What Is Strata Management? A Complete Guide for Australian Property Owners

When you buy an apartment, townhouse, or unit in Australia, you're almost certainly buying into a strata scheme. Strata title is a form of property ownership where individual lots (your apartment) exist within a shared building or complex. You own your lot outright, but the common areas — lobbies, lifts, gardens, car parks, pools — are collectively owned by all lot owners through what's called an owners corporation (or body corporate in Queensland).

Think of it this way: you own everything inside your four walls, but everything outside those walls is shared. That shared ownership creates shared responsibility — and that's where strata management comes in.

Strata management is the administration of a strata scheme's shared property, finances, and compliance obligations. It covers everything from maintaining the building's common areas to collecting levies, enforcing bylaws, and ensuring the building meets fire safety and accessibility standards.

There are three ways a strata scheme can be managed:

Self-managed: The owners corporation handles everything internally. Committee members volunteer their time to manage finances, organise repairs, and handle compliance. This is common in smaller schemes (under 20 lots) but can be overwhelming as buildings grow.

Professionally managed: A licensed strata management company is appointed to handle day-to-day administration. They manage finances, coordinate maintenance, ensure compliance, and act as the primary point of contact for owners. Most medium to large schemes use professional management.

Hybrid approach: The committee handles strategic decisions while outsourcing specific tasks (accounting, compliance) to professionals. This is becoming more common as digital tools make self-management more feasible for larger schemes.

Owners corporation (body corporate): Every lot owner is automatically a member. This is the legal entity that owns the common property and makes decisions about the building.

Strata committee: A group of volunteer owners elected at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) to make decisions between general meetings. Usually includes a chairperson, secretary, and treasurer.

Strata manager: A licensed professional appointed by the owners corporation to handle day-to-day administration. They don't make decisions — the committee does — but they execute those decisions and manage the paperwork.

Building manager: Sometimes called a caretaker, this person handles the physical maintenance of the building — cleaning, minor repairs, contractor coordination. Not all schemes have one.

Levies are the regular contributions every lot owner pays to fund the running of the building. There are two main funds:

Administration fund: Covers day-to-day expenses — cleaning, gardening, insurance premiums, strata management fees, utilities for common areas, and minor repairs.

Capital works fund (sinking fund): Covers long-term maintenance and major repairs — painting, roof replacement, lift upgrades, waterproofing. A 10-year capital works plan is usually required by law.

Levy amounts are set at the AGM based on the scheme's budget. They're typically calculated using unit entitlements — a formula that determines each lot's share of expenses based on its relative value within the scheme.

As a strata lot owner, you're legally required to:

- Pay your levies on time
- Comply with the scheme's bylaws
- Maintain the inside of your lot in good repair
- Not do anything that damages common property
- Seek approval for renovations that affect common property or the building's structure
- Attend or vote at general meetings (or appoint a proxy)

Understanding these obligations is the first step to being a good member of your strata community — and protecting your investment.

Managing a strata scheme involves tracking dozens of moving parts — levy budgets, maintenance schedules, compliance deadlines, meeting minutes, contractor contacts, insurance policies. Traditionally, this has been done through a combination of spreadsheets, shared drives, and email chains.

Modern tools like Planform are designed to bring all of this into one place — an interactive dashboard where committee members, building managers, and strata managers can see everything about their scheme at a glance. From levy tracking to defect management to compliance monitoring, the right tool can save committees hundreds of hours each year.