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I would like to ask for a few comments on strata management companies, strata managers and their responsibilities please.
I have read in Flat Chat they can only be expected to collect money from owners, pay bills, run meetings if required, organise insurance (for which it is ‘normal practise’ for them to get a commission apparently) pass on complaints to the Executive Commitee and send out a letter or two, but that’s about it. Many, or most, never even visit buildings manage.
When anything tricky comes up, they say ‘I can only act on directions from the executive commttee’. And the Executive Committee usually says: write or speak to the strata manager! That’s why we have one! Let’s all hum round and round and round she goes… or as time goes byyyyyyy…
In my humble experience, one of the the larger strata managers, who’s gobbling all the others up, is the worst. They know exactly how the system works; how little they can get away with; how to lean whichever way the wind is blowing; which side of their bread the butter will be on; how to sideline anyone who’s a bit of a thorn in their side, or who maybe threatening their income stream.
I’m sure our situation is typical: medium-sized block of 30; mostly apathetic, uninvolved owners; core of self-interested owners on the executive committee; decent bank balance; lots of things needing to be done to get the place looking half-acceptable. Reactive committee and strata manager. Almost nothing proactive ever happens. Tons of fobbing-off by both the committee and strata manager in the manner mentioned above.
Surely strata managers who, despite what they say, make a decent whack. Should be doing MORE for their money and being more proactive and surely they have the power to make sure things are don properly? Surely they must!
Why shouldn’t strata managers be able to take errant executive committees to the CTTT or seek mediation against an owners corporation to get them to do the right thing?
I reckon it’s time to make strata managers more accountable, offer more guidance and don’t just take the money and run with minimum responsibility.
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What’s involved in the O/C making decisions? When I was on the Executive Committee at the time when our Plan last used the services of a Strata Manager (SM) all we did was to “approve” what the SM put before us based on his recommendations; about 10% of the work that the SM did to manage the entire Plan.
We didn’t pay “peanuts” either – I just checked the Agenda of our 2005-6 AGM, the last one before we resolved to self-manage. At that time we’d paid the SM $10,202.23 comprising their Management Fee $6,068.96, Disbursements $3,841.77, and Legal (payment reminders prepared by them) $291.50. At the time, the above amounts paid to the SM represented just over 30% of our total expenditure for our 27 Lot Plan.
A damn lot of money for an “administrator”, and even though he was more than that, we discovered post self-management that the SM had put Motions on past Agendas that we’d resolved by simple majority instead of as a Special Resolution, had tax returns prepared without showing sundry income, and his Office had late-paid so many E/C approved invoices that many Contractors simply wouldn’t quote on work that his Office put out.
Whilst there are SMs out there who will competently manage in the way that I still believe many O/Cs expect, it’s every O/C to their own; we’ll stick with self-management where I have but one Plan to worry about, and where we save ourselves a packet.
Whale – Whilst $10k is a lot of money for an individual, in a 27 lot plan, that translates to roughly $1 a day per lot for all the services a good SM provides. I’m not saying you had a good SM given the problems you list, but $1 a day won’t get you a cup of coffee or newspaper these days, so it is not a lot to ask for all the messy little things an SM can be saddled with, such as being available to take calls from all 27 lot owners and/or their partners over the most trivial matters. The time wasting of some owners is the real killer – I’m aware of SM who got a half hour or more lecture about the bad mobile reception within the strata with demands for the SM to get it fixed now.
Someone with common sense and a co-operative OC should be able to self manage without too much difficulty and save a good amount that can be put towards repairs. The real issue with self management is keeping up with things such as fire safety and asbestos handling requirements and handling complaints once you have one or more obnoxious owners. It is when these things go wrong that OCs come looking for an SM to clean up the mess.
Hi Yclept – you’re a Strata Manager right?
Remember that the $10K was 6 years ago, so it may have got me a few cups of coffee per day!
Seriously though, it wasn’t just the Strata Manager’s Fees and the occasional poor advice that convinced our Owners Corporation to self-manage, but moreso the fact that we could better prioritise and manage our expenditure in a way that no SM with 50+ Plans to manage could easily do; if at all.
Of course with 85% of our Units under Lease, the fact that I manage the strata for nothing was somewhat of an incentive for my Proprietor / Landlords to go that way!
