Management Company Reference Check Script

Before you dial

• Confirm the reference is a current or recent BOARD MEMBER, not an employee of the management company
• Note the reference community's size and type; a 40-unit townhome community's experience may not transfer to a 400-home master association
• Have the bidder's proposal open so you can test claims against lived experience
• Log for each call: reference name, community, units, caller, date

The 12 questions

1. How long has [COMPANY] managed your community, and how does your community compare to ours in size and type? (Listen for: tenure under two years tells you little; a mismatch in community type weakens the reference.)

2. Who is your assigned manager, and how many managers have you had in that time? (Listen for: turnover — more than one change per two years means you will be retraining your manager, not the reverse.)

3. When a homeowner emails a routine question, how long until they get a real answer? (Listen for: a number. “Pretty responsive” is not a number.)

4. Tell me about the last after-hours emergency. What happened, and how did the company perform?

5. Are your monthly financials on time and accurate? Have you ever found an error — and if so, how was it handled?

6. Has the company ever surprised you with a fee you didn't expect? What was it?

7. When you need bids for a project, do you feel you get genuinely competitive options, or the same familiar vendors every time? (Listen for: hesitation — affiliated-vendor steering is the quiet cost center of bad management.)

8. How does the company handle covenant enforcement — consistent and documented, or reactive?

9. What is one thing you wish the company did better? (Everyone has one. A reference who claims none was coached.)

10. Has your board ever considered leaving? What kept you — or what brought you back?

11. If you moved to a new community tomorrow, would you hire this company again — yes or no?

12. Is there anything I should have asked that I didn't?

Scoring

Immediately after the call, before comparing notes, each caller scores the reference 1–5:

• 5 — unprompted enthusiasm, specific examples, an unhesitating “yes” on question 11
• 3 — satisfied but generic; no specifics either way
• 1 — hedged answers, surprise fees, manager turnover, or a “no” on question 11

Average the reference scores into the Experience component of your RFP evaluation rubric (see the Management Company RFP template, Section 6). One weak reference is a data point; two is a pattern.