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Hi all
I’ve been following this site for a while so many thanks for the tips and advice here. I was hoping for some collective wisdom on the pros and cons of appointing a building manager in my strata complex (apologies if it has been addressed elsewhere on this site, but I haven’t been able to find a topic on it).
Background
Our 3 year old strata complex of 40 apartments and 15 townhouses in northern Sydney is managed by a couple very hands on EC members supported by an offsite Strata Manager whose office is in the south of Sydney. Ours is a generic scheme with no fancy facilities like a pool, gym or bbq area, apart from 2 lifts in separate 4 storey buildings and some common equipment like communal hot water systems.
Some of their tasks have included maintaining a website, updating the noticeboard notices (we have 4 separate blocks, 2 with lifts, so there are 3 noticeboards), checking for blown lights etc and liaising to have them replaced, liaising with the developer to follow up building defects, proactively managing our contractors and tradies to maintain/repair common property and monitoring by-law compliance (from abuse of car parking to residents who dump rubbish on common property).
Problem
Unfortunately, those EC members (who were able to do these tasks as they either worked from home or are retired) are now selling and the remaining members don’t have the capacity to continue these onsite tasks or aren’t interested.
We are unlikely to be able to convince any other owners from joining the EC as at least half are investors, and of the remaining owners, many are not interested or have the attitude that “it’s the Strata Manager’s job” (but in actual fact, it’s a diligent EC member who attends to emergencies such as the hot water system failing at 10pm at night, or the garage door getting stuck).
As one of the remaining EC members, I’m concerned about ensuring that we can continue to maintain common property and run our scheme well once these EC members are no longer with us.
Potential solution
In light of the inability of the remaining EC members to pick up the slack, one potential solution suggested by our strata manager, is to appoint a building manager. He’s obtained a quote from a building management company to perform our cleaning/gardening as well as the tasks currently performed by EC members.
The building manager would be based offsite and would rely on the cleaners/gardeners to proactively report issues and undertake the tasks currently performed by our few hard-working EC members.
Has anyone here had experience engaging a building manager to help with the proactive onsite maintenance/repair of common property, as well as monitoring by-law compliance?
My pipe dream, if possible, is for the building manager to work proactively with the strata manager to run and improve the complex. EC members would still report issues where identified, but would not be burdened with having to run from their 8am-8pm day job to attend to strata issues at night like counting the number of blown light bulbs and telling the strata manager to send the electrician to replace them.
Instead, the EC would be akin to a company board directing at a high level, the strategic direction of the scheme in terms of maintenance/repair, as well as signing off/approving suggestions from the building manager and strata manager.
Am I being too idealistic here, or would a building manager solve our issues? What should we practically be expecting them to do (I presume they would reduce the current strata manager’s workload and hence we should be able to negotiate a reduction in management fee), and are there any good building management companies out there?
Your collective wisdom would be greatly appreciated!
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