PayHOA Alternative: The Good HOA vs PayHOA (2026)

The short answer: PayHOA is a paid per-unit subscription, and The Good HOA is free up to 400 units. PayHOA's published price runs from $54/month for a community of 25 units to $275/month at 500, with annual billing taking roughly 10% off each tier. The Good HOA is $0/month for every module for communities up to 400 units. Both platforms cover dues and invoicing, GL accounting and reports, violations, document storage, resident communications, an owner portal, online voting, and one-click USPS mail. If your board is under 400 units and the recurring software line is what you are trying to get out of the budget, that is most of the decision. The rest of this page is the detail — including several places where PayHOA is genuinely the better buy.

Pricing on both sides verified 2026-08-26, from payhoa.com/pricing and our own published rates. Software pricing moves; re-check both before you commit. Every claim below about PayHOA comes from their own public pricing and feature pages — nothing here is based on private testing, support experiences, or anything we cannot show you a source for.

Price comparison: the published tiers

PayHOA prices by unit count. Every tier includes the same core modules, so the number below is the whole platform, not an entry-level plan you grow out of.

PayHOA offers a 30-day free trial with no credit card required. It does not offer a free plan. The Good HOA has no trial clock because there is nothing to convert to — the platform is free at 400 units and under. Above 400 units we ask you to talk to us, which is a real ceiling and we would rather name it here than let you find it after migrating your roster.

What that is per year, at the three most common community sizes

For a 100-unit association collecting $250/quarter, that subscription is roughly 1.2% of annual dues revenue. That is not ruinous. It is, however, a line item your board has to defend at every budget meeting, and it is the largest structural difference between the two platforms.

Where the money actually goes on both sides

Subscription price is not total cost. Both platforms also make money on payments and mail, and an honest comparison has to include the lines where we are the more expensive option. There are three of them.

Card payments — PayHOA is cheaper

PayHOA publishes 3.5% + $0.50 on incoming card payments. Our default is 3.75% + $0.50. On a $300 assessment that is $11.00 through PayHOA and $11.75 through us — they are 25 basis points better on every card transaction. If most of your owners pay by card, that gap compounds all year.

ACH payments — it depends on your assessment size

PayHOA publishes a flat $2.45 per incoming ACH payment. Ours is 1.5% with no flat fee, capped at $7. Flat-versus-percentage means the answer flips at about $163:

So monthly dues under about $163 are cheaper on our side, and quarterly or annual assessments above that are cheaper on theirs. A 100-unit community billing $250/quarter would pay us $3.75 per ACH payment against their $2.45 — roughly $520/year more in transaction fees. Set against a $1,188 subscription the board is still meaningfully ahead, but the gap is real, and you should run this arithmetic with your own assessment amount rather than ours.

One structural difference worth naming: our payment fees are charged to the resident as a convenience fee, disclosed before checkout, and paying by check or bank transfer directly to the association is always free. PayHOA publishes theirs as fees on incoming payments; their pricing page does not state who absorbs them, so ask.

Physical mail — PayHOA is materially cheaper

PayHOA publishes $1.25 per USPS First Class letter, $1.05 per Standard Class letter, and $2 per mailed check, printing and postage included. We charge $4.99 per standard letter and $14.99 for certified mail. On a 50-letter delinquency run that is about $62 through PayHOA against $250 through us. If your board mails often, this is the line that matters most to you, and they win it clearly.

We did not find a published certified-mail rate on PayHOA's pricing page, so we are not comparing that line. If certified mail with tracking and proof of delivery matters to your enforcement process, ask them directly.

Add-ons

PayHOA includes a website builder and message boards in the subscription. We charge $10/month for the public community website and $5/month on top of that for the resident wall. If a community website is a requirement for you, theirs is bundled and ours is not — that is $180/year of our $0 that is not actually $0.

Feature comparison

This table only includes capabilities we could verify on public pages as of 2026-08-26. Where something is not listed on a vendor's public site we say exactly that, rather than assuming it is missing — ask them directly before deciding on it.

Where PayHOA is the better choice

There are boards for which we are the wrong answer, and pretending otherwise would waste your evening.

