Does small scheme need small manager?

Have you considered self-management using software like Stratabox (our sponsors)? If you are as low maintenance as you say, why not cut out the middle person and just deal with stuff yourselves?  If your strata managers are only getting the average fees, based on a cost per unit of, say, $220,  that adds up to $1320 a year for the whole block; i.e. it’s literally not worth them picking up the phone more than a handful of times.

Smaller firms have ways of amortising their costs for small blocks – but these days of Zoom meetings and management and accounting platforms, self-management is worth considering.

I’ll weigh in on self-management. We (well, I) manage my 14 unit building in Sydney’s inner west.

The economics of strata management really don’t work well for small buildings. Many of the tasks (paying routine bills, issuing levies, budgets, organising and running an AGM) take pretty much the same time for a 6-lot plan as they do for a 150-lot plan. So a good, conscientious manager charging reasonable rates will cost each owner a chunk of money.

A sloppy, third-rate manager (as you seem to have) will charge much the same and resent you because the opportunities for exploitation aren’t as good as a big building.

I’m most familiar with the Strata Schemes Management Act, while an NA is governed by the Community Land Management Act 2021 . Looking through it quickly, it seems to mirror the SSMA, but do check.

The key jobs of a manager are:

1. Financial: preparing the budget, setting and collecting the contributions and paying the bills. Keep this simple, with all regular bills paid by direct debit and a single annual contributions notice. Owners can pay monthly or quarterly with automatic payments.
2. Managing maintenance: Find good local tradespeople and give them regular tasks. For example: we have our plumbers do an annual check of gutters/roof, balcony drains, flexible hoses and hot water systems (all sources of past problems) and a more frequent check of our sump pump. While they’re in the building, owners get tap washers and trickling toilets fixed – for the marginal cost of the extra time (i.e. no callout fee).
3. Statutory: You need to maintain a roll and hold an annual general meeting with some required motions.

One of my key recommendations to potential self managers is to know your limits (of knowledge and time) and use outside experts. Lawyers, accountants, building consultants will all know more about their respective fields than even the best strata manager (who would often engage these for you, and, quite reasonably, adding the cost of their own time).

My other recommendation is to sign up for sites like Flat Chat and join the Owners Corporation Network [disclosure: I am a director of OCN] so you have access to resources and advice.

This is a bit rough and ready, but I hope it’s helpful.

Good luck!

There are two thing to consider

1. is someone willing to actually do the administrative work. Is someone knowledgeable about the strata laws.
2. Do you want someone else to take all the “hassle” out of managing your strata

Self managing a small strata is not very difficult, but if there are personality clashes, an independent referee is sometimes helpful

There are many strata managers who are willing to manage small schemes

Why not change strata managers. But in doing so interview the prospects and see how willing they are to manage a small complex.

Personally I would steer clear of the bid strata firms as a small scheme wil just get lost in the noise. Also the large strata managers are driven by process (do it our way) when small schemes want more  flexibility than that.