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CAI just released free HOA Board Member Training that could change how your board leads. Learn more!
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We’re here today for episode 149 to share news about a new free course from CAI, the National Community Associations Institute. If you're not familiar with it, they're a trade organization. It's called Community Association Living and in their words, it's meant to be an accessible introduction for anyone wanting to know more about living in a community association. This can range from seasoned board members looking for more formal knowledge, which is you our audience, to homeowners thinking about volunteering, and this is your pipeline of new board members, all the way to folks thinking about buying in a community association for the first time. So today, we have two staff members from CAI to help describe and promote this course. Alden Michaels is the instructional design manager at CAI & Sean Coffers is their director of learning, and is relatively new after joining the CAI team in September of 2025 he's currently developing a variety of new educational programming for CAI membership, like this new course!

Chapters

00:00 What Is the Free HOA Board Member Training From CAI?
00:42 What Is the Community Association Living Course?
03:57 Who Is the Free CAI Course Designed For?
05:06 Why Do Many Homeowners Not Understand HOAs?
06:27 Is the CAI HOA Course Really Free and Accessible?
06:58 What Does the Online HOA Training Course Look Like?
07:49 How Is the Course Structured for Learning?
09:08 Why Did CAI Create This HOA Training Program?
10:19 Why Are Educated HOA Volunteers So Important?
11:50 What Makes This Course a Good Foundation for New Board Members?
13:19 What Training Comes After the Intro Course?
14:15 How Does CAI Train Community Managers?
15:39 What Is the Board Leader Certificate Program?
16:42 How Do People End Up Serving on HOA Boards?
17:26 How Long Does the HOA Training Course Take?
18:36 Why Should Homeowners Learn HOA Basics?
20:32 What Topics Does the Course Cover About Community Living?
21:08 Why Is Civility Important in HOA Communities?
21:30 Ad Break - Association Reserves
22:02 Do You Get a Certificate After Completing the Cours

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