month. Now, if you are dealing with something big, like a big problem, a big project, and a lot of people are going to be affected by the problem or the project, or everyone's affected by the dues increase, that's when your communication really needs to ramp up. Now, Robert, you were just, we were just talking about that association in Florida, right? Why don't you tell that story? That's really good.

Robert Nordlund:

Yeah, well, the different things going on, I could tell so many stories, but yeah, so much turns on communication, getting in front of the story, making sure the owners know what's going on, so they don't reach out to the news media and start complaining about the board, if you are being proactive. And every way, every way you can think of on the association's website, with email blasts on the mailboxes in the lobby, on the door, from the garage to the lobby all these different ways. If you can say we are working on this project, we're aware the pool isn't heated. We're aware that the spa is out of commission. We expect it fixed by Tuesday of next week. Get ahead of this, and there's just so much good that comes from being proactive in your communication, and so the rumor mill doesn't start and all of a sudden, like you say, you've got tortures and pitchforks and they're coming for you, and not because you did anything wrong, but you just failed to include them. And these are grownups, and I believe we've had other episodes here where we talked about the importance of treating your owners like grown ups, giving them the respect they paid as much money for their well, maybe more, maybe less for their units as you did, and they're legitimate owners in the association. And so if you can build community, we are here, and you build that trust by saying, I've done this, I've done this, I've done this, I've done this, or I should say, we've done this as a board. Then you get the Association on your side and you think, Ah, they're doing okay. I'm, yeah, everything's okay here. I'm

Julie Adamen:

either people are like, I'm proud to be a part of this, or I like being a part of it. And if you are going to be doing something or where the spot doesn't work, it's going to be working by next Tuesday. Just remember for all of your communication if this, if something happens and that spa is not going to work on Tuesday, someone needs to have that in their tickler, or roll up on their in on their Microsoft product, or whatever they're using to change all that communication to the most updated. There is nothing worse and nothing that makes the board look more out of touch than communication that's posted up somewhere that's about two months old. It's you're not in a doctor's office. We do not need, you know, two year old magazines So, but

Robert Nordlund:

so you don't you want to be communicating accurately. So if on Monday you get a call from the pool service saying that part that we needed is not going to arrive till next week. You need to change all your signs and say we're sorry, because you want to be teaching them, training them, that what they hear from you is the truth, and you don't want to be training them to ignore and gee, the board has no idea what's going on, just like you say old wrong, that kind of stuff. So communication is a wonderful, powerful tool. I don't think in this episode we can Well, we've talked about three things. We've talked about the organizational health, which is silos, and taking good care of your manager, and vice versa, having good. Communication. And we've talked about financial and physical having the financial resources to take care of the property so that you look around, you say, Oh, the front gates fixed.

Unknown:

Cool. Yeah.

Robert Nordlund:

Is that nice? That's nice, yeah, so great. And they don't eat. Communication, you say, Oh yeah, that's right, they were going to fix that. Or you can be dead, yeah, or you come back and your driveway is blocked off because, Oh, that's right, they said they were going to sealcoat the asphalt this week. Okay, you're right. They told me, Well, good for them. All those things work effectively, because when you have accurate communication, then you're able to say, well, to take care of the asphalt, we're going to have to this is one of the many reasons we need to raise our assessments next year from an estimated making numbers up 350, to 382, or whatever the number is, keep them in the loop. And so the communication loop, the physical and financial loop, the organizational health loop, those three things work together. So again, we're not talking about the trivia of is the financial report exactly correct? Now we had to bounce it back. Okay, let me run through my list. No board meetings, no elections, no competitive elections, no communication between board and homeowners, no meeting notes, no financial reports, no budget no delinquency controls. So when you ask them, if you have 80 units in the association, how many people are currently paying their dues, and if you don't know, that's a problem, you should know. You should know. Got to know, cash flow is lifeblood, and then the supporting committees. No like no Architectural Review Board, no rules committee, no increases in assessment the last few years, no reserve study, cycling through the service providers and management companies. When you are a pendulum and you're firing here and firing there, your association is going to get a reputation as just a hot mess, and that's not good. No rules or rules enforcement, absence of supporting professionals, where you have no management, no attorney, no insurance expert, no reserve study professional, and that floats into no painter that you can rely on, no landscaper that you can rely on, no plumber that you can rely on. Because when you call on a Friday night saying, we have a burst in front of building 13, you want the plumber to say, Oh, good. I know where that is. I can help you those mature relationships focus only on the low monthly assessments. That's destructive. I had my list. You had your list. Again, I think, can we fairly categorize them into three things?

