Due to the poor economy, the foreclosure crisis and a growing amount of owner delinquencies, community associations are considering ways to lower their expenses in ways that would not be considered before. Today, Boards are open to lowering their overhead in creative ways that will lessen the impact of their association receiving lower assessment income. Consider these suggestions before you ratify your 2010 budget;
1. Begin to “Piggy Back” your mailings. For example, combine mailings for 2 meetings in one package. Or Notices with newsletters and other announcements. Assessment coupons and meeting notices. The point is to combine and save on paper, postage and labor.
2. Begin to utilize as much as you can by communicating through email to your owners in order to cut down on paper, copies, postage and labor. There are cheap email programs that you can use to coordinate, manage and send mass email messages to your owners.
3. Have your management company cut down on the amount of site visits during the month. This should result in a lowering of the management fees.
4. If you have a manager that is on-site for a certain amount of hours, consider cutting back on the time/hours and there will be a savings.
5. We now see many companies and several associations going to 4 day work weeks or 6 hour days. No one wants their income reduced, but this is a better alternative to being let go and not having a job at all.
6. Same as #5 for maintenance, janitorial and security personnel.
7. Have your landscaper provide prices for less mowing, bed cleaning and reduced amounts of other services. December, January and February are months that can have reduced landscape services that do not impact the overall appearance of the community.
8. Consider reducing the amount of site visits and pool cleanings from your pool maintenance company. Have your pool company as the Licensee (responsible for the Chemicals & Repairs) and your maintenance people trained to do the cleaning. Your pool maintenance company will reduce their service costs this way.
9. Meet with your insurance agent and see if your insurance deductibles can be raised and what the impact will be on your insurance premiums. Depending on what you decide, there could be a large savings. Also, consider having an insurance appraisal done, as costs and values are down and your insurance premiums should go down too.
10. Maybe this is the year to waive, partially fund or fund only the important reserve components. If possible, have a Review instead of an Audit. Or Waive this entirely.
I understand that we have all become accustomed to a certain level of service in the association where we live. But at this point in time, this is very hard to maintain or achieve when there is a high level of owners who are late or not paying their assessments at all. We all have to learn to live with a little less nowadays and these are some suggestions to help your association to get through this difficult time.
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