September 2021 | Goodwin & Company

1. We Help You Invest in Preventative Maintenance

Although preventative maintenance requires some money spent to preserve an investment, it actually saves your association tons of money in the long term.

Preventative maintenance like filling in potholes in the neighborhood or electrical and plumbing inspections of common areas helps preserve the integrity of your community, keeps members comfortable, and saves money by preventing future, larger repairs.

2. We Eliminate Several Paper Costs

While it may not seem like much on the surface, the cost of printing flyers, postcards, and invoices throughout the year can quickly eat up a good chunk of your budget.

Many HOA management companies save associations thousands in office expenses through the use of online portals.

Online portals eliminate the need for pen and paper communication and offer instant, simple methods for association members to make dues payments, check up on violations, review community notices, and more!

3. We Ensure an Association Always has the Best Vendor Contracts

When negotiated without the help of an experienced management team, vendor and insurance contracts can become an expense that associations end up stuck with until it’s time to renew. Even then, they could fall into the same expensive mistake and lose even more money in the next year.

An association management team should come with several reliable vendor relationships and a plan of attack for vendor and insurance negotiations. We can help you review all bids and make sure that your final decisions are both within your annual budget and the best choice for your organization.

4. Monthly or Quarterly Budget Reviews

While your association may already have annual budget creation down, there should still be monthly or quarterly budget reviews that ensure your budget is on track to meet your goals.

Fortunately, many association management teams have connections with experienced financial advisors that can help facilitate planned budget reviews for your community.

These reviews are important because hindsight is always 20/20. What you may think you needed at the beginning of the year, maybe something that could be trimmed from your budget right now.

Regular reviews not only keep you in the loop about the status of your budget but also prevent your association from running low on cash when it comes to paying vendors and handling emergency association incidents.

Put Your Association’s Budget to Better Use With Goodwin & Company

If your association is ready to save money without having to delve into the complexities of excess accounting, let the team at Goodwin & Company help!

We’ve helped associations of all sizes save money and put it towards the further improvement of their communities.

Contact us today to learn more about our management style and how we can help your association become the best it can be!

An annual HOA budget helps an association determine how much to charge owners for their annual dues and how much money is available to complete projects and cover emergency situations throughout the year.

Your association’s annual budget is likely something that adjusts from year to year. So, taking some time to plan out your community’s finances is essential.

While this task may seem daunting to the average board member; the help of your association management team and their financial connections can quickly bring together a workable budget.

Here are a few of our top tips for approaching annual budgets and ensuring that your association is in a position to succeed in its coming year.

Have the Right Team on the Job

When planning a budget, there has to be a specific group of people on the project. This task force will be solely dedicated to planning the community’s budget. This budgeting team that will lead your association to success should include:

Board members
The Board President
The Board Treasurer
Finance and budget committee leads

Reserve Time for a Budget Session

Planning out your association’s budget isn’t something that your board can add to its next scheduled board meeting. This process is going to take time and should have 100 percent attention devoted to its completion.

Make sure that the task force in charge of organizing the budget reserves a specific time to discuss the budget and build it out for the good of the community.

Examine the Actual Expenses From the Last Year

It’s always important to look back on the previous year when looking ahead at the next. The actual expenses that your association accumulated paint an accurate picture of what you can expect for your next budget.

From vendor charges to insurance premiums, the receipts your board has saved over the last year can help you start to determine what it’s going to cost to keep your association fruitful.

Looking back on the last year and prior year’s dues delinquency trends can also help your team predict how much money needs to be set aside to ensure that the community’s needs are met while your management team actively pursues cash owed to the association.

Line Up the Next Year’s Major Projects

Every association has a lineup of projects and maintenance needs to complete throughout the year. Take a moment to prioritize the projects that must be finished by year’s end and plan out the estimated costs of each.

If a project requires the use of a vendor, reach out to them and send requests for proposals. You want to make sure that this aspect of your budget is precisely planned out so that your community can afford to keep up its property value with annual improvements and repairs.

Make Sure Your Budget Has Planned for the Unexpected

Whether this year brings in an influx of unexpected dues delinquencies or your community faces extensive repairs after a natural disaster, your budget must always have a cushion to protect your community from the unexpected.

Your HOA management’s financial team can help you review your past year’s spending and determine how much money your association can set aside for emergencies. In most cases, if your association has been managed wisely, the funds are there, the trick is merely knowing where to allocate them.

Budget Your Association for Success With Goodwin & Company

If you are an association board member that knows your community needs help building a budget, let the experts of Goodwin & Company show your community ways to save money.

We are one of Dallas’ leading HOA management companies and have provided the highest quality of service to our clients since 1991. From budgeting to community outreach, we are ready to help you excel.