Review of Association's Financials

A CAI-designated Reserve Specialist will review the financials of the association. Reserve fund balances and interest rates are evaluated. Current and past annual budgets are reviewed to identify trends and differences in reserve funding.

The association's operating budget is closely evaluated to determine whether specific projects are funded through the operating budget or capital reserve budget. This is extremely important in setting up an accurate reserve study, both to prevent "funding gaps" and to prevent doubly funding projects in both budgets.

Establishing Responsibility of Capital Assets

Your reserve specialist will accurately define the parties responsible for all capital assets located on your property (association, home-owner, utility company, local municipality, etc.) Association legal documents are reviewed, and past practices and precedents are discussed.

A Responsibility Matrix is provided within your reserve study.

Investigative Property Research

Your reserve specialist will gather information on past and future capital projects. We "dig deep". Beyond identifying replacement times and ages, we inquire about maintenance practices and preventative care. We ask how spaces are utilized and the varying occupant load for each building space in order to assign useful lives that are specific to each component of your property.

We collect vendor information, service contract data, and property inspection reports in order to identify factors that may not be visually apparent during a property inspection. We collect data on past project costs and review specifications for completed projects whenever available.

Reliable Inflation Rates & Interest Rates

Construction inflation rates are one of the biggest variables when determining how much an association should budget. All construction inflation rates are location-specific and are based reliable cost indexes.

Interest earned on your invested reserves is another variable that can considerably affect projected budgets. We calculate the actual weighted average of all invested reserves to ensure an accurate, reasonable projection.

Accurate Data Collection

All component quantities are either hand measured or gathered through architectural drawings if available. All reserve specialists are experts in reading and analyzing architectural drawings. All equipment and materials are inspected for actual specification tags whenever available. Our in-depth property inspections include hundreds or thousands of photographs, all of which are reviewed and archived. All data in your reserve study is thoroughly reviewed by a team of industry-specific experts prior to shipment.

Transparent, Easy-to-Read Reports

A BUILDING RESERVES reserve study is easy for everyone to understand. All recommended replacement times are supported by high quality photographs illustrating the condition of each component.

It is easy for everyone to understand the definition of all components and to understand replacement schedules. Our reports include photographs that clearly describe each component as well the associated replacement cycle... all on one single easy-to-read page.

Reserve studies that include text and numbers that are completely separate from photographs are difficult to understand.

Prioritized Replacement Schedules

It is important to make sure you have enough money for what truly matters. We create a customized, prioritized funding plan to ensure that you have enough money available when HIGH priority projects come due.

All projected replacement times are based upon actual quality of installation, quality of materials, frequency of use, plus many more complex property-specific variables. Most reserve study providers use standardized useful life charts to determine replacement times.

We base replacement times upon actual observed conditions. This is simply more accurate!

Archived Photograph Inventories

We document and archive high-resolution photographs of your property over time. This allows you to clearly understand AND SEE the rate of deterioration that is specific to your property. We can accurately predict replacement times and remaining useful lives based upon actual documented changes.

Customized Replacement Costs

All replacement costs are derived from reliable resources. Most of our replacement costs are based on actual capital projects that have been completed at near-by properties similar in scale and scope. We utilize an in-house proprietary database of replacement costs of actual past capital repair and replacement projects. We do not solely use average replacement costs from standardized cost tables. All unit costs are custom tailored to your specific property.

Reasonable Reserve Recommendations

A reserve study that recommends increases that are so excessive that they cannot be implemented is not useful. We are sensitive to property demographics and provide reasonable, achievable reserve recommendations.