Save Money with a Community Landscape Audit!

Looking to keep annual assessments down while still maximizing your HOA’s reserve fund? You might be surprised by just how much money can be saved by performing a simple community landscape audit. What this means is simply taking stock of the different ways in which your association is spending money on community landscaping, and taking note of the areas in which you might—quite literally—be flushing money down the drain! Tightening up your community landscaping procedures can eliminate waste and thereby increase funds.

Here are a few things to look for when conducting your HOA landscape audit:

  • For starters, take a look at your automatic sprinklers. Having these sprinklers running pretty regularly is, of course, integral to ensuring that your common areas are lush and green, but, during the winter months, it’s all too easy to waste money by over-watering. Decrease the number of times the sprinklers water by just once per week and you can save pretty significantly.
  • Set the irrigation system to water during the nighttime hours, or early in the morning, to get the most out of your waterings.
  • Make sure you’re using energy efficient heads on your sprinkler system. If you’re not totally sure about this, your community landscaping company can advise.
  • Remove any sprinkler heads that overlap with others; again, there is just no sense in wasting money by over-watering, especially not during the winter months.
  • Invest in a good rain detector, which will turn off the sprinklers if there’s enough rain to provide adequate watering. These things pay for themselves pretty quickly.

These may all seem like minor things, but they add up significantly! Don’t flush more money than you have to into community landscaping. Be smart about it, and cut costs for your HOA and your residents.

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Bryan Kuester

Bryan Kuester

Bryan is the CEO of Kuester Management Group. He has over 15 years of managing community associations throughout North and South Carolina.

His specialties include Community Association Management - maintenance, budgeting for operational and reserve funding, long-range planning, covenant enforcement, amenity management, onsite management, large scale management.