Nelson Alexander takes hands-on approach in managing owners corporations

It’s the crunch question facing the owners of apartments and townhouses that are governed by an owners corporation. Where do you find a manager with the right skill set to make residential buildings operate at their optimum level but at reasonable cost?

More than ever, property owners and investors are striving to limit their exposure to the surprise financial outlays that can flow from a poorly managed owners corporation.

Nelson Alexander has set up a division to manage owners’ corporations, the strata administration bodies once known as bodies corporate.

The company’s move is a timely one.

The pressures on owners corporations are ratcheting up as Victoria sees a surge in new medium-density and high-density apartment buildings. This is intensifying the competition between unit buildings to attract tenants and owner occupier residents – and makes the presentation of a building’s public areas and gardens and the promptness with which maintenance and budgeting issues are addressed, of vital importance.

Nelson Alexander Partner, Jason Marston, says the company’s owners corporation division conduct regular on-site inspections of the buildings under its management.

This is a key point of difference with some stand-alone owners corporation management operations whose staff only see fit to inspect a building once a year, if that.

“We conduct a physical inspection two times a year of each building we manage and will undertake additional inspections on request” Mr Marston says.

“Our managers make a point of understanding the physical aspects of a property with regular site visits and a willingness to meet with committee members and owners corporation members’ onsite.”

He says when owners corporations decide to switch their management to Nelson Alexander two reasons are typically given for the move.

One is that members are not receiving a response to repeated enquiries they make to their existing manager. The second is that their building is not being inspected on a routine basis by the current manager.

According to Mr Marston, making multi-unit properties perform at the optimum level is a multi-faceted task.

“Not only do the individual apartments or units have to perform well, but so does the building itself,” he says.

“The budgets have to be right, the building has to be sufficiently insured and the maintenance programs need to be kept up.

He says the biggest issue with an owners corporation is to plan ahead so that you avoid costly financial surprises for the owners.

This means setting up correctly-funded budgets so that the gardens and public foyer areas of a building are maintained in tip-top condition. It can mean budgeting ahead for foreseeable items of expenditure, such as painting the exterior of a building, by introducing staggered levies over a number of years, rather than hitting the owners with a single large bill for the works.

“If you nip most maintenance issues in the bud, it saves money,” Mr Marston notes.

“For example, a lick of paint can save a major carpentry issue from developing later on.”

Nelson Alexander manages owners corporations for buildings in regional Victoria as well as in many suburbs of Melbourne. It has a strong administrative framework in place and a 16-office network, which are essential to supporting active owners corporation managers.

These administrative systems allow managers to prepare for expenditure items in the medium and long term, and to manage owners corporations according to the wishes and needs of their members.

Some issues affecting strata buildings can’t be put on the backburner. Essential services audits are required annually. An owners corporation is required to make sure that fire equipment and exit and foyer lighting is maintained in good order and that reports are filed to appropriate government authorities.

Nelson Alexander has the systems in place to manage these issues. Its owners corporation divisional managers also provide advice on the successful running of annual general meetings, which require a quorum of members to be in attendance.

“Not only do we manage buildings, we actually manage them according to the wishes of the majority of the owners,” Mr Marston says.

“It is all about being ahead of the game.”

“For example, bulk hot water systems need to be replaced every eight or 10 years. Our owners corporation managers, in conjunction with the members of the owners’ corporation, plan ahead for those events, and there are a lot of other areas where synergies are very important.

“The people who live in apartment buildings have to enjoy their home.”

“If the gardens are not kept well and the entries are not aesthetically attractive, people’s living standards are going to drop, so it’s really important that you have a good owners’ corporation and an excellent level of service from your owners corporation manager.

“We like to keep everything running tight, with good budgets and good maintenance programs.

“You can’t turn buildings into what they’re not, but you can have them running at their maximum operating level. The good buildings that are run well attract better tenants – they are not under-financed or undercapitalised, the maintenance is kept up and they keep attracting quality people.”

If you would like to receive a competitive quote or more information from Nelson Alexander’s owners’ corporation division, contact Sharon Thomas or Jason Marston today.

For a no obligation conversation about the needs of your Owners Corporation submit your details below.