HOA documents can easily become confused, and messy which leads to hard copies getting lost. This can get the community association into legal trouble. Your HOA’s document storage must be well-organized, and keeping copies online helps to ensure that they’re accessible and easy to find.

Common Issues with HOA Document Storage

Having lots of different boards change over and community association management companies come in and out of your HOA can lead to files being disorganized or misplaced. One board might organize documents by year, another by type, and another just puts them in one big folder. The other problem is that physical files can get lost, damaged, or destroyed. When documents pass from one board director to the next, they can easily disappear and never be seen again. 

The other problem is how boring it is to file and reorganize documents. Boards can easily not file documents and just push them into boxes or folders at random. Or they might follow a filing system that’s not very good and not bother to change it because there are more important things to do.

This may be true, but it can lead to legal problems if documents are missing. You need to keep legal, financial, and correspondence files for around 5 years depending on the rules in your state. 

How should I organize my HOA’s documents?

There isn’t one way to file your HOA’s documents, but filing by legal, financial, maintenance, correspondence, and miscellaneous is a good system. Then you should have years as subcategories. This works well for physical documents and also the ones that you have scanned. By looking into your state’s rules, you can discover how long you need to keep your records.

Correct document storage in your HOA will help you, future board members, and your property manager. It can help you avoid legal issues. Even though organizing them is a dull task it is a great legacy to pass down to future boards. It also allows you to be more productive and efficient, if there’s ever a discussion over who said what in a meeting, then you can find the minutes very fast.

Read on to find out more about how to store physical copies and how using an online system can save you time and stress.

HOA Document Storage: Physical Copies

You must check your state laws to see what needs to be kept and for how long. Ask a lawyer if you’re unsure. You can also check with your property management company to see if they could store your papers. Once you’ve talked to a lawyer then you can decide which papers are fine just being stored online. If you’re sure that it’s alright to just have them online then you can shred the originals. 

If you feel safer keeping your paper records in your HOA then you need to file them in a dry, water, and fireproof cabinet to make sure that they’re stored properly and can’t be damaged. They need to be filed well so that you save time when searching for them. This should be done by date and category, with a clear system in place that should be written down and taped on the cabinet that they’re kept in.

Store HOA Documents Online

Keeping documents digitally can hugely help you and all future board members to ensure that they’re organized and all in the right place. It ensures that they’re secure on a password-protected system, backed up so they can’t be lost, they’re safe from damage and they can only be viewed by the correct people. You can have folders that residents can access and others that are just for the board.

Solutions like Google Drive, or Dropbox, can be a great help as they’re free for a certain time. Also, they’re secure systems and you can control who has access. However, they’re not perfect as they aren’t made for HOAs.

How Neigbrs by Vinteum can help

Ideally, you should look into software that does more than just HOA document storage. Neigbrs by Vinteum is an all-in-one communication and management platform. You can send emails, texts, and calls to residents, manage maintenance requests and create an easy-to-use, modern website.

That way you get more than just simple document storage, you get a place to centralize all communication, where residents can easily find information that they need, saving time and improving satisfaction.

With software, you can sort your documents into folders and decide who has access. For instance, governing documents should be available to the whole community, but financial information or legal issues may be restricted to certain groups, such as committee or board members, and your manager. You can send notifications when a new document is posted, sort them into folders, and add links.

With Neigbrs by Vinteum, you gain a software partner. During our white-glove onboarding, we set up your document section for you, and organize it in a way that works best for you.

Wrapping Up HOA document storage

Keeping your HOA document storage well organized will help board members, and community managers save time when searching for a document. It also helps residents when they request to consult a document, as they will receive it faster, improving their satisfaction. If you keep documents online residents won’t need to request to view the document, they would be able to find it themselves, cutting red tape and saving everyone time.

Discover our solution to all your communication, management, and storage problems in your HOA. Book your free demo of Neigbrs by Vinteum, and find out how we can help you improve your community.