Let me tell you though that preparing the budgets, managing expenditure, dealing with non-paying Proprietor / Landlords, their ignorant tenants, their equally ignorant Property Managers who expect the O/C to pay for simply everything, attending the Tribunal, preparing Agendas, Chairing General Meetings, preparing the Minutes, doing the annual safety audit, updating the sinking fund plan, drafting and registering Special By-Laws, completing / submitting insurance claims, writing work specs., getting quotes, issuing work orders, managing contractors, inspecting their works, paying the bills on-time, and keeping our website up-to-date gives me a perspective on what a real Strata Manager does and concurrently keeps my retired brain-cells moving!
Though I was no fan of our strata manager whilst on the EC,they did do a lot of work for our complex over the years. They did this because I kept on top of things asking them to arrange quotes, works, payments, notices. I kept track of what should happen and when. I realized that our strata manager had a lot of plans on their books, not just one. So the onus must be on the owners to check up on happening in their own complex. Your own water leak might have been overlooked because the manager had 10 others they were attending to on that day. They did earn their money whilst I was on the EC because I rang, emailed, and asked the status of repairs/maintenance. I asked for confirmation of receiving instructions. I did a lot of work for free making sure that they earned their money. And they did. I am sure they hated hearing I was on the phone.
Having a strata manager means that there is a contact point for owners at least 5 days a week. On matters of urgency, where person or property were in danger of injury or damage, the SM would step in, after trying to contact EC members and get work done. The big problem with our last strata manager was not the company as a own whole, or the owner of the business, but rather some of the property managers that crossed our path were astoundingly incompetent, and down right rude. But I kept on top of matters, I complained, I had monies reimbursed where they were in the wrong, such as the time they sent out a notice to owners at least 4 times that was 4 pages long. The photo copy fees plus the postage fees might not have been a million dollars, but we weren’t going to pay for it.
The problem with owners here is that they think the SM does everything. That the SM gets the work done and if it isn’t done then it is their fault. I have had one resident here ask which unit the SM lived in. Most here think that the OC is the EC so they don’t have to do anything, it is all for someone else, namely the SM. In the case of the outstanding maintenance for our complex, now up to for quoting processes over the past 12 months, an owner recently said to me that perhaps things will be better with the new people. Thinking there had been some EC coup that I did not know about I asked which new people. He was referring to the new SM. Because obviously it was the old SM who didn’t get around to the maintenance here. Not the current EC who would ask the SM to arrange quotes then do nothing with them, then they expire, they ask for more quotes do nothing etc etc. I pity our new SM. People are already starting to say they are incompetent. But they are waiting for instructions to carry out works. I had some tradespeople over to my place. They were astounded at the state of the exterior common property just outside my front door. A problem that was reported 12 months ago. They said it was not an expensive job, and would only take 30 minutes. Quoting process started with the last SM. Up to two quotes for the new manager about to get the third. And no doubt they a charging now for getting this job, not to mention the others, requoted.. And so they should.
Whale – Me? A Strata Manager? I’m just an old retired guy with an interest in the industry.
That perspective you have gained is something that a lot of owners could benefit from. Most think they understand strata, but in reality they are so far removed from reality it isn’t funny. Unfortunately most won’t appreciate just how much work you are doing on their behalf.
struggler – If you were as sensible and level headed on the phone as in your post here your Strata Manager wouldn’t have hated to hear from you at all. They would have realised they could actually work with you as opposed to the screamers who they usually have to deal with who are only interested in abusing, swearing and making threats. Those people are impossible to deal with and steal time that an SM could be spending attending to the civilised people.
You have summed up a lot of the issues beautifully.
I agree completely.
Yclept. Thank you for be.ieving my postings a sensible and level headed. I can assure you my phone conversations in the past with out SM were also conducted in this manner in the first instance, and even the second.
However, when you have a SM who just approves and pays for repairs and puts them through your insurance without your knowledge, over and over again, and refused to give you the details of these repairs not even which unit, or they write to a company advising that the EC is unhappy with their services will not be using them anymore when we were infact happy and had not authorized this correspondence. when the SM would send out a trades person for a repair and tell them just knock on “Struggs” door, without notifying me nor finding out if I would even be there, on more occasions than I can remember, and would tell residents to not bother contacting them re repairs in the complex but to just knock on my door. Then the SM gave an owner who had destroyed common property permission to half fix it despite what the strata lawyer had instructed him to do, then yes all semblance of sensibility, level headedness, calmness and reasoning went right out the window. I can totally understand a SM overlooking this, or not getting around to that and having to be reminded. But not when one has to ring and ring and ring and ring.
So yes, I initially approached matters with a reminder phone call/email in a friendly manner. But there’s is only so long one can keep “smiling”. Then bad Struggs appears.
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