How Eclipse Pulled off a Zero-Disruption Platform Switch to Vantaca
When Chris Vecchi founded Eclipse Community Management nine years ago, he was stepping away from a 15-year career as a firefighter and paramedic. He saw a need for responsive, owner-centric community association management in his hometown of southwest Ohio and set out to build something better.
That vision built Eclipse into a company managing 170 community associations and 20,000 homeowners, growing 30 percent year over year since inception. But by 2024, the software holding the operation together had become the thing threatening to slow them down.
"We realized we could not continue the growth trajectory we were on while staying where we were," Vecchi says. "So, we had to make a change."
A Company Ready for Its Next Chapter
Eclipse had built a strong reputation in the HOA and condominium space, but their previous software was pulling them in the wrong direction. Processes that should have been automated still required manual workarounds. Reporting was inconsistent. Scaling the company meant adding complexity instead of adding efficiency.
"We were stuck doing a lot of manual tasks," Vecchi recalls. "We weren't able to grow and scale, and the software just wasn't aligned with our vision of being exclusive to the HOA and condo space."
Vecchi and his team knew a platform change was necessary. What they didn't know was how to pull off a platform transition without rattling 20,000 homeowners, 170 boards, and every employee in between.
Choosing a Partner, Not Just a Platform
Eclipse didn't take the decision lightly. Before choosing Vantaca, Vecchi and his team built a 170-line evaluation spreadsheet and sat through presentations from nine different vendors. They weren't shopping for software. They were searching for a partner that understood the work they did every day.
What ultimately drew them to Vantaca was alignment. The platform wasn't built for generic property management. It was purpose-built for community association management, developed by people who had lived the same daily reality Eclipse was navigating.
"The innovation and the features coming out are responsive to the needs that both we've identified and that we didn't even know we needed until they were developed," Vecchi says. "They're being championed by people who do the work that we do."
The action items engine was a particular differentiator, with the ability to configure workflows precisely to Eclipse's standards, automate repeatable processes, and scale without adding proportional headcount.
Implementation Built Around Eclipse's Standards
From the moment Eclipse engaged Vantaca's implementation team, the approach felt collaborative. Cameron Williams, Vantaca’s Implementation Project Manager, describes the early priority as alignment, and understanding not just what Eclipse needed to function today, but what they wanted their operation to look like in five years.
"They knew exactly what they wanted their operation to look like today, tomorrow, a year from now, and five years from now," Williams says. "It was really easy for us to match their standard and get them configured for what they wanted to do, not just what they were doing, but what they wanted to do in the future."
Vantaca structured the implementation around a detailed project plan with clear milestones, dual signoffs at each phase, and defined ownership for every action item. Eclipse always knew what was coming, what was expected of them, and who to call with questions.
"We had a project plan. We had defined benchmarks. We knew exactly what was expected out of us each week," Vecchi says. "The project played out exactly how it was planned to play out."
Taking the Fear Out of Data Migration
Data migration is the part of a platform switch that keeps many leadership teams up at night. For Eclipse, it didn't have to be.
Vantaca's Data Conversion Engineering Team Lead, Kim Mailhot, worked alongside Eclipse to map a pathway from their legacy system, automating as much of the transfer as possible and validating the rest.
"We migrated over almost all of our data in a very hands-off way," Vecchi says. "Two months in, the system has all of our legacy data — it provides that full picture as if we had never migrated."
Aidan Morrow, Director of Professional Services at Vantaca, puts it simply: "We've saved clients ten to forty hours of migration time by owning the exporting, the cleanup, and the validation. That time goes back to the client so they can focus on becoming confident in Vantaca before go-live."
Getting the Team Ready, and Keeping Boards on Board
Eclipse's biggest concern going into the transition wasn't technical...it was human. Vecchi addressed it head-on by sharing the full evaluation process with his team before a decision was even made, walking them through the 170-line spreadsheet and the reasoning behind it.
"Our team understood that remaining where we were was just not feasible," Vecchi says. "They were able to see the challenges in their day-to-day work. They were able to see the vision."
Eclipse's leadership split up workflows, each taking ownership of a piece and training peers, board members, and homeowners from there. They even ran board training webinars before go-live. The prep paid off.
Sarah Watson, Client Enablement Specialist at Vantaca, saw it firsthand. "He told me exactly what he wanted prior to calls. He provided detailed information, so we could configure things that might take an hour just for discovery in 30 minutes because of the prep work he did."
Go-Live Day
December 1, 2025. Eclipse went live on Vantaca.
Within the first day or two, the team was processing lockbox, making payments and handling violations all on the new platform. The internal subject matter experts Eclipse had developed during implementation stepped up immediately, supporting their peers and owning their areas of the product.
"We were able to get things up and running, producing our first homeowner payments, our first maintenance requests, violations, all of those things within the first day or two," said Vecchi.
Post go-live, Vantaca's client enablement team stayed close. Sarah Watson and the team were on calls daily, fine-tuning action items in real time, routing Eclipse to subject matter experts the moment questions came up, and making sure the system continued to evolve alongside how Eclipse worked.
"My favorite part of success with Eclipse was when I could configure two action items, in 30 minutes, and knock it out of the park," Watson says. "I will shout that to the rooftops about Chris and the Eclipse team!”
Growing Throughout the Switch
Here's the part that surprises most people: Eclipse didn't lose a single client during the transition. They gained business, adding 19 associations and 2,000 doors since go-live on November 1, 2025.
The homeowner portal gave boards the transparency they'd always wanted, real-time financial visibility, self-service access to community information, and fewer reasons to call their manager with routine questions. Board members who had previously strained the relationship with high-volume requests became self-sufficient. Managers, freed from those interactions, could focus on higher-value work.
"We have seen zero loss of business through this software transition," Vecchi says. "In fact, we have gained business as a direct result of the transition."
Two months after go-live, Vantaca has already become part of Eclipse's sales pitch. When Vecchi meets with prospective boards, he leads with visibility and transparency, two things boards everywhere are hungry for, and two things Vantaca makes easy to demonstrate.
"So many things we hear from boards who are struggling with their management relationship have to do with a lack of information, a lack of transparency, a lack of trust," Vecchi says. "Vantaca has answered all of those for us."
A Platform That Keeps Pushing Forward
Nine years ago, Chris Vecchi left the fire department and bet on himself. He built a company on the belief that community association management could be done better.
That bet paid off. And now, with Vantaca, he has the infrastructure to keep making it.
"Vantaca is moving our company forward by getting us away from manual, day-to-day tasks and allowing us to put systems and processes in place that are both reliable and optimizable," Vecchi says. "The most exciting part is that it's not done, and it probably never will be done. We have the visibility and the insight into where to lean in."
For Vecchi and the Eclipse team, the switch to Vantaca was about more than software. It was about finding a partner to move forward with.
“What impressed us most is that Vantaca isn’t just a software platform, it’s a forward‑thinking framework for how our industry should operate. From onboarding through everyday operations, Vantaca moves our organization, our boards, and our homeowners forward, allowing us to fundamentally transform how we connect, collaborate, and make decisions and that’s exciting.”
“Vantaca brings real‑time financial transparency, smarter budgeting through AI‑powered analytics, streamlined operations, and flexible payment and reservation options that empower communities and homeowners alike. The switch felt like a no-brainer”
“We have seen zero loss of business through this software transition. In fact, we have gained business as a direct result of the transition.”
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