Village Amenities Fund

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Panorama Village Amenities Fund?

What is the Panorama Village Amenities Fund?The Panorama Village Amenities Fund (“VA Fund”) is a non-profit fund paid into by property owners and guests staying in Panorama. The VA Fund is managed by Panorama Mountain Resort (“PMR”) and overseen by a Governance Committee of which the members are elected from the Panorama Owners Council (“POC”). The VA Fund’s financial statements are audited annually by an independent auditor.

What value do I get from the VA Fund?

The VA Fund was implemented to provide a range of amenities and benefits to property owners in Panorama on a shared cost basis. Among other things, the VA Fund looks after:

Why am I required to pay a Village Amenities Charge?

The Village Amenities Charge (“VA Charge”) is documented in the Amended and Restated Village Amenities Agreement dated January 1, 2003 which was further amended in December 2008 (the “VA Agreement”). The title to your property in Panorama includes a Rent Charge that legally binds your property to the VA Agreement. All properties on lands developed by Intrawest and its successors are subject to the VA Agreement: single family homes, condominiums, townhomes, commercial properties (e.g. The Approach, all restaurants, rental/retail outlets, etc.) and sold vacant lots. Properties in the original subdivision are not subject to the VA Rent Charge, but property owners in the original subdivision can opt in if they want to access Village Amenities.

What if I don’t pay?

Paying late or not paying will result in late payment fees (1% per month, compounding) being added to your outstanding balance. Because a Rent Charge is registered on the title of your property, you will not be able to transfer title of your property (e.g. selling your property) without paying any amounts owing under this Rent Charge. To avoid unnecessary late payment fees and issues when you want to sell your property, it is best to pay Village Amenities invoices on time.

How is the amount of the VA Charge determined?

The VA Agreement includes a “Schedule A” which outlines the formula for calculating the VA Charge on an annual basis. Essentially, it is a combination of the value of your property as assessed by BC Assessment (same basis as your property taxes) and the budgeted cost to operate and maintain the Village Amenities as drafted by PMR and reviewed/approved by the Governance Committee. The “Net Village Amenities Costs” from the budget (calculated as the total costs of operating/maintaining the amenities less the revenue collected from Guest Resort Fees as explained under question 7 below) is the amount that needs to be covered by VA Charges paid by homeowners. The Net Village Amenities Costs divided by the total assessed values results in the VA Rate that is needed to balance the budget. For 2024, the VA Rate is 4.321 cents per $1,000 of Assessed Value.

As per the December 2008 amendment of the VA Agreement, a ‘cap’ is applied to the assessed value for single family homes. This cap amount is adjusted for inflation annually and is set at $903,417 for 2024. Effectively, owners whose assessed value exceeds $903,417 only pay the VA Rate on the first $903,417 of assessed value which results in a maximum VA Charge of $3,903.61 ($903,417 x 0.004321) for 2024.

Another factor that influences the VA Charge for individual property owners is whether the property is part of a strata and if that strata has set up the units in the building with a Unit Entitlement in their bylaws. This is usually the case for condominiums or townhomes whereas single family strata’s usually don’t have a Unit Entitlement structure. If a strata is organized by Unit Entitlements (larger units have higher Unit Entitlements than smaller units), the VA Charge is first determined for the building as a whole (e.g. the total assessed value for Ski Tip Lodge multiplied by the VA Rate) and then allocated to individual units/owners (i.e. each owner’s share of the Ski Tip VA Charge is calculated based on their Unit Entitlement compared to the total Unit Entitlement for the building). If a strata is not organized by Unit Entitlements, the allocation to individual owners is based on the relative share of the individual property’s assessed value compared to the total strata’s assessed value.

Why do VA Charges go UP for some owners and DOWN for others?

Keeping in mind the formulas explained under question 5 above, it is possible that the assessed values for some buildings or properties increase more than those of other buildings or properties. As a result, the buildings/properties with a larger increase in assessed values that are below the cap amount set for that year will get a relatively bigger share of the total VA Charges allocated than those with smaller increases in assessed values.

Because the cap amount is linked to inflation, the maximum VA Charge for properties that are at or above the cap amount can go up or down, depending on the rate of inflation and the change in assessed values for properties that are below the cap amount. Since the cap was introduced in 2008, the maximum VA Charge has increased by an average of 5% per year for 13 years (to its highest level of $4,209 in 2021), but with overall Panorama assessed values significantly increasing in the last few years, the maximum VA Charge has actually decreased because a larger portion of the total amount is covered by properties that are below the cap amount.

Nightly rentals and Guest Resort Fees Schedule

A of the VA Agreement specifies that in addition to the VA Charge that is based on the assessed value of each property (see question 5 above), a Guest Resort Fee shall be added for anyone who directly or through a property manager rents out their unit for a period of less than 30 days. Guest Resort Fees should be paid by all resort guests and reduce the amount of VA Charges paid by owners. The Guest Resort Fees are set as follows:

For units that are included in the Rental Pool managed by Panorama Mountain Resort, the Guest Resort Fee is automatically collected from guests and remitted to the Village Amenities Fund. For qualified rentals for periods less than 30 days that are not part of the Panorama Rental Pool, the VA Agreement requires you to report the number of nights rented and remit the Guest Resort Fees that are owing. Please report your unit type, number of room nights rented and Guest Resort Fees owing to Ashley Kowalchuk (ashley.kowachuk@panoramaresort.com) on a quarterly basis.

Village Amenities and RFID Locks

At the moment, two of the Village Amenities are only accessible with a valid RFID key card: the Panorama Springs Pools and the gym in the Approach Hotel. In 2022, PMR replaced the old magnetic key card system (Ving) with a new RFID system (Salto). Same as the old system, RFID cards are issued by Central Check In (“CCI”). Owners who are current on their VA invoices can get their VA key cards from CCI (or have access to the VA locks programmed to their existing key cards if they already use the RFID system to unlock their unit doors). More information on the RFID system can be found here. 

If you have any further questions about the Village Amenities Fund, please contact one of these two people: