Body corporate and strata management, explained

Once you manage apartments or townhouses, you are managing more than individual lots; you are operating inside a strata or body corporate scheme, with its own money, rules and meetings.

Levies and the funds they feed

Owners pay regular levies (or body corporate fees) that fund two broad pots: the day-to-day administrative fund for running costs, and a capital-works or sinking fund that saves toward major future works like roofing or repainting. Setting and collecting these correctly is central to the scheme's financial health.

By-laws, AGMs and common property

A scheme runs on by-laws (rules covering things like pets, parking and renovations), an annual general meeting where owners vote on budgets and decisions, and the maintenance of common property that no single owner owns alone. The body corporate or strata manager keeps all of this moving.

The rules change with the border

Terminology and law differ by jurisdiction. New South Wales talks about strata schemes; Queensland about body corporate under the BCCM legislation; other states and New Zealand have their own frameworks for what is broadly the same idea. The principles travel; the specifics do not.

Where software helps

Cuvanti tracks levies, fund balances, by-law records and meeting documents per scheme, so the financial and compliance picture of a building is in one place rather than scattered across spreadsheets and inboxes.

This is general information, not legal advice. Confirm the requirements for your scheme and jurisdiction with a qualified strata or body corporate adviser.