Who develops your maintenance content?

Over the past 10 years Compendia (formerly Master Manuals) has developed a considerable library of practical proprietary maintenance information. Written in partnership with nationally-recognized forensic experts, our maintenance content is highly regarded as an industry standard. Our experts write, review and/or update the content in their areas of specialty to ensure that it is current, accurate, consistent, reasonable and defensible.

Our strong content makes the difference between a simple manual and an effective documentation solution. The content addresses specific needs of a community and the climatic requirements of the region.

There are six considerations for Compendia's content:

• Climate appropriate--based on climate variables
• Follows industry standards--vetted by experts in each specialty field
• Minimizes risk - maintains compliance with right to repair and other documentation laws
• Community-specific - reflects the homes (or high/mid-rises) you build; creates brand extension
• User friendly - easy to read, easy to follow; written for the layman using tables and schedules
• Progressive and evolving - annually reviewed and revised.

What is included in "comprehensive turnkey service"

Each Compendia solution offers comprehensive turnkey service. This means we do all "heavy lifting." We do it all! We handle data collection and content creation all the way through professional production, fulfillment and delivery to your doorstep. For our online customers, we upload your content, we design your web portal to match your branding, we load your legacy users, we activate your homeowner accounts. We offer a one-stop shop to ensure your homeowners receive the highest quality solution. We provide the content. We collect the manufactured product warranties. We process and create your community or builder branded solution. We package and deliver your final product.

Our turnkey service also extends to our Master Archives customers. We work with your team to collect all your documents (we even travel to your storage facilities to personally pick them up). Once they are catalogued and indexed, Compendia’s expert team of archivists audit the files and provide you with a list of those files missing or incomplete. We then scan and upload your entire document library to our web-based application. And your old paper files? We box them up and return them to storage.

What's the difference between your online offerings (Home Experience/Community Experience) and the printed version for homeowners and HOA Boards?

Although the maintenance content is identical, the chief difference between the printed version and our online offerings is its scope. Home Experience is truly an after-sale communication platform. It is a dynamic resource that creates a more relevant, personalized and compelling customer experience. Whereas the content on a traditional manual is static, the online offering provides consistent content updates and sends monthly emails to the homeowner reminding to perform certain maintenance tasks. Additionally, the web-based versions contain more information that result in fewer service calls, greater loyalty, reduced marketing and operating costs and increased revenue. Such features include expanded documentation (like floor plans, HOA information, CC&Rs etc...) links to manufactured products/subcontractors websites, integration with your customer service process, comprehensive search capability, and community/neighborhood detail.

Community Experience empowers HOA boards, property managers and homeowners to use their community-specific knowledge base to enhance their ability to maintain the property. This comprehensive resource eases the transition from builder to the board, meets compliance requirements, and reduces a builder’s exposure to litigation. It creates on-demand access to the integrity-critical documents every HOA needs.

Our online solutions offer a variety of interactive and valuable features to serve as a key differentiator in your marketing campaigns. They allow you to expand the visibility and vitality of your brand while directly addressing the needs of your customers.

With your new online offerings, are you discontinuing the printed manual?

No. To those whose needs require it, Compendia will continue to offer paper-based solutions delivered. However, for our print customers, the manufactured product warranty portion of the manual will be delivered on CD only. Yet, in keeping with the raised expectations of homeowners our primary offering and signature solution will be software as service (SAS) interactive web-applications Home Experience and Community Experience. These “green” solutions are much more than maintenance and warranty information provided online. It is a comprehensive homeownership resource system that benefits the builder, homeowner and Homeowners Association. We will continue to provide the same wealth of solutions including maintenance information management, manufactured product warranty organization, HOA and community care and document retention.

Do you service Single Family Development communities or high and mid rise residential projects?

All of them. Our solutions easily apply to any type of community or residence. We understand the unique nature of each residential project and offer maintenance content that is tailored to their specific needs. Compendia provides homeowner and homeowner association content that is directly applicable to high rise and mid rise condominiums as well as master planned communities.

