HOA MC's and the Revolutionary Apps

A few days ago I heard from Gina who is a PCAM, which means she's a Professional Community Association Manager, working in business development and flogging what she called her app. She instantly recognized the ugly side of HOA's due to lack of communication but failed to mention anything about board bullies. She went on to say "I happily provide the communication portions of the app which include notifications, two way communication, document storage etc. to associations for free." I sent her notice out to my connections to ferret out what we could and we found some interesting information.

First this app TownSq was bought by a major HOA industry player, Associa, who coincidently empowers the HOA companies it manages using the app (Associa also owns utility companies, insurance companies, Associa-on-call which I assume is 24 hr emergency contractors, collection services, community archives which might be like genealogy LOL, title services, a bank and a construction firm. Looks to me as though they have a plan to take over the world. They ultimately have final say over the direction of that friendly sounding app. That led me to speculate that volunteer Board of Directors who are being sold these apps independent of the MC butare actually a long-term target of major MC's like Associa. This isn't the only app like this ... many similar services are cropping up, claiming they will revolutionize the HOA industry. They might just clean out your wallet. Here's an on-line question that was asked and answered when we did our research: Will I incur fees when I pay my HOA Assessment thru Xxxxxx? A. When making on line payments there is a convenience fee of $2.95 + 3.5% of the total payment amount. When making a payment via ACH, a cash discount of 3.5% is applied resulting in a net convenience fee of $2.95, after the cash discount has been applied.

Make of that what you will. I only hope your Board of Directors will be skeptical of these kinds of services. It's always better to self-manage, but even that doesn't assure Members of the Board won't hide documents, won't embezzle and won't intimidate HO's with threats or use contractors to get additional free or heavily discounted personal services.

HOA communication and bullying can only be corrected if and when BofD's and/of MCs decide they will communicate and be transparent. That will never happen until until Legislators put teeth in the State Statutes and Insurers refuse insurance to HOA's that have been sued.

If you have suffered HOA abuse, contact HOATruth.com. Dennis Legere is the principal advocate. Or you can reach me at EarsUp@iCloud.com. Full disclosure, neither are attorneys. We do this bc we don't like bullies. FREE.