A maintenance calendar for HOA and property managers

Boards change, property managers change, and the court or the lot stays and keeps its own calendar. This is the one-page version I hand over at the end of a job, written for the person who inherits the file: what to do, when, what to budget, and what to leave to a contractor. The maintenance page has it as a table; this is the reasoning.

The principle

A court or a lot fails from water and neglect, in that order, and both are cheap to prevent and expensive to cure. Nearly everything on this calendar is about keeping water off the surface and out of the cracks, and noticing problems in the year they start rather than the year they cost money.

March: look

As soon as the snow is gone, walk everything with a phone. Photograph new cracks, lifted edges, potholes, plow scrapes, heaved net posts, standing water. The photos date the damage, which matters for a claim and for deciding whether something is getting worse. Nothing gets fixed in March; the ground is too wet and the materials too cold. But the list gets made.

April: clear

Sweep or blow the winter grit off; it grinds a surface under feet and tires. Clear the drains and the swale. Trim back anything shading the court. On a lot, mark the potholes and plow damage for patching as soon as the plants open, usually late April. Do not pressure-wash a court while nights still freeze.

May: wash and book

Pressure-wash the court with a wide fan at low pressure, treat algae, rinse. Book the contractor: crack repair, resurfacing and sealcoating all want June to September, and the calendar fills from February. A board that decides in July gets October, if it gets anything.

June to August: use and watch

Keep metal legs and wheels off courts. Check the nets. After a storm, walk the court with a quarter and note where water covers it. On a very hot day, hose a dark court before play. Blow off seed pods and leaves. On a lot, keep heavy trucks to the drive lanes and watch for sealer tracking in the first week after a seal.

September: inspect

The second walk with the phone, before the leaves fall and hide the cracks. Compare with March. Anything that has grown goes on the October list.

October: fill

The month that matters. Every crack on the court bridged or filled, every crack on the lot hot-poured, before the first freeze. Drains cleared. Nets lowered or removed, windscreens pulled. Curb stops and catch basins marked for the plow. This is the one contractor visit I would not skip in any year; the October article says why.

November: leaves and the plow

Blow the leaves off the court before they lie wet. Tell the plow contractor, in writing: blade up over sealed asphalt, no chains, no salt piles on the pavement, do not plow the court. Half the spring damage on a lot is the plow.

Winter: stay off it

Snow melts. A court plowed or salted to play in February loses more surface than a month of summer play takes off. A lot cannot be sealed or patched in winter, and nobody should tell you otherwise.

The budget lines

Every	What	Scale
Year	Crack filling, a wash, the autumn walk	The smallest line in the budget
2 to 4 years	Sealcoat and restripe the lot	Per square foot; see the costs page
4 to 8 years	Resurface the courts	The big line; predictable years ahead
20 to 30 years	Overlay or rebuild the base	If the lines above were kept; sooner if not

Do it yourself, or not

Sweeping, washing, drain clearing, leaf blowing, net checks and the two walks are an hour each and need no contractor. Crack filling on a lot can be done in-house for a few small cracks with a cold-pour product, if the crack is dry. Crack repair on a court, leveling, sealcoating, striping and resurfacing are contractor work, because the materials and the timing are unforgiving and a bad job has to be removed before a good one can go on. The split is roughly: anything with a broom, yours; anything with a kettle, a squeegee or a membrane, ours.