Glossary

This is a quick-reference glossary of every term that matters in HomeHerald. If you’re reading another handbook article and a word doesn’t click, the definition is here.

Core entities

Community — Your HOA itself. The top of the data tree. Everything else lives inside one community.

Property — A lot, unit, or townhome in your community. The unit of record — dues, fines, and balances attach to it. Residents are linked to it but don’t own its balance. See Properties are the unit of record.

User — A person with a HomeHerald account in your community. Has a role (Resident, Board Member, or Admin) and is linked to one or more properties.

Resident — A user with the Resident role. Sees their own property, balance, requests, bookings.

Board Member — A user with the Board Member role. Has admin access to manage the community.

Admin — A user with the highest tier of access. Can manage billing, payments, and integrations.

Primary resident — The main contact for a property. One per property. Has full access to that property’s data.

Co-resident — An additional resident linked to the same property as a primary. Sees and can act on the same data as the primary (within the property’s scope).

Household — Informal term for the group of residents linked to a single property (primary + co-residents).

Financial entities

Ledger — The list of every financial transaction tied to your community. Sometimes called “transaction log.”

Financial Record — A single line entry in the ledger. Can be a charge, a payment, a credit, or a refund.

Dues — Recurring charges (monthly or annual) on every property. Set per property. Generated automatically per the community’s dues schedule.

Fine — A penalty assessed for a rule violation. Charged to the property, not the resident.

Special Assessment — A one-time charge to all (or a subset of) properties for a specific purpose, e.g., a roof replacement fund.

Booking Fee — A rental fee for using an amenity (clubhouse, pool, pavilion).

Cleaning Deposit — A refundable hold authorized on a resident’s card during an amenity booking. Released or forfeited after inspection.

Late Fee — Charged when dues go past the grace period. Configured as a flat dollar amount.

Initial Balance — The carryover balance from a previous system, set on a property at import time. Affects the property’s total balance going forward.

Credit — A reduction in the property’s balance, usually given for a waived fee or payment in advance. Lives in the ledger as a credit-type entry.

Refund — Money returned to a resident, reversing a payment they made. Through Stripe / PayPal for online payments; manual for offline.

Requests and enforcement

Request — A general term for any work item flowing through the community: general question, ARC, complaint, or neighborhood request.

General — A request type for questions, suggestions, or board correspondence that doesn’t fit other types.

ARC — Architectural Review Committee request. A request for board approval of a property change.

Complaint — A specific request type for reporting a covenant violation by a resident.

Neighborhood Request — A community-wide concern or request about shared spaces, often published to the community board.

Violation — A confirmed covenant breach. Often results in a fine.

Enforcement — The process of escalating violations through tiers (warning, formal warning, fine).

Escalation Step — A step in the enforcement ladder. Each step has an offense number, action, and configuration.

Fine Mode — On a fine-action escalation step: Auto means the fine applies automatically; Flag for Review means a board member decides.

Grace Period — The buffer time between when something is due (dues, violation resolution) and when penalties apply.

Status (request) — The lifecycle stage: New → Acknowledged → Under Investigation → Closed. See The request lifecycle.

Amenities

Amenity / Asset — Community-owned shared resources: pool, gym, pavilion, parking, clubhouse, etc. Bookable by residents.

Booking — A reservation of an amenity for a specific time / date. Has its own status lifecycle (Pending → Approved → Completed, with possible Rejected / Cancelled / Charge-failed states).

Approval workflow — The flow for amenities that require admin sign-off before a booking is confirmed.

Capacity — The maximum number of guests / occupants for an amenity.

Communications

Announcement — A community-wide message sent in-app, by email, by push, or some combination.

Unified inbox — The shared admin email inbox where resident emails arrive and admins reply.

Physical Mail letter — A physical letter sent via the Physical Mail integration.

Certified mail — A premium mail class with delivery tracking and (optional) signature receipt. Used for legal / formal notices.

Automations

Dues Chaser — The automation that sends escalating reminders to residents with overdue dues.

Herald Shield — The AI agent that helps handle violations — auto-dismissing no-violation cases and proposing escalation actions for confirmed ones.

Herald Chat — The AI chatbot that answers resident questions in the portal.

Admin Digest — Daily or weekly operational summary for the board (dues collected, payments, overdue, violations, requests, members, bookings).

Herald Dispatch — Quarterly, semi-annual, or annual financial reports for the community (revenue, expenses, reserve balance).

Settings

Community settings — HOA-level configuration: name, logo, mailing address, contact email/phone, dues schedule, late fees.

Plan tier — The HomeHerald subscription level: Free, Automate, Enterprise, or Founder. Enterprise is for management companies running multiple HOAs.

Pre-approved emails — Email addresses on a property’s allow-list. Sign-ups matching these auto-approve as co-residents.

AI knowledge base — The configured sources (external websites, indexed announcements, indexed neighborhood requests) the AI uses to answer questions.

Convenience fee — The fee added to online payments to cover processing costs. Configurable as pass-through (resident pays) or absorb (HOA pays).

Statuses

Property statuses

Occupied — Resident is linked and dues are current.

Vacant — No resident currently linked.

Delinquent — Resident is linked but the property has an overdue balance.

User statuses

Active — Normal — can log in.

Pending — Awaiting admin approval after self-signup.

Rejected — Signup was rejected; account exists but no community access.

Moved Out — User has left the community; can’t log in.

Banned — Access revoked due to abuse.

Violation / request statuses

New — Just filed.

Acknowledged — Admin has seen it.

Under Investigation — Actively being worked on.

Closed — Resolved or dismissed.

Booking statuses

Pending — Awaiting approval.

Approved — Confirmed and on the calendar.

Rejected — Denied by admin.

Completed — The booking time has passed.

Cancelled — Cancelled before completion.

Pending Charge / Charged / Charge Failed — For deferred-charge bookings, the payment lifecycle around T-24h.

Roles, briefly

For a full breakdown, see User roles explained.

Role	One-liner
Resident	Sees their own property and can interact with the community
Board Member	All resident access plus admin dashboard for the whole community
Admin	All board access plus billing and integration control

Common acronyms

• ARC — Architectural Review Committee
• CC&Rs — Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions (your HOA’s primary rule document)
• HOA — Homeowners Association
• NSF — Non-Sufficient Funds (a bounced check)
• POA — Property Owners Association (sometimes used instead of HOA)

Where to go next

If you’re new to HomeHerald, start with How HomeHerald is organized — the mental-model article that ties all of this together.

If you’re stuck on a specific topic, search by glossary term in the relevant article. Each definition links to the deeper coverage where applicable.