I've signed up for your service...now what?

Compendia works with your project management team to facilitate a rollout plan that meets your specific requirements. Getting started is as fast and easy as filling out our brief QuickStart form. We have developed a 5-step process that allows us to do the "heavy lifting:

STEP 1: Confirm Scope and Timeline/ QuickStart Review/ Project Kickoff

STEP 2: Document Collection

STEP 3: Content Adaptation and Personalization

STEP 4: Prototype Delivery/Review-Approval

STEP 5: Final Delivery/Activation

What is a QuickStart form?

The QuickStart form is our proprietary document that maps out the initial scope of your project. It identifies the proper contacts, content option choices, component list (for manufactured product warranty collection), a list of required data/documents, and design options. Each solution we offer requires a finished QuickStart form in order to properly initiate your project.

How do you collect my warranties for each manufactured product?

Based on the amenities and manufactured products you listed on your QuickStart form, we begin the process of contacting your vendors and subcontractors to compile all the necessary warranty, O&M, and/or troubleshooting documents. We make a every effort to track down all the identified documents; which in many cases are spread amongst various departments or available at different points in the construction process. Compendia provides you with a Gap Report after the initial collection identifying which documents are incomplete or missing. As part of our service, we can we assist in the location and recovery of your missing documents.

Several states require you to turn over the warranty and maintenance documentation for such manufactured products to the homeowner. Compendia's service allows for the smooth and smart transference of those documents. And, we deliver the collected warranties on CD or online.

Home Experience is a Software as a Service (SaaS) product. What internal benefits do I receive from this type of solution?

SaaS eliminates the need to deal with servers, staging, version maintenance, security, and performance. SaaS is enables companies to more quickly deploy business software, more easily administer these applications, obtain best-in-class capabilities and redirect their scarce IT resources to strategic initiatives.

Key benefits of SaaS include:

• Rapid application deployment, sometimes immediate after sign-up.
• Reduced complexity - there is no software and hardware to buy and install, no IT resources are required to deploy, and the provider handles updates, upgrades and patch management.
• Reduced initial costs - and more predictable, usage-based recurring costs.
• Freedom to focus on core business.
• Reliability and scalability.
• Global accessibility (wherever a browser and internet access are available).

What is vetted content and why is it important?

This means you are getting correct, fully endorsed and recognized best practices from the leading experts in each individual field (ie electrical engineering, architecture, water and waste management, Anyone who claims expertise in every aspect of home management and maintenance may be doing a disservice to homeowners. Vetting is simply a recognized best practice not just in the home building industry, but in any 21st century corporation dealing with mission critical information that impacts performance and liability. Compendia uses several key sources to forensically validate the best practices we present in each homeowner guide.

What does "compendia" mean?

Simply put, compendia is a storehouse of knowledge, easily accessed. The name reflects our transformation into an information company. To our customers, Compendia means a trusted partner who is working to help builders and developers achieve their goals of generating revenue, containing costs, reducing risk, and strengthening customer satisfaction.

What is your ownership status?

Compendia is a privately held corporation owned and run by Steve Fabry who founded Master Manuals, now Compendia, in 1999.

Is Compendia a data company?

No. Compendia is an information company. Our core competency is the development and distribution of best practice preventive care and warranty information for new residential construction. We collect, aggregate and integrate relevant information, create analysis and apply that collective knowledge towards the benefit of our customers. Moreover, we understand the homebuilding industry. We understand a builder's business needs and what information they need to achieve their goals. This is considerably different than painting a wall or oiling a gate hinge.

Why did you change your name from Master Manuals to Compendia?

We have outgrown the name Master Manuals. The new name is a more accurate reflection of the types of solutions we offer and needs we can solve for homebuilders and homeowners. We are an information company. Additionally over the past year and a half, we have developed several new online offerings, such as Home Experience, Community Experience and Master Archives, that represent the direction of the company and the new name conveys the right message. Here is CEO's Steve Fabry's open letter.

