Ask Veronica: What are the skills of an effective HOA board member? 

Serving on the board of your local homeowners association (HOA) is equal parts privilege and predicament. For some, there’s a real benefit to having a seat at the table when decisions are being discussed. For others, the prospect of trading weeknights for spreadsheets—all alongside neighbors you’ll inevitably bump into at the mailbox the morning after a heated vote—is better left to someone else.

For the neighbors who do raise their hands, the skills and backgrounds associated with a strong board member are as varied as the homeowners on any given street. Some roles such as treasurer, though, are traditionally better suited to a person with a background in finance and accounting or, at the least, an ease with numbers, budgets, and contracts.   

Lyle Seddon, a longtime resident of Skinker-DeBaliviere, has served for years on her neighborhood’s HOA board. “I can’t tell you exactly what year I became treasurer, but I’ve definitely been involved for quite a while,” she says. “I like to say 30 years but maybe it’s slightly less. There have been a couple terms where people did take it over and then quickly seemed to hand it back to me.”  

Over the years, she’s called on her background in accounting and facility with technology to carry out work for the board. Prior to her arrival on the block, board members used to manually input everything–budgets, bids, notes. She took on the project of upgrading that process. “I added the technology piece and I think that’s been a good thing,” she says. 

Soon after moving to St. Louis, Hannah McAfoos was looking for a way to meet more of her neighbors. When she heard that a position on the board in her neighborhood was turning over, she decided to volunteer for it. That was four years ago. Today, she manages communications, keeping neighbors informed about important issues, including security, street repairs, social events and more. Her background in compliance has been helpful, she says, especially when questions arise about board governance. “I have a lot of experience there and sometimes that does provide some benefits,” she says. “But I do think everyone can bring something while serving on a board. I don’t think there’s a specific background required.”

Seddon echoes that point: Maintaining neighborly relations and being the kind of person who can take an idea, run with it, and stand by it through the inevitable ups and downs are attributes of any successful board member—and not necessarily pinned to one particular profession or background. The same goes for leading with integrity and being transparent with neighbors. “Being able to hear people out and understand their perspectives and take those into consideration when determining the best way forward is important,” says McAfoos. Boards are most effective when they’re run by people who want to contribute. Seddon considers herself a doer. “If something comes up, I’m like, ‘Well, how can we address this and figure it out?’ I’m willing to reach out to people,” she says. But being the type of person who will say yes to leading a new project or yes to returning every communication, no matter how smalll, can be exhausting too. “One of the challenges for me, at least, is having to draw lines on when to say no because there is so much of a demand from residents for different things,” says McAfoos. 

Similar to a career, some skills are developed on the job. After the tornado hit St. Louis last May, working with insurance companies and filing claims has become somewhat of a specialty for some HOA boards. “When the insurance policy comes out and it’s 300 pages long,” says Jeffrey Senter, president of his condo HOA, “there’s a language to it that you would have to be an insurance specialist to understand. But having worked through what we’ve worked through in the past year, our board has gained experience. The current board is going to know what to look for in future insurance contracts.”

In the aftermath of the tornado last spring, the workload for most HOAs in neighborhoods affected by the storm intensified. Before the tornado, Seddon described the work on her block as relatively “low-key.” The biggest project they had undertaken was repaving the street. “Now, we’ve had to take a bit more of an active role than we had in the past,” she says. “Being on the HOA is more work and people are already feeling tapped out.”

McAfoos agrees. “Undertaking the tornado recovery is huge. It’s something we never could have imagined that we’d be faced with,” she says.

If you haven’t been deterred from volunteering for a board position yet, there are a variety of ways to show your interest. “You can let your neighbors know that you’d like to have the position. You can even say so at the annual meeting and somebody can nominate you. We want people that want to serve. You kind of know who’d like to do it, who has the time, who doesn’t, and who’s a good people person,” says Senter. 

The best board members combine a relevant skill such as finance or communications, a tolerance for the social friction that can emerge from time to time, and the willingness to keep showing up. 

Seddon says she’d love to get an attorney to join her HOA, or people with an interest in landscaping or historic preservation. “Any of those would bring a nice touch to a board,” she says.

Just don’t let your ego get in the way.

“You can’t think about being on the board as a prestigious position,” says Senter. “You can’t think, ‘Oh, I’m the president of the board and I’m looked up to.’ It’s work and people have to show up.”