FRONTSTEPS vs HOA Simplify
FRONTSTEPS
frontsteps.comHOA Simplify
hoasimplify.comSide by side
| Figure | FRONTSTEPS | HOA Simplify |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | — | $49/mo |
| Free plan | — | — |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | Yes | Yes |
| Android | Yes | Yes |
| API | — | Yes |
| Plans published | 0 | 6 |
| Spec score · Homeowners Association Management Software | 7.8 (#8) | 8.8 (#1) |
| Spec score · HOA Management Software | 7.9 (#37) | 9.0 (#5) |
| Spec score · HOA Accounting Software | 7.6 (#15) | 8.6 (#6) |
| Accounting | Caliber supports automated payment posting, budgeting, collections, fund-based accounting, compliance workflows, work orders, and architectural review requests. | AI Smart Accounting can generate financial reports and budget alerts from natural-language questions and record expenses, payments, and journal entries through chat. |
| API access | The release notes say third-party vendors requiring Caliber API access must contact Customer Support for onboarding and that internal customer use does not incur charges. | API access is included in the Premium plan and custom integrations are listed there; the public documentation page says the API reference is still coming soon. |
| Audience | The platform is designed for community management companies, HOA boards, and homeowners. | The company says its founder developed the product after serving on an HOA board and experiencing manual processes and poor communication tools. |
| Integrations | FRONTSTEPS lists banking partners including Western Alliance, Axos Bank, BankUnited, First Citizens Bank, Webster Bank, Columbia Bank, SmartStreet, Truist, Enterprise Bank, Northrim Bank, Association Prime, Wintrust, and Citizens Business Bank. | Active integrations listed by the maker are Stripe Connect, QuickBooks Online, AI Smart Import, AI Support Assistant, Resend email and SMS, push notifications, document storage and PWA installation. |
| Product | FRONTSTEPS brings HOA accounting, payments, security, and communication tools together in a community-management platform. | HOA Simplify provides a workspace for HOA dues, documents, votes, and maintenance requests for boards, managers, and residents. |
| Resident portal | Yes | Residents can pay dues, view documents and statements, submit requests, receive announcements, vote and reserve amenities through the portal. |
| Support | The maker links customers to a help center, knowledge base, and live training sessions. | Support ranges from email on lower plans to priority email on several higher plans; Enterprise offers a custom support plan. |
Plans
HOA Simplify
- Community$79 a month
- Association$119 a month
- Standard$179 a month
- Premium$379 a month
- Basics$49 a month
- EnterprisePriced on request
In their own words
FRONTSTEPS
FRONTSTEPS has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.
HOA Simplify
HOA Simplify provides a workspace for HOA dues, documents, votes and maintenance requests for boards, managers and residents. Its AI Smart Accounting can produce financial reports and budget alerts from natural-language questions, and record expenses, payments and journal entries through chat. Election tools include quorum tracking, proxy and ranked-choice voting, anonymous results and an election archive. Residents can pay dues, view documents, submit maintenance requests, vote and book amenities through a portal that can be installed as a PWA on mobile devices. Property managers get cross-HOA reporting, reusable dues templates, bulk resident imports and a portfolio activity feed. AI Smart Import accepts CSV files from Buildium, AppFolio, PayHOA or spreadsheets, maps columns automatically, and supports preview and rollback. Stripe payments and QuickBooks Online sync are listed as built in; Slack, Google Calendar, Zapier, DocuSign, Plaid and Twilio are marked coming soon. Community, Association and Standard plans list unit limits of 50, 125 and 200; Premium lists unlimited units. Platform transaction fees apply in addition to Stripe fees.