Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: a slush fund for temporary financial relief

[Katie Henry (katie-henry]

Good point about maintenance. You would want to have everyone in the same 
twice-a-year service contract and have the provider report user issues, such as 
really dirty filters. 
[everyone else stop reading now] TVC has an individual loop for each unit, so 
each unit owner has more responsibility. EVC has one giant loop that serves the 
entire building. Pressure in the loop is centrally monitored and water is 
automatically added as needed. An alarm is triggered if excess water is being 
lost. The only possible user intervention is changing the filter. So there are 
fewer variables.
Interesting idea about making the heat pumps common property. I wonder what 
Stan would say. I think I like the idea.
Katie
      From: Sharon Villines <sharon [at] sharonvillines.com>
 To: Katie Henry <katie-henry [at] att.net>; cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org 
 Sent: Friday, October 20, 2017 6:00 PM
 Subject: Re: [C-L]_ a slush fund for temporary financial relief
   

> On Oct 20, 2017, at 4:18 PM, Katie Henry <katie-henry [at] att.net> wrote:
> 
> I had a proposal that never got off the ground, but I still think it was a 
> good idea -- the community should self-insure the equipment. Say there are 55 
> dwelling units in the building and a total of 70 heat pumps. Each unit owner 
> pays $50 per year per heat pump, which puts $3,500 into the self-insurance 
> fund per year, which then would reimburse members for heat pump 
> repair/replacement.

One way to do this would be to declare the heat pumps common property and 
include them in the reserve and maintenance study.

The problem with heat pumps inside units is that (1) the owners can misuse 
them, and some people may value a higher quality. I would find it difficult to 
take on expenses that involved the irresponsible actions of others. Not 
accidents but ignoring proper use requirements.

The issue here is that the owner owns the furnace and the association owns the 
loops. The association has no plan for inspecting the loops. If there is a leak 
in the loops it can damage the furnace. The lack of water in the loops is 
discovered too late. Who is responsible?

Sharon
----
Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org