[kshellyflorida]

We are a small (110 unit) townhouse community around a lake in north Florida. I have lived here for three years and we have had three lawn services. (hold on, don't stone me yet )

The company that we have now is great, but the contract that we have is not specific enough in terms of work to be carried out. This is leading to different expectations of what our lawn service should do- residents expect one thing, the contract states another thing and our covenants & restrictions say something else.

I am the new pres and we have a small, cohesive board now that is trying to professionalize the way the association is being run. The current "contract" with the lawn service is open-ended. I would like to develop a two-year contract for the lawn service so that the owner can have some kind of a business plan. We are giving him an area in our secured storage to put a shed, keep a small trailer, pinestraw, etc.

Where we need help is in the details of what work will be carried out. Right now the owner and his crew are going above and beyond to do what every neighbor wants done. It is a new business and he is tap dancing to keep everyone happy. The board has told him that he doesn't need to do this, but that is the way he is. We don't want him to burn out and we want him to receive fair compensation for his work. We have mandated that residents are to contact a designated board member with lawncare issues, NOT approach the lawn service while they are working.

We'd like the contract to include specifics of the work to be carried out- ie- common areas, private property; shrubs trimmed, those dirt circles around trees kept free of weeds (I'm horticulturally disabled), etc.. We are responsible for maintaining the landscaping, but some neighbors have a freakin Biltmore garden in their yard. How to word issues like- if you want special mulch, it's your responsibility, you are responsible for flower beds. If someone has statuary in their yards, is it a major time consumer to edge around them? If so, how to exclude? DECKS BLOWN OFF- some want it done, others don't. This is not our responsibility, but some long-time elderly owners want it- any ideas how to handle?

For those with the Biltmore gardens in their yards, is it wise/feasible for the lawnservice to provide additional custom work for a separate fee? Would that be a management nightmare for him? Would it be fair to ask that the custom work be done on a day when the routine work is not carried out?

We are a working class development, but do not want the lowest bid. We want to build a long-term partnership with our lawn service and keep residents happy.

Any and all input is most welcomed.

[FungusMudGrub]

An thought occured to me -
Have a tiered plan with different levels of service: basic, basic plus, and "Biltmore" level. People like a choice, and it would let the contractor know what to expect at each unit. Work with the contractor to specify what is included in each level, and an approriate price. I assume the basic service comes with the property, but little extras, like the deck cleaning for instance, could be in the "plus" level.
I would leave the scheduling up to the contractor, as long as the basic work is being done in a timely fashion.

Basically from a contractors point of view, I would want to avoid the nightmare of every resident popping out to get my crew do to just one little extra. Get them all signed up for what they want ahead of time so the contractor can plan ahead, and stay efficient.

[Mac]

Id say your HOA is a keeper since you are investing your time in finding these things out for your contractor. PS, you may have a gem of a company too if he is really going so far and above for you.

Regarding your contract, id leave it open ended. I dont work on a specified time period contract. Every proposal I put out specifies that our relationship is perpetual and may be terminated at any time with a 30 day written notice (my commercials require "just cause"). I love it this way as I know that as long as I keep up my end of the contract that Im not going to be replaced any time soon. Besides, why would you want a fixed length contract? What lure does that have for you?

As was suggested above, if residents want additional services, they certainly need to pay accordingly.

What custom work are you talking about on a different day? Generally, I schedule all maintenance for a property on their given weekly day so that travel time is kept to an absolute minimum. There are exceptions but the further the site is from the shop, the more closely I folow my scheduling guidline.

[peteg]

I am going over the profit margin for my maintenance contracts
and I see it gets smaller when I include leaf clean up.

[my big dog]

Have you tried contacting other hoa either nearby or afar to view there agreemens. More importantly If you like your scaper that much I would ask for his input.

[mdvaden]

About 2 years ago, I put together an article along these same basic lines. It dealt with avoiding weak landscape contracts.

One suggestion, was making sure the contract stated a minimum experience involved with the property.

Certainly companies need to train new people, so that can't be excluded.

But a contract should insist that a person with a certain number of years experience - say 2, 5, whatever - is required to be on the property at least once per month inspecting the quality.

Right now, most contracts I'm aware of, for homeowners at least, have the landscape maintenance controlling to many loopholes for quality.

If the maintenance company workers don't have a degree of education, how can they tell if a disease is starting? How can they tell if there is fertilizer burn from an accidental overdose the previous week?

How do they know what to put pre-emergent herbicides on, since the labels list reams of plant names?

So nothing wrong with new workers mowing and raking, but there is no professional service at all if new workers are the only ones showing up for the next 8 weeks.

You really need someone with no less than 2 years experience on-site once a month minimum, but once per week at best. And they need education or certification to match anything they lay their hands on. If they are going to apply pre-emergents, they have to be able to walk the property and Identify for your satisfaction, probably 80% or more of what you have, provided its not an exotic collection.

That's what 95% or more of homeowners don't do, and they get raked over the coals on that one for quality.

[kshellyflorida]

Thank you all for very good advice. Some that was taken, some that was not. Note to Board- TAKE THE ADVICE NEXT TIME....

The board was presented with a multi-year contract and it was approved. The owner lost his foreman at the end of the summer and now has his son and another young man doing most of the sub-par work. He has others supplimenting their work. The crew was all to have experience, with police background checks- we had a registered sex offender as super with last service.

He is supposed to have a 32-part check list that he walks the property with each week- his idea, not ours. When we asked to receive a copy he stated that we could not see it, as it was proprietary.

It's just a mess and his board contact was too soft a guy and just let him run all over him and would then make excuses to the residents. Now we have an effective property management company, so there is professional oversight and follow-up.

Long story short- we are about to issue a deficiency notice and give him an opportunity to perform his contract and the next step is to terminate him. If he wants to take us to court, then that will be a lesson learned on both our parts.

Just wanted to share with those of you who spent time giving thoughtful advice, as well as others who may be about to step in it!