As a member of a condo it is my dream and fantasy to keep our maintenance fees low and avoid the necessity of special assessments.  I never want to see my monthly fees go up, and it terrifies me that I could get slapped with a special assessment of an unknown amount.  I also wish for world peace, a cure for all diseases, and an end to world hunger.  Unfortunately, as noble as these dreams may be I know that they are not possible.  So what to do?

Although our expertise is in community association collections our Senior Management Team are experts in money management, and after all when we recover association funds there are things you should know.  So here are some commonly asked questions and answers that we get from boards of directors regarding reserves:

1) What types of bank accounts are operating funds and reserve funds held in, respectively?

Answer:  Association funds should be held in financially stable, federally or state chartered banks and/or savings and loans that provide government guarantee on deposits.  As importantly, they should NOT be comingled and transferring money from the reserve account to the association’s operating account should not be a simply task to be accomplished by just one board member.  Therefore, the financial institution the association utilizes should have appropriate control procedures available to the association to make sure at minimum two active board members are involved with any transfers out OR between their bank accounts.