Julie Adamen:

Weekend, about three strands, and that's exactly the one you brought up. That's super good. I want to say, is that relationship with the business partners, vendors, those relationships and see if, if your board is functional, if your community is functional, that means, typically, you have management that's functional, hopefully management that's functional, and all of these other and your finances are good, that means you have people want to come in and work for you. And again, as Robert said, Would you call in at five o'clock on a Friday and that guy's, you know, towing his boat out to the lake. He may come back around because he knows that you guys pay on time. You're great to work with. He doesn't mind taking time out of his personal time to do the work, and then he's going to go out gap to the lake. I'm telling you those when I was way back in the day, when I was actually a manager, those kind of relationships are absolute gold for an HOA, absolutely

Robert Nordlund:

yeah. Okay, well, we tempted people at the beginning with ideas of what to do. Yeah, I think we've given everyone kind of a nice list, if they listen to this a second time, maybe. But if you realize, if we don't have communication vehicles, if we don't have a budget, if we don't know how many delinquencies we have, all these kinds of things and, Oh gee, if we don't have committees, if I've been on the board too long, or everyone here is always just lasting one term, because it's such a man killer of a job. Hopefully these are the things that you can start to think, Hmm, start tackling them. But Julie, if you could only attack one thing. What would you do? It? What would you do? First,

Julie Adamen:

communicate,

Robert Nordlund:

I'm there too. Yes, you can at least say we are going to do a better job. You could start with that. And we're going to form a budget committee. We're going to form a rules committee. We're thinking about hiring a management company, whatever it is, but start to treat the association as a we and get everyone together and on board, and I think that begins to create the glue anyway. But yeah, it's

Julie Adamen:

where you're right. No, it is. It's you're absolutely right. And the communication starts first, and people will be blown away by the communication if your association has not done it. And. Quite a while, they'll be like, Wow, they actually deem to talk with us, yeah, and treat us like grown ups, yeah, treat us like grown ups. And they'll some of them may not act like grown ups, but it but the thing is, as a whole, this is what you need to do. You got to set your sights, as Robert was saying, it's not, not on the micro. You want to set your sights on the macro. The macro is not well, you know, there's a dot missing here on the minutes, or, you know, there were $4 off in the financial statements, which you will see. And Robert, I know, you know this is that a lot of board members become very comfortable with focusing on the micro because that's comfortable for them. They're not really comfortable spending 150,000 on a roofing project because they've never had that experience before. But it is your juveniles Think bigger, to think bigger. Which brings me last thing, you had future ideas about doing core values and planning. I think we should do a whole talk about

Robert Nordlund:

that. Yeah, building community. Yep. Julie, as always, it's fascinating here. I think we're a little bit over time, but this is sorry, no no no, yeah, this is all good stuff. So any closing thoughts, we've got that idea about communication is the first place to start. And we can talk about the idea of core values, anything go along with that launch of committee. Or,

Julie Adamen:

I would say, strategic planning. I that's, I mean, I do that, if I've done that several times for boards, is to facilitate that kind of thing, and associations that never big ones and small ones that never have had any kind of a plan for the future. Because honestly, what happens a lot is that, you know, one board will make all these big plans, and they'll set forth a three or five year plan on what we're going to do and how we're going to pay for it, and what our fiscal reality is going to look like, what our infrastructure is going to look like through these different programs. And then a new board comes in and they just bang it, which is true, that does happen. I'm not going to say it doesn't. However, if you set that stage, at least you are giving new board members and a whole new board coming in, at least a structure for operations, a structure for administration of the community, and meaning in all senses, communication, staffing, meaning homeowner, staffing board. Remember staffing that kind of thing. So that's, that's where I would go with the next part, strategic planning, three to five year plan, mission statement, vision statement, I would go through the whole process. It's really a great thing to see communities do that. They become very cohesive. Yeah.

Robert Nordlund:

Well, this is an Olympic year. We're going to see, or have seen, relay races on the track, relay races in the swimming pool, when you can hand something off with momentum, which is that core purpose. This is what we're all about. I think that's when the community association can absolutely thrive.

Julie Adamen:

Great alliteration. Robert, that was perfect. Perfect.

Robert Nordlund:

I have to listen to it and see what I said. Well, we hope you learned some HOA insights from our discussion today that helps you bring common sense to your common areas. We look forward to having you join us for another great episode next week.

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