How to Increase HOA Neighborhood and Property Value

Homes in communities managed by homeowners associations (HOAs) tend to be more attractive to potential buyers, particularly when the exterior of the homes is well maintained. An HOA’s main purpose is to provide homeowners with a consistent lifestyle quality and maintain each property’s value relative to others in the neighborhood.

Therefore, these community governing bodies charge a fee and uphold a series of standards, regulations and processes to maintain building exteriors and landscaping. The funding gives homeowners the ability to re-invest in their homes collectively. Below are some practical tips to increase neighborhood property values in HOA communities.

Read the full article or jump to a specific section:

• Improving the Exterior of Buildings
• Lighting
• Parking Lots
• Activities and Events for Residents
• Consider More Amenity Options
• Don’t Forget the Details
• Increase Usability of Outdoor Spaces

IMPROVING THE EXTERIOR OF BUILDINGS

The HOA board is responsible for improving building exteriors to maintain the community’s curb appeal and enhance longevity. It also boosts the community property values and protects the residents from harm and health risks. Exterior maintenance and inspections help identify issues such as mold, mildew and rot before they affect the properties’ structural integrity.

Here are ways residential developers can improve the exterior of a building and property value:

Pressure-Wash Regularly

Pressure-washing exterior surfaces regularly helps to get rid of dirt, grime and other buildup, leaving the walls looking fresh and clean. It can also remove stains, mold and mildew that cause discoloration and structural damage over time. You can pressure-wash concrete, brick, wood, vinyl, aluminum and stucco walls without damaging them.

Adding pressure-washing to your maintenance schedule at least twice a year keeps the walls in tip-top shape. When pressure-washing, pay special attention to signage and trim. Use safe surface detergents and equipment that will not damage the surfaces. Hiring a professional exterior house cleaning company ensures the job is done thoroughly while minimizing damages.

Apply New Paint

It can be time-consuming and expensive to paint entire buildings, but touch-ups on shutters, trim and gates are small paint projects that greatly impact a building’s exterior for a lot less money. Applying a new coat of paint on these parts protects them from the elements.

Community amenities such as playgrounds, pool areas and recreation centers are typically repainted every five to 10 years. However, you can do it sooner if the paint is peeling, faded or outdated. A fresh coat of paint refreshes the spaces and gives them new life.

An HOA may have specific paint guidelines to follow within communities, so homeowners must always check in before making exterior paint changes to properties.

Fix Wear and Tear

Constant exposure to the elements causes wear and tear on building exteriors. Without maintenance or repair, the everyday wear and tear can cause further deterioration, making the entire property look undesirable. Frequent inspections help to identify areas of concern, such as loose siding, mold growth, cracking or chipping paint and rotting wood.

You can fix wear and tear around an HOA neighborhood by:

• Regularly cleaning and maintaining gutters and drainage systems.
• Replacing broken, bent or faded street signs and mailboxes.
• Repairing cracked, loose or missing roof shingles.

Maintain Walkways and Entryways

HOAs can maintain and improve walkways and entryways in their communities in various ways. Some of these ways include:

• Installing shade structures: Shade structures block up to 97% of the sun’s harmful UV-A and UV-B rays when installed over entryways and walkways in a residential development. These boost visual appeal and add a striking presence to the exterior of a building or other communal areas like neighborhood outdoor seating areas, pools or playgrounds.
• Add markings: Lines indicating parking spaces and other pavement markings can become faded or chipped over time. HOAs can repaint parking space lines and markings in parking lots to improve safety, freshen the look of lots and roads and provide clear, visible directives for drivers and pedestrians.
• Repair concrete sidewalks and trails: Crumbled and cracked greenways and sidewalks are unattractive and can pose a tripping hazard for residents. Simple measures such as patching and repaving improve the appearance and safety of concrete walkways and extend the life of pavements.

Perform Regular Landscaping

Regular neighborhood landscaping by sprucing up the trees and entrances to a community improves the exteriors of buildings and increases property values. A regular landscape schedule for the entire neighborhood or community helps you manage the budget. It also helps you anticipate landscape enhancement projects and increased autumn maintenance costs.

