Blog

By Jeffrey A. Beaumont and Kyle Meade

This article first appeared in our Communicator Magazine, Summer 2025 Edition.

California law under Civil Code Sections 4000 et seq. grants home‐ owners associations (HOAs) the ability to recover delinquent assessment payments through foreclosure. There are two types of foreclosure available: judicial and nonjudicial. Each has its own procedures, advantages, and disadvantages. This article outlines the requirements for handling both judicial and nonjudicial foreclosure, compares and contrasts their respective processes, and highlights factors for boards to consider when choosing a foreclosure type.

JUDICIAL FORECLOSURE PROCEDURE

Judicial foreclosure involves filing a lawsuit in superior court to obtain a court order authorizing foreclosure, and potentially to secure a personal money judgment against the property owner. To initiate this process, an HOA must first send a pre‐lien letter to the delinquent owner via certified mail. This letter out...

Caller: Help! We need an Assessment! It’s an EMERGENCY!

By Zer Iyer, Esq.

This article first appeared in our Communicator Magazine, Summer 2025 Edition.

Unexpected expenses. Unanticipated cost increases. Unforeseen repairs. Unprecedented rate increases. These are examples of all‐too‐common situations affecting homeowner associations in the state and the all‐too‐common response of most boards to levy an emergency assessment. An association needs money, doesn’t have the money and that board is pretty sure the membership won’t approve the assessment on their own, so an emergency assessment makes sense, right? I mean, what could go wrong? Actually, a lot could go wrong and in fact, a lot often does go wrong when boards decide to levy emergency assessments. The purpose of this article is to explain what an emergency assessment is, when it is appropriate to levy and, perhaps most importantly, how to approach an emergency assessment to minimize challenges by homeowners. 

First, a quick re...

By Erik Sundquist, RS

This article first appeared in our Communicator Magazine, Summer 2025 Edition.

IN THE WINTER of 1914, as explorer Ernest Shackleton and his crew faced the crushing ice of Antarctica aboard the Endurance, they didn’t rely on wishful thinking to survive. They relied on planning, preparation, and constant reevaluation of conditions. Though the ship was eventually lost, every crew member survived thanks to leadership that understood this truth: conditions may be beyond your control, but your response never is.

Today’s California HOAs are navigating a similarly hostile environment – not of ice and isolation, but of inflation, regulatory pressure, and risk exposure. Boards and community managers can’t stop insurance markets from tightening or buildings from aging. But they can lead with foresight, and they can pre‐ pare. In this landscape, the updated reserve study is their map, compass, and survival kit all in one.

Let’s examine four urgent issues facing California H...

By Anuj Gupta

This article first appeared in our Communicator Magazine, Summer 2025 Edition.

If you’ve been on an HOA board long enough, you know that financial conversations usually revolve around the obvious – roof replacement, paving schedules, insurance premiums, maybe even lawsuits. But there’s one line item that shows up on every budget, year after year, and yet doesn’t always get the long‐term thought it deserves: landscaping.

Most communities treat landscape maintenance as an operational expense, a necessary part of keeping things neat. What often gets missed is that land‐ scaping is actually tied to some of the biggest financial decisions your association will face – whether it’s planning for reserves, avoiding special assessments, managing liability, or keeping property values high. I’ve worked with enough HOAs over the last 10 years to see that the communities who take a long‐term, strategic view of their landscaping avoid headaches. The ones who don’t? They’re usually the ...

By Robert W. Browning, PCAM, RS  

For years, tariffs were a topic mostly confined to college classrooms and economic policy debates. But, as recent headlines have shown, tariffs have stepped firmly into the mainstream – and with them, new and unexpected implications are emerging across various sectors, including reserve studies.  

If our office is any indication, in recent months, reserve specialists are fielding an increasing number of questions: Are tariffs impacting reserve studies? If so, how should associations respond? This article explores what tariffs are, how they might influence reserve funding plans, and what tools associations can use to mitigate their effects.  

What Is a tariff? A tariff is defined by Random House Webster’s Dictionary (1996) as “a schedule of duties imposed by a government on imports or exports.” In practical terms, tariffs are taxes placed on goods entering (or leaving) a country, designed to influence trade dynamics, support domestic industries, or a...

by Colleen Montoya from Whit's Painting 

If you were anywhere near San Pedro Square Market on July 31, you probably heard it — the laughter, the music, and the unmistakable hum of our CAI community having an amazing time. That’s right, Summer Fest 2025 was in full swing, and it was one for the books! From the moment guests arrived, the vibe was pure summer magic. The warm evening air, the buzz of conversation, and the scent of incredible food drifting through the market set the perfect stage for an unforgettable night.

One of the best things about the venue? The endless lineup of mouthwatering options. And everyone that came made the most of it! People were wandering with tacos in one hand, sliders in the other, even a mochi donut (or two) for dessert. There were so many tempting flavors to explore that “just one plate” quickly turned into “okay, maybe three.” Zero regrets.

It wasn’t just the two-legged guests having a blast either— the four-legged ones were living their best lives, ...

By Robert M. DeNichilo, Esq., CCAL
CLAC Legislative Co-Chair, Orange County Regional Chapter Delegate

This article first appeared in The Communicator Magazine, Spring 2025.

CAI’S CALIFORNIA LEGISLATIVE Action Committee (CLAC) hit the ground running in 2025 in pursuit of its legislative agenda, which included allowing emergency assessments to cover the cost of insurance premiums and liability protection for associations and board members who are unable to purchase the level of insurance coverage required by CC&Rs for a reasonable cost, or at all. While the bill introduction deadline passed without CLAC being able to secure an author for its proposed bills, we continue working and are hopeful of getting some cleanup legislation into an omnibus bill.

In addition to pursuing its legislative agenda, CLAC is taking positions on several bills introduced that will significantly impact associations and man- agers. AB-739 (Jackson) would require all managing agents to be licensed real esta...

By Jacqueline Vanacek

This article first appeared in The Communicator Magazine, Spring 2025.

When I moved from the San Francisco Bay Area to the Gulf Coast of Florida, I thought I was done being an HOA board president. Not so! Now I have one HOA foot on each coast.

It is fascinating to see homeowner associations end to end, from a builder board in Florida to an owner board in California. And boy are those board objectives different. In 2024, I attended CAI West Florida Chapter’s “Home On The Range” to learn about Florida’s HOA best practices. As a California board director living in a Florida HOA, I was looking for common ground.

WHERE DID HOAS COME FROM?

California has the largest number of homeowner associations in the country, with approximately 80% of multi-family residences in HOAs. Homeowner associations (HOAs), or common interest developments (CIDs), first appeared in the 1960s when high density housing exploded. Cash-strapped municipalities looked to “associations” to fund...

By Kimberly Lilley, CIRMS, CMCA

This article first appeared in The Communicator Magazine, Spring 2025.

Most of us have been impacted by the insurance crisis in California, and if we haven’t been impacted yet, we will be. California has billions of dollars of property that needs insurance, and as losses piled up between 2017 and 2022, carriers in CA tightened their underwriting criteria, limited the amount of property they would insure, or left the state entirely in order to stay solvent. This constriction in the insurance marketplace left many without affordable or adequate insurance, and too often, no insurance options at all.

In this vacuum, carriers are being creative in finding ways to write insurance in CA, while reducing their risk enough for it to be reasonable for them to do so. One way of managing risk is to spread it out over multiple carriers, so each only takes a small part of the risk, ensuring that none of them hold the lion’s share of the losses if one should occur.