I just bought a home here. What do I need to do?

1. Your association's records are updated to show you as the owner.
2. Your account is opened, so assessments are billed to you rather than the seller.
3. You are sent an invitation to set up portal access.
4. You get the documents and rules that apply to your home.

None of these happens the moment escrow closes. Each is done by someone at your management company, working from the closing paperwork that title or escrow sends them. How quickly that happens is your association's and its manager's business, not something the software decides — which is why this page tells you what to check rather than a date to wait for.

An email inviting you to set up portal access. It contains a link that asks you to create a password, and it is the only step you have to do yourself.

It will not ask you for a payment, a bank account, or a Social Security number. If something claiming to be from your association does, stop — see Is this email from Roam real?.

That link stops working after a while, so use it soon. If it says This link has expired, nothing has gone wrong on your side; contact your management company.

Your assessments are running whether or not anyone has contacted you.

Ownership starts at closing. The charge for your home does not wait for your welcome email, and in most associations an unpaid assessment accrues late fees on its own schedule. A new owner who waits politely for three months to be told what to pay can end up genuinely delinquent — through nobody's bad faith.

So the useful thing to do in your first week is not to wait. It is to ask two questions:

"What is my assessment, and when is it due? Can you send me a statement of my account as of my closing date?"

Ask them even if your portal access hasn't arrived yet. You do not need a login to pay, and you do not need one to be told what you owe.

Work through these in order. Most cases are the first two.

1. Check which email address they have. The address that reaches you is often not the one on the closing documents. If a co-owner handled the purchase, the invitation may have gone only to them.
2. Check spam and promotions. The invitation is an automated message with a link in it, which is exactly what filters catch.
3. Contact your management company and confirm the email address they have for you.
4. Ask whether they have received the closing documents. Sometimes escrow has not yet sent them, and until they arrive there is nothing for the manager to work from. If that's the answer, your title or escrow company is the one to chase.
5. Ask for the governing documents — the CC&Rs, bylaws, and current rules — and for the assessment amount and due date.

If you don't know who to contact, see Who is my association?.

Worth getting in writing, once, early:

• The assessment amount, how often it's charged, and when it's due.
• How to pay, and which payment methods they accept.
• The governing documents and current rules.
• Whether anything about your home needs architectural approval before you change it — paint, fences, windows, landscaping, solar.
• Whether there is a special assessment in progress or planned.
• Where notices will be sent — email or post — and how to change it.

That last one matters more than it sounds. Some associations require you to opt in before they will email you, and if you never do, everything comes on paper to the address on file.

Notices, decisions, and charges go to the owner of record — you — even when a tenant lives there. Tell your association who is living in the home and how to reach them, and tell your tenant which rules apply to them. Most disputes between an association and a landlord start with a notice that reached nobody.

How long your association takes. Whether it charges a transfer or set-up fee, and who paid it at closing. Whether your first bill will be prorated. What the previous owner did or didn't disclose.

Those vary by association, by your closing documents, and by state law. If money or a disclosure is in dispute — an unpaid balance you didn't know about, a violation you inherited, a special assessment that wasn't disclosed — that is a matter for your title company or your own attorney, not for a support ticket.