Your budget should include the yearly costs of landscaping every area of the community, including grass, trees, flowerbeds, shrubs and bushes. It’s best to start with maintaining landscapes in common areas such as clubhouses, walking trails, parks, playgrounds, community pools and recreation centers. Poor landscaping in these common areas minimizes the appeal and desire for current and potential homebuyers or tenants to live in your community.

Preventive landscape maintenance will save you a lot of money by optimizing your HOA budget. Some of these measures include:

• Incorporating growth regulators
• Pruning trees and shrubs on schedule
• Plant care to support plant health
• Weeding flower beds

Refer to the USDA Plant Hardiness Zones to find shrubs and other kinds of plants that will thrive in your geographical location. Choose flowers that bloom throughout the year to increase curb appeal all year around. Over time, you’ll need to inspect and replace shrubs and trees with signs of fungus, disease or old age. Replacing these with drought-tolerant varieties able to survive and thrive in both shade and sun is good practice when landscaping around the exteriors of buildings.

Professional landscapers can help you select the best trees, flowers and shrubs to plant in your community. They understand tree root systems and can help you avoid problems such as cracked gutters and curbs or raised sidewalks later, which can be potentially hazardous to tenants and homeowners and destructive to property.

Update Lighting

Residential developers and HOA managers must regularly check and update outdoor lighting to ensure bulbs are working properly and not burned out. You must light dark areas such as sidewalks, walkways, stairwells and parking lots for safety. Adequate outdoor lighting makes residents, tenants and guests feel more at ease by increasing visibility and a sense of security.

Outdoor lighting also acts as a theft and robbery deterrent. Consider motion-sensitive exterior lighting to save energy when not in use.

There are several other ways you can update lighting in your HOA neighborhood:

• Adding warm lighting: Installing warm lighting to the exterior of buildings creates an ambiance people are attracted to and adds a safety element to your community. Solar wall lights, pathway lights and post-cap lights produce a warm glow to illuminate driveways, gardens and adjacent structures. They’re safe, easy to install and can help cut back on energy bills.
• Highlight your properties’ best features: You can boost the appeal of landscape features like fountains, shrubs and trees with accent lighting, such as spotlighting and uplighting. Wall lighting on the exterior wall of a building can also add depth and create a warm, inviting atmosphere.
• Light the community entrance sign: A well-lit and easy-to-read sign helps visitors and potential investors easily identify your neighborhood or community. It’s welcoming and reflects positively on the state of the rest of the neighborhood.
• Create lines of light: Rope lighting is a decorative form of outdoor lighting and an inexpensive way to create lines of light. Attaching rope lighting to the top of fences defines the perimeter. You can also attach it underneath deck areas, around swimming pools or under awnings for additional lighting in spaces used for night events and activities. Rope lighting is available in various colors and can be applied in straight lines or wrapped around objects like palm trees or fences.
• Improve parking lot lighting: Installing lights near tenant and resident parking, along walkways, in stairwells and near elevators deters crime by improving the visibility around these areas. LED light bulbs in parking lots last longer, burn brighter and consume less energy, making them a safe and smart improvement for parking lots.

Parking Lots

The quality and safety of parking lots should be carefully considered by HOAs and residential developers. Here are some ways to make sure your parking areas give the right impression:

Shade Parking Lots

Covered parking can increase property value and provide safer spaces for residents and visitors to park their vehicles. Having parking lots with shade structures shields cars and keeps them cooler in the summer. Plus, it protects vehicles from debris falling from trees in harsh storms.

Shade structures offer innovative designs that are built to local building codes, all offering unique and functional benefits such as:

• Blocking up to 96% of UV rays
• Increased air circulation with fabric shade versus a solid structure
• Durable steel columns
• Tested for tolerances to wind and snow loads
• Low maintenance
• Added aesthetic appeal

Shaded parking structures offer a cooler environment for vehicles, reducing the time required to cool them down from sitting in the hot sun.

Add Pavement Markings

Lines indicating parking spaces and other pavement markings can become faded or chipped over time. HOAs sometimes handle road and pavement maintenance for residences within their community instead of relying on municipal help. HOAs often manage repainting parking space lines and markings in parking lots to improve safety, freshen the look of lots and roads and provide clear, visible directives for drivers and pedestrians.

Repair Concrete Sidewalks and Trails

Crumbled and cracked greenways and sidewalks are unattractive and can pose a tripping hazard for residents. Simple measures such as patching and repaving can help improve the appearance and safety of concrete walkways and extend the life of pavement.

