Residential community operating system

Over-50s lifestyle resorts, land-lease communities, gated estates and community housing providers all run a small town. Residents report problems by phone, email and a note under the office door. The grounds crew works from a whiteboard, the clubhouse and pool are booked in a paper diary, and the gate keeps its own visitor book. Home sales live in a separate CRM, rent arrears in the tenancy system, and contractor insurance in a folder nobody checks before the contractor drives in. Meetings, site agreement reviews, funder reports and fire and pool safety checks are tracked in a spreadsheet, so something important is usually found overdue the week the committee or board meets.

An illustrative operating system for an operator running several communities, with views for the operations manager, community manager, maintenance and grounds, office admin, home sales, tenancy and support workers, and the committee or board.

• Resident requests to work orders: requests from the resident app, phone and office on one board. The requests agent suggests a category, priority and contractor; a person triages. Safety items (pool barriers, gates, trees, fire) are urgent and link to the compliance calendar. Work orders to contractors raise a purchase order, appear on the schedule and at the gate, and close only once the contractor's bill is matched. Resident-cost work creates a draft invoice.
• Grounds and common areas: a week schedule by crew (grounds, pool and cleaning, maintenance, contractor visits) with drag or button rescheduling, clash checks against crew load and facility bookings, and resident notices drafted for noisy or disruptive work.
• Facility bookings: clubhouse, pool, courts and cinema room requests from the resident app, checked for clashes, with the next free slot offered for approval. Closing a facility puts its bookings on hold.
• Visitors and gate: pre-registered guests, deliveries and contractors. Contractors are checked against the insurance register before they sign in. Visitor parking overstays and new resident fobs are handled here.
• Notices and events: notices drafted by the agents or staff and approved before they reach residents, events with RSVPs and reminders.
• Home sales, lead to cash: enquiry, inspection, offer, contract, settlement and paid. Follow-ups and the contract and disclosure pack are drafted for approval. Settlement creates the invoice in accounting, the new resident's fobs and a welcome notice. Site fees and resident charges sit in the same invoice list with overdue reminders.
• Tenancies and rent (community housing): application, eligibility check, offer, lease signed, sustaining tenancy and exit. Rent arrears with payment plans and support referrals, all decided by the tenancy team.
• Compliance calendar: site agreement reviews, residents committee and annual meetings, annual compliance returns, funder reporting, fire and pool safety. Evidence is filed against each item and the next due date set. Meeting papers and funder reports are drafted from live data and signed off by the committee or board, alongside a monthly report.
• Purchasing and contractors: supplies and capital items from suggestion to approval, purchase order, delivery (including short deliveries) and bill matched in accounting. Capital items over a set limit need committee or board sign-off. A contractor register tracks insurance certificates.
• Staff: a seven-day roster with cover checks, leave and shift swaps, timesheets to payroll, certificate and check expiries, and onboarding.
• Follow it end to end: one pool gate request goes from the resident app through triage, pool closure, a resident notice, the contractor work order, the schedule, the gate, completion, compliance evidence, bill matching, accounting and the committee report.
• Guardrails: nothing reaches a resident, tenant, buyer or contractor, and nothing is ordered or charged, without a person approving it. Tenancy decisions stay with people.