Summary of Finance Committee Meeting of 4 April 2006

 

Present:

            Finance Committee:  Phyllis Benaman, John Frisch, Sanya Ham, Don Horan, Jim Pierce

            Board of Directors (BoD):  Mal Malo

 

Subsequent Member Fee (Resale Transfer Fee):  Pat McCord, local Realtor and Falls Run resident, was invited to explain the process of reselling a Falls Run residence from the perspective of making sure the Falls Run Community Association (FRCA) collects the Subsequent Member Fee, 1/3 of 1% of the selling price, associated with most sales.  This fee is described in the Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions (C, C, & Rs) for Falls Run, Section 8.6 of the original version and Section 7.4 of the version of 13 February 2006.  Pat gave a very clear and thorough description of the process, as follows.  Almost all sales involve a selling real estate agent who will list the property in the Real Estate Multiple Listing Service (MRIS).  A knowledgeable agent will also notify CondoCerts at the beginning of the sales process.  CondoCerts is a central data center for communities with homeowners associations, such as Falls Run.  Since Falls Run is registered with CondoCerts, Koger Management will then be notified by CondoCerts that a resale is in progress in Falls Run.  Koger Management will then inspect the property to make sure that it is in compliance with the C, C, & Rs, prepare required documentation for the resale, and notify CondoCerts that all is OK.  CondoCerts will then send the resale HOA documents to either the owner/seller or Realtor, whoever ordered the documents. Prior to settlement, Koger Management will be contacted by the settlement attorney or the settlement company to verify that everything is in compliance.  Koger Management will inform the settlement company/settlement attorney about the Subsequent Member Fee and any other fees to be collected at settlement.  The Subsequent Member Fee and other fees are then collected at settlement and sent to Koger Management by the settlement company for deposit into the FRCA account.  The great majority of home sales will use either a local real estate agent or a local settlement company, which virtually ensures that FRCA will collect the fee.  Owners selling houses without using a real estate agent will be responsible for ordering the HOA resale package which will then alert Koger Management and start the resale process to insure that all fees, including the Subsequent Member Fee, are collected at settlement.  Most local settlement companies/attorneys are aware of the fee for Falls Run resales.  Therefore, it is highly unlikely that the Subsequent Member Fee would not be collected.  As a verification that FRCA has collected the Subsequent Member Fee where it is due, Pat provided a list of all home sales in Falls Run during 2005 from the Real Estate Multiple Listing Service (which is public record).  This list will be sent to Koger Management for comparison with the Subsequent Member Fees collected for 2005 sales.  Pat will provide this list of all sales of Falls Run homes on a quarterly basis in the future.  As a final mechanism to ensure that a sale does not escape payment of the Subsequent Member Fee, a change in the name of the person to be billed for the monthly assessment will reveal that a sale may have occurred and provide an opportunity to investigate further.

Also discussed was the contractual provision that the Subsequent Member Fee had to be shared equally with Silver Retirement Communities II, LLC if Del Webb did not completely exercise its option to buy a certain parcel of land, as described in Section 8.6 of the original C, C, & Rs.  Pat expressed her belief that it would be prudent to obtain a document from Del Webb verifying that they had completely exercised their option and that the contractual requirement to share the Subsequent Members Fee with Silver was null and void.

Monitor FRCA (Koger) Account:  A spreadsheet comparing a small number of available invoices with the record of checks written was discussed.  Since invoices corresponding to the great majority of checks were not available, Koger Management will be asked to routinely provide a copy of every 2006 invoice to the Finance Committee for a more accurate comparison between invoices and checks.

The Balance Sheet provided each month by Koger Management in the package of monthly financial reports was discussed.  Several changes were suggested for the purpose of clarifying and improving the information presented in the Balance Sheet.  Since we would like to make all desired changes to the Balance Sheet at once, it was decided to delay a request to modify the Balance Sheet until the committee can give it more thought.

Monitor Community Center Account:  Discussion from the last meeting of having the Quicken application write checks was continued.  Cost information from several sources for Quicken-compatible blank checks has been provided by John Frisch.  It was clear that the advantages of saving the time required for manual check writing and the elimination of a common source of error were well worth the cost of the Quicken-compatible checks.  Mal Malo will tell Ann Jones to purchase Quicken-compatible checks.  John Frisch will help Ann select the source and  he and Phyllis Benaman will help Ann automate the check writing.