How much of the country does Compendia service?

Compendia is a national company. Our solutions are used in a majority of the states across the country.

How does maintenance documentation affect/satisfy right to repair laws?

The short answer is that several of the right-of-repair laws across the country require maintenance documentation for compliance. All of them require the provision of manufactured product warranties.

One of the substantial value propositions that a Compendia solution offers builders is a means to satisfy, and/or maximize compliance with right to repair laws across the country. Currently, 31 states in the U.S. have adopted various fix-it laws and our documentation solutions provide a way to present an affirmative defense should you be involved in a Construction Defect Litigation case.

Additionally, right-to-repair laws also cover the manufactured products you install in a home. The homebuyer has the right to expect that these manufactured products do what they're supposed to do for as long as they're intended to last (useful life), and performance can be affected by installation. Builders are required to provide warranties for all these manufactured products.

Some laws are more complex than others, but regardless of the state in which you build, collective wisdom states that it is not an issue of if you will be sued, but a matter of when. And whether there is a specific law dictating your rights, or the courts are driven by case law precedent, you need to take steps to protect your assets. The following is some information about right to repair laws. For more specific information about your state, consult our Compliance Map.

As a builder, what do right-to-repair laws mean to you?

In a nutshell, right-to-repair laws codify two rights.

• The right of the homebuyer to have the home be what it's intended to be.
  
• The right of the homebuilder to fix whatever might be validly wrong or inoperative in the home without costly and draining legal action.
  
• Homebuyers have an obligation to take reasonable steps to maintain their homes.

What is an affirmative defense?
A homeowner is obligated to follow all reasonable maintenance obligations and schedules communicated in writing to the homeowner by the builder and product manufacturers, as well as commonly accepted maintenance practices. A failure by a homeowner to follow these obligations, schedules, and practices may subject the homeowner to the affirmative defenses.

Simply stated, affirmative defense is the ability for a builder to shield itself from liability against frivolous lawsuits. By providing (and documenting) that the homeowner received maintenance and manufactured product warranty information, builders shifts responsibility for upkeep to the homeowner. It is now the homeowner’s obligation to follow the directions of the manufacturer…any failure to do so exonerates the builder from blame (unless the issue is truly a defect, in which a builder is legally obligated to address.) Without affirmative defense, builders are more vulnerable to legal action.

Disputes between homebuilders and consumers are often fueled by differences of opinion between what is considered defective and covered under a warranty versus what is the result of inadequate homeowner maintenance. Smart information transfer of key documents: performance standards, maintenance guidelines and warranty information clearly and systematically define the roles and responsibilities for both builder and buyer. It sets in writing the expectations of performance and delivery.

What is Magnusson-Moss?

Magnusson-Moss Warranty Act of 1975 is a federal law that protects consumers by compelling any warrantor warranting a consumer product to a consumer by means of a written warranty must disclose, fully and conspicuously, in simple and readily understood language, the terms and conditions of the warranty to the extent required by rules of the Federal Trade Commission.

All manufacturers, whether as a standard business practice or compelled by various state laws, are required to provide written warranties. Therefore, a builder/developer, as a partner/reseller/ agent/distributor of the manufacturer, is bound by Magnuson-Moss.

Furthermore, many builders use 2-10 warranties (i.e. PWC, RWC etc…) also directly and specifically address the builder’s responsibility: “WE assign to YOU all the manufacturer’s warranties on all appliances, fixtures and items of equipment WE installed in the HOME.” (VIII General Conditions C. Transfer of Manufacturer’s Warranty).

Note: We are not attorneys, and this document was created for informational purposes. All decisions remain yours. This document does not constitute, nor should it be considered to contain, legal advice. Please evaluate your needs and make decisions in conjunction with appropriate legal counsel.