Re: How does your community handle finances?
From: Craig Ragland (craigraglandgmail.com)
Date: Fri, 1 May 2009 07:34:42 -0700 (PDT)
Songaia is similar to Heartwood, except we've never paid for
bookkeeping - its always been volunteer. To date, its been done by two
members, one of our less physically able members and another who's
interested in the bigger picture, annual budget support, various
systems, reserve studies, etc. They act as a sub-committee which is
accountable to our leadership team, the Navigators.

Our late fee is a percentage of what is owed (don't remember), with a
monthly minimum payment. At one point a few of us were worried about
late payments - the magnitude of our "accounts receivables." I had a
philosophical conversation with the "bigger picture" person - and it
really shifted the way I looked at "late fees."

I now see them as offering ourselves a form of revolving credit, sort
of like a credit card, except the spending rate is capped by the size
of the monthly assessment, making it harder to truly get into trouble
- and we do talk also with those who get more than a few months
behind. There is no defined "credit limit" and hopefully that will
never become an issue.

Since we have never spent as much as we've budgeted, its theoretically
possible for our accounts to carry quite a bit of this type of credit
without messing up our cash-flow. Nobody's credit load has just kept
increasing month over month for very long - so far, people who've
fallen behind a few months have been able to catch up again.

By the way, another helpful "innovation" was to allow different
payment due dates. While most are on a simple beginning of month
cycle, others have due dates that are tuned it to their pay cycles.
This lessened the number of late payments - its easier for some to pay
bills shortly after they've just been paid.

In (financial) sustainability,

Craig

On Fri, May 1, 2009 at 7:00 AM, Mac Thomson <mac [at] heartwoodcohousing.com> 
wrote:
>
> We have have a 24 household HOA.  We used to hire a bookkeeper, but
> now we have a member who does it for free.
>
> We charge members a $15 late fee if they haven't paid by the 15th of
> the month.  If they get behind in payments by a couple of months, we
> also begin a conversation with them to get them caught up.
>
> Cheers,
> Mac
>
> --
> Mac Thomson
>
> Heartwood Cohousing
>
> On May 1, 2009, at 4:16 AM, cohousing-l-request [at] cohousing.org wrote:
>
>> Date: Fri, 1 May 2009 01:31:08 EDT
>> From: NetiPotLady [at] aol.com
>>
>> Our community, up until now has had a management company collect dues,
>> write checks to reimburse members for expenditures, pay bills,  keep
>> the  books
>> etc. We'd like to hear how other communities handle these tasks. Do
>> you
>> have people in the community manage these things? Do you employ a
>> bookkeeper?
>> What do you do when people are overdue paying their dues/fees (we
>> are a COA
>> and  so have monthly COA fees)?
>>
>> Gina Kruse,
>> Stone Curves  Cohousing
>> Tucson,  AZ

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