A broken sprinkler or a dead streetlight usually reaches the board as a text to whoever lives closest. Nobody else on the board knows it was reported, who's fixing it, or whether it ever got fixed.
With HOA-OS, those reports land in one list. The board sets how urgent each one is, records who owns it, and moves its status along until it's resolved.
What the video covers
- A resident reporting a streetlight out through the maintenance request form
- The Maintenance tab in the board's submissions inbox
- Opening the new request
- Setting the priority
- Recording a board member as the owner of one request
- Recording an outside vendor as the owner of another
- Moving a request through in progress to resolved
- Reading the list for what's still open
- Statuses change when the board changes them
The full walkthrough, in words
A resident has a streetlight out on their street, so they open the maintenance request form on the Forms page of the community site. Their name and email are already filled in. They add where it is, pick the kind of problem and how urgent it feels, say what they saw, and send it.
On the board's side, the submissions inbox has a Maintenance tab. The number on it counts every maintenance request, resolved ones included. Each row shows when it came in, who sent it, where it stands and how urgent it is.
The streetlight report is the new one, still marked submitted. Opening it shows where the light is, what kind of problem it is, how urgent the resident thinks it is, what they saw, and who sent it.
The resident gave it an urgency, but the board decides the priority, from Low up to Emergency. A dark street at night gets High.
Next, someone has to own it. This one stays with the board, so a board member is picked from the list as its owner, and the status moves to assigned.
The board won't fix the sprinkler itself, so it records an outside vendor as that request's owner, typed in by name. That request reads assigned too.
Then the broken pool gate, already assigned to a vendor, moves along. When the work starts, the board moves it to in progress. When the gate's fixed, the board marks it resolved. Back on the maintenance list, its status shows Resolved in green, with the other resolved requests. Any status that isn't green is still open, and it says how far along the request is.
HOA-OS records who owns each request and where it stands. The repair itself happens outside HOA-OS, so a status is only as current as the last time someone on the board changed it.
Questions boards ask about this
Who decides how urgent a request is?
The resident gives it an urgency when they report it. The board sets the priority, from Low up to Emergency.
Can the owner be someone outside the board?
Yes. In the walkthrough a board member owns the streetlight, and the board records an outside vendor, typed in by name, as the sprinkler's owner.
Does the number on the Maintenance tab mean open requests?
No. It counts every maintenance request, resolved ones included. The status on each row says which are still open.
Does a status change on its own when the work is done?
No. Someone on the board changes it.
Related reading
- The HOA Maintenance Playbook for Self-Managed Boards
- HOA Maintenance Responsibilities: Who Fixes What
- How does a board keep track of its vendors' contracts and insurance before something lapses?
HOA-OS is software for self-managed HOA boards. See what it covers at hoa-os.com/self-managed-hoa-software.