• You are over 400 units. Our free plan stops there. At 500 units PayHOA is $249–275/month with published, predictable pricing, and that is a straightforward buy.
• You want bookkeeping or tax filing done for you. PayHOA sells human bookkeeping from $199/month and tax filings from $399. We do not offer either at any price. If your treasurer seat is empty or the books are a year behind, a service beats software, and that is a genuine gap on our side rather than a positioning difference.
• You need bank feeds, accounts payable, or resale packages. Automatic bank transaction import, vendor payment approvals and resale document packages are on their published feature list and not on ours. A board doing real AP volume will feel the absence.
• You need to reach owners by text or phone. They publish text and voice broadcast. We send email only.
• You mail constantly. Covered above — their per-letter price is roughly a quarter of ours.

There is also a straightforward argument for paying for software: a vendor whose revenue comes from your subscription has a simpler relationship with you than one whose revenue comes from payment fees and add-ons. That is a legitimate reason to choose a paid product, and we would rather state it than pretend it does not exist. Our full accounting of who pays and why is in how a free HOA platform actually makes money.

Where The Good HOA is the better choice

• You are a self-managed board under 400 units. Every module, $0/month, no trial clock and no credit card. At 100 units that is $1,188/year that stays in the operating account.
• Your budget cannot absorb a recurring software line. Small associations with $30k budgets are the ones that quietly end up back in spreadsheets when the subscription gets cut. If that is your community, see the case against running your HOA on Excel.
• You need a defensible record more than you need bookkeeping. Board actions are written to an audit trail with 10-year retention, polls seal into tamper-evident records suitable for a minutes packet, and certified mail gives you proof of delivery for enforcement. If your community is heading toward a contested election, a fine dispute or a records request, that paper trail is what you will be asked for.
• You want your owners to have a free way to pay. Paying by check costs nobody anything on our side, and online payment fees are disclosed to the resident before they commit.

How to switch without a risky cutover

Do not migrate mid-cycle and do not cancel anything on faith. The safe version takes one billing cycle:

1. Import the roster. Export owners from PayHOA as CSV and import it. Nothing is billed and nothing is sent to residents at this stage.
2. Run one dues cycle in parallel. Issue the same assessment in both systems. Owners pay wherever they like. You are checking that the ledger, the delinquency aging and the reports match what you expect.
3. Pull your records out before you cancel. Download documents, financial history and violation records while your account is still active. This is good practice with any vendor, us included — export before you cancel, always.
4. Cancel after the cycle clears. Once one full cycle has settled and reconciled, cancel. If you paid annually, note the renewal date so you are not switching two weeks after a renewal charge.

If you are also moving off a management company rather than just changing software, that is a bigger project with its own sequence: see switching from a property manager to self-managed.

Frequently asked questions

Is there a free alternative to PayHOA?

Yes. The Good HOA is $0/month for communities up to 400 units, with every module included — dues, accounting, violations, ARC, documents, communications, voting, resident portal and audit trail. There is no trial period and no credit card required. Above 400 units, pricing is by conversation. More on how that is sustainable in free HOA software: what to check before you trust it.

How much does PayHOA cost?

As published on 2026-08-26: $54/month for 0–25 units rising to $275/month for 401–500 units, with annual billing about 10% cheaper per tier, and $0.55/unit/month above 500 units against a $275 minimum. Payment and mail fees are separate, and bookkeeping and tax filing are priced as add-on services. Check their pricing page for current numbers.

Can I move my HOA's data off PayHOA?

Ask them for their export formats before you sign anything — with any vendor, the time to establish how you get your data out is before you put it in. Practically, the records you want are the owner roster, financial history and ledger, documents, and violation history. Pull them while the account is active.

Does free HOA software mean my dues get skimmed?

It should not, and you should verify rather than take anyone's word for it. Your association keeps 100% of assessed dues on our platform, and funds settle to the association's own bank account rather than to us. Our revenue is the payment convenience fee the resident sees before checkout, per-letter mail, and the optional $10/month website. If a vendor cannot tell you plainly where its money comes from, that is itself the answer. The full breakdown is in the free HOA platform business model, and the payment-fee arithmetic specifically is in the real cost of HOA credit card processing.

What if we are bigger than 400 units?

Contact us. We would rather tell you honestly that the free plan has a ceiling than let you discover it after migrating your roster.

Comparison compiled 2026-08-26 from both vendors' public pricing and feature pages, and updated roughly quarterly. If a number here no longer matches PayHOA's published pricing, tell us and we will correct it. For a wider view of the category, start with the HOA management software buyer's guide.