FAQ's

There are three broad categories of services that are provided: physical, financial and administrative services. The physical services include the management of items such as roofs, parking lots, pool, exterior painting, lawn & landscaping and other common elements. Financial services include collection of maintenance fees, payment of invoices, financial statement preparation, payroll, budget preparation and other related financial matters. Administrative services include matters involving compliance with Florida Statutes, board meetings, annual meetings, correspondence with owners, obtaining bids, coordination with legal counsel, etc.

The alternative to professional management is "volunteer" management provided by homeowners and board members. The volunteer approach may work well for a while but volunteers generally lose interest in the non-paid and rather thankless job of assisting the association. Additionally, the Florida Statutes which govern community associations are very complex and if not strictly followed, the association may be subject to fines or penalties for non-compliance. Companies such as SunVast  are equipped to deal with the business and statutory requirements of associations.

SunVast  has a 24 hour emergency answering service that will contact a property manager in the event of an emergency. All of SunVast ’s property managers are provided with pagers and cell phones so that they may be contacted day or night for an emergency.

Because SunVast  manages approximately 8,000 units throughout the Tampa Bay area, we have access to a large database of preferred vendors and contractors. SunVast  will generally recommend two or three firms which can be interviewed by the board so that a new vendor or contractor may be selected.

SunVast  will obtain bids from reputable contractors and present the bids to the board for their review. The final choice of the contractor is the responsibility of the board.

LCAM stands for "licensed community association manager." Generally, any individual who works for a management company and manages homeowner or condominium associations must receive the LCAM designation from the state of Florida. In order to become an LCAM, an individual must undergo a thorough background check, pass a state of state of Florida administered examination and must then meet continuing education requirements.

SunVast  works with many contractors who can provide replacement cost information for major replacement components. SunVast  also utilizes several reserve study companies that can provide a complete analysis of an association’s reserves to determine the adequacy of the reserves and the required annual funding. SunVast  reviews all reserve calculations on an annual basis during the budget preparation process.

Although we at SunVast  are not insurance agents, we deal with insurance on a daily basis. Association insurance is very complex and costly, therefore we only deal with agencies that specialize in association insurance. There are several good agencies in the area that SunVast  can refer to your association.

SunVast ’s accounting department works very closely with the collection department of several law firms who specialize in the collection of association maintenance fees. SunVast  has an excellent accounting system which tracks maintenance fee charges and payments and assesses late fees when appropriate. SunVast  also has a very structured program for issuing reminder notices and lien notices.

SunVast  engages various paint suppliers who will prepare detail paint specifications to be presented to painting contractors so that all bids are based on the same requirements. The paint supplier will inspect the job at various stages of completion and upon completion to verify that the work is being properly performed and that the correct materials are being used..

SunVast  offers a training program for board members which includes a professionally prepared video presentation and a question and answer session.

SunVast  has arranged many bank loans which in effect allow the association to finance a special assessment over an extended period of time in order to ease the financial burden on the unit owners in the association.