Managing agents

Cius

Cius

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Hey All

So we have had it up to here with our managing agent of the past few years Angor. Service levels are just so down we can't really stay with them anymore. Was wanting to gather some info from you super experienced forumites on other companies and what their service levels where like.

FYI the reason we are leaving angor is mainly due to how many issues never got completed and how completely un-proactive they where with us. Despite their advertising as being sectional title experts they regularly failed to advise us of fairly basic stuff such as "This claim should be claimed from insurance" or stuff like that. In addition any issue marginaly complex can take them years to sort out and even then only by referring us to an expensive third party who may or may not resolve it quickly. I sympathise with the people I worked with there over the years as it probably just related to them being overworked. As I understand it each 4 man Angor team manages upwards of 30 complexes so that leaves them very little time to deal with each complex's issues. I also realize that they are a relatively "cheap in cost managing agent" which is why they are so thinly spread and you get what you pay for.

So basically we are now willing to pay more to get better and more dedicated service. Any recommendations (or the opposite) would be welcome.
 
yeah they are more or less all the same, in our building we have narrowed their activities to effectively just collecting levies (and arrears) and making payments

We have our own in house building manager that reports directly to the trustees and we have our own accountant that works together with the managing agent to prepare our financials. The building manager liases with contractors, arranges quotes, manages the staff, maintains the common area and so on.

Also theres a problem with the bank accounts, managing agents have a weird way of collecting levies (it goes into one big account) and as such insurance on these accounts is tricky, as a result we now have our own business account thats insured against any fraud.

All in all if you want your BC to improve, you as owners will have to do something about it and simply changing managing agents won't really do that much.
 
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Interesting. We have a maintenance manager who is decent but for what we pay her she is mainly supposed to laise with the managing agent and get them to do all the work, just chasing them to get the quotes etc. Perhaps we should up her salary and switch duties over to that role and spend the extra cash that way....

My issue is we as trustees are not professionals at building maintenance, law, insurance etc. So often what we really need is people with experience in that space to tell us stuff ahead of us making mistakes.
 
An acquaintance who invests in commercial properties runs his own office that handles everything from rentals to building maintenance.

His comments regarding managing agents are best described as "colourful".
 
Cius said:
Interesting. We have a maintenance manager who is decent but for what we pay her she is mainly supposed to laise with the managing agent and get them to do all the work, just chasing them to get the quotes etc. Perhaps we should up her salary and switch duties over to that role and spend the extra cash that way....

My issue is we as trustees are not professionals at building maintenance, law, insurance etc. So often what we really need is people with experience in that space to tell us stuff ahead of us making mistakes.
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A trustee need not have expertise in any of those fields, in terms of building maitenance you need to find a contractor that you can trust and give him the work while still doing comparative quotes and so on. This will take a few tries as you find a suitable one.

In terms of insurance we have a broker.

In terms of the law, fortunately we have many lawyers as owners but you can get a lawyer on retainer (we have one for our HR issues)

Its not really that difficult to manage a building, the only problem is owner apathy really- which is bizarre considering its your own property.
 
Cius said:
Hey All

So we have had it up to here with our managing agent of the past few years Angor. Service levels are just so down we can't really stay with them anymore. Was wanting to gather some info from you super experienced forumites on other companies and what their service levels where like.

FYI the reason we are leaving angor is mainly due to how many issues never got completed and how completely un-proactive they where with us. Despite their advertising as being sectional title experts they regularly failed to advise us of fairly basic stuff such as "This claim should be claimed from insurance" or stuff like that. In addition any issue marginaly complex can take them years to sort out and even then only by referring us to an expensive third party who may or may not resolve it quickly. I sympathise with the people I worked with there over the years as it probably just related to them being overworked. As I understand it each 4 man Angor team manages upwards of 30 complexes so that leaves them very little time to deal with each complex's issues. I also realize that they are a relatively "cheap in cost managing agent" which is why they are so thinly spread and you get what you pay for.

So basically we are now willing to pay more to get better and more dedicated service. Any recommendations (or the opposite) would be welcome.
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you are not the first person i heard have this complaint about