7 Mistakes New HOA Board Members Should Avoid to Ensure a Long Honeymoon Period

Congrats, you’re the newest HOA board member in your community! Chances are if you made the move to get elected to the board, there was a reason why you wanted to get involved in your community—whether there were specific changes you wanted to be a part of or you just wanted to volunteer to make your neighborhood a better place. Whatever your motivation, though, there’s a lot of responsibility that comes with being a board member. For most people, it’s completely new territory and can start to seem overwhelming fast.

To help you have the best experience possible as a new board member, we’ve put together a list of 7 of the most common mistakes to avoid. Making an effort to steer clear of these mistakes will make your efforts much more productive and will hopefully keep you from feeling burnt out or frustrated.

1. Not Focusing on Learning Before Doing

You wouldn’t take your vehicle to someone who has never done an oil change and expect them to do it correctly, would you? No! As a newly elected member, you’ve probably never taken a class titled, “How to Be an HOA Board Member.” To do your job the best way possible, it’s important that you take the time to learn about how your association works first before you take action.

All new board members should seek guidance from their management company. Look for materials, like the blog, that teach them the basics of your roles and responsibilities, how to run board meetings, how to read financial statements, etc. Remember: educated board members are the best board members!

2. Being Overzealous

Enthusiasm is a great quality for new board members to have, but having too much can get you in trouble. A lot of new board members make the mistake of doing too much too soon, or even trying to do more than the governing documents permit them to do. If there are issues with the community that you’re really passionate about, make sure you have the authority from the governing documents to actually enact change—some issues may be totally outside the board’s authority. And when it comes to creating and enforcing new policies, remember that good decisions take time. Residents need to understand and be “on board” (pun intended) with your new ideas, too.

3. Changing Policies Before Understanding Them

Try to avoid going into “bulldoze” mode as a new HOA board member where you seek to get complete fresh start with past policies. There may be existing policies you don’t necessarily agree with, but that doesn’t always mean there isn’t a good reason for them to be the way they are. It’s important to understand the background of why a policy is the way it is before you change it. You’ll probably be surprised to find that previous boards have implemented it that way for good reason.

4. Making Rash Decisions about Vendors

Even if you didn’t agree with how the previous board members ran things, don’t automatically pass that judgement onto the vendors they chose. Before you jump the gun and let go of your previous vendors like landscapers, CPAs, etc., make sure you meet with them and understand what direction they were receiving from the previous board. Your community management company should be able to offer some perspective. It’s likely that these vendors were just doing things as they were told by the previous board, but they can usually modify things to your preferences. If after you’ve given your vendors or HOA management company some time and you don’t feel they are fulfilling their promises then work with your community manager to get some bids.

5. Not Learning from Their Predecessors

Just because you didn’t agree with everything the previous board did doesn’t mean you can’t learn from them. Take time to understand their history with the association. Do your part to read through meeting minutes and notes so you can get a bigger picture of how their decisions affected the community, whether positively or negatively. Your management company should post previous meeting minutes on your community website as part of their service.

6. Only Looking at Short-Term Finances

A lot of new HOA boards make the mistake of adopting the “now” mentality for changes that involve finances rather than looking at how those changes will impact the HOA’s finances 5 or 10 years down the road. There will always be a way to justify spending the money now by saying, “Well, the neighborhood really needs this,” or “Homeowners won’t stop asking for this.” Be careful that you don’t do more harm than good for your association in the long run by not looking at the long-term financial impact.

7. Not Focusing on Transparency

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that the HOA board is an exclusive club where secrecy is permissible. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. You want residents in your association to get the feeling that your board is doing the right thing, so transparency should always be a top priority. A good rule of thumb is just to assume that any issue your board deals with will get discussed publicly. That way, board members won’t get in the habit of just sweeping things under the rug. Remember, your role as a board member is to serve.

By following these few tips, you’re setting yourself up for success as a new HOA board member and ensuring that you’ll feel both productive and adequate in your new role. Still have questions about your new position as a board member or find that you’re not getting the support you need from your existing HOA management company? Contact Spectrum! We’re proud to offer some of the industry’s best board member training resources and our team is dedicated to making your job easier.