Improve Parking Lot Lighting

Parking lot lighting plays a prominent role in deterring crime because of how it affects visibility. LED light bulbs in parking lots last longer, burn brighter and consume less energy, making them a safe and smart improvement for parking lots.

Install lights near tenant and resident parking, along walkways, in stairwells and near elevators. Other dark areas with limited visibility at night that would benefit from lighting for safety reasons include alleys, behind buildings, and near dumpsters.

Plan for Resident Activities and Events

Potential homebuyers and tenants appreciate opportunities to meet and interact with others in the community they hope to move to. Therefore, maintaining and making improvements to common areas, recreation centers, playgrounds, pools and parks can help to form a tight-knit community by providing space for community activities and events. The following are simple ways you can bring members of your community together.

Organize Community Events

Many people desire to live in neighborhoods with an HOA that regularly plans activities and events to socialize and interact. Events also allow for new tenants or homeowners to meet their neighbors and have fun together.

Some ideas for community events you can organize include:

• Pool parties
• Potlucks
• Barbecues
• Game and trivia nights
• Wine tastings
• Film screenings
• Yoga and aerobic classes

An HOA can subsidize the party planning costs by partnering with businesses and community vendors, such as the landscape maintenance company.

Create Clubs

Clubs are a great way to get people with similar interests together. They also allow residents of your community to make new friends and build their social support networks.

There are many options to consider, so use the community demographic as a starting point to gauge interest in the types of clubs to offer. Some ideas include:

• Dinner club
• Walking club
• Book club
• Card club
• Tennis club
• Golf club
• Swimming club
• Shuffleboard club
• Pickleball club
• Gardening club

Consider More Amenity Options

Keeping up to date with current HOA trends is one of the best ways to attract future tenants. Look beyond the basic conveniences, such as community pools, indoor fitness centers, tennis courts, basketball courts, clubhouses and playgrounds, to boost a community’s overall appeal.

Adding shade structures to communal spaces is an example of a necessary update that can provide welcome, cool relief from the harsh summer heat. Fabric shade structures protect your playground equipment from becoming too hot in the sun and reduce harmful UV-ray exposure to children playing. Installing shade structures over outdoor seating areas such as park benches and sports courts provides functional, architectural and aesthetic benefits.

Shade structures in common outdoor areas benefit residents in multiple ways:

• Shade structures can block UV rays and create more inviting community areas.
• High-quality shades can endure winds of up to 90 miles per hour.
• Fabric-shaded structures increase airflow in the shaded space, keeping the area cooler and providing more air circulation than metal or wood structures.
• Fabric-shaded structures cause up to 25-degree temperature reduction.
• Shaded community areas encourage families and friends to gather in outdoor communal spaces and spend more time together outside.

Other examples of unique amenities that will increase the property value of homes in your community include:

• Electric car charging
• Free internet Wi-Fi connectivity throughout the HOA communal facilities
• Inclement weather services
• Outdoor spaces available to rent
• Additional shade for outdoor areas
• Designated pet-friendly buildings
• On-site dog park
• Outdoor fitness centers
• Art studios
• Music studios
• Woodworking workshop
• Indoor racquetball court
• Gates or other security features
• Koi pond
• Waterfalls and reflecting pools
• Tenant-accessible business office complete with computers and printers
• Car-tire air station
• Modern HOA payment methods, like apps and online payment portals

Increase the Usability of Outdoor Spaces with USA Shade

Shade offers a great way for HOAs to increase neighborhood outdoor spaces for their community and make them more comfortable for residents. Choosing shade structures as an outdoor upgrade adds a unique architectural focal point, elevates aesthetic appeal and optimizes the use of the space. Adding versatile Hip shade structures to your community is one good example that provides all three benefits.

At USA SHADE, we provide fabric shade structures in standard designs as well as unique and custom designs. Our shade structures are also available in a wide range of colors and different fabric options depending on your needs.

Popular areas for shade structures for residential developers or for HOAs to consider are:

• Community pools
• Walkways
• Entryways
• Parking areas
• Tennis courts
• Shuffleboard courts
• Clubhouses
• Playgrounds
• Courtyards
• Outdoor lounge areas

For more information on how we can help you improve the community value of your HOA with commercial shade products, contact us today.