Why the 'old school attitude' works best in running a strata

While lot owners might describe strata as an adversarial industry, service providers such as lawyers, accountants, engineers, and body corporate managers will often describe it as a collegiate industry, James said.

"From the service provision side, it's the same old players. It's actually quite a collegiate industry from the lawyer, accountant, engineer, body corporate manager point of view," James explained.

"They quite often will have industry events, where everyone just forgets which colour they fly during the day and just gets along and talks about advancing the industry more broadly."

In fact, these professionals often come together and offer their time and expertise to help the government make smarter decisions, assist committees and lot owners in terms of education, and ultimately make way for better relationships among all parties involved.

His advice for property investors looking into strata as the next big step in their investment journey: Build a good team that you can trust to help you navigate your way through and maximize the potential of your investment. After all, investors and field professionals do share one goal—to make way for smarter and more capable schemes.

"It's something that is really inherently part of the job in [a] strata—that we don't bill for absolutely everything we do. You just couldn't, because there's certain parts at the beginning and the end of the engagement that are just relationship builders, that are just part[s] of that education process. Our hope is that the schemes that we work with get smarter and more capable over time," James concluded.

Tune in to Ian McKnight and James Nickless' episode in The Smart Property Investment Show to know more about the rules behind strata, the politics involved with the owners' corporation, as well as their tips and tricks to ensuring buyers receive the right advice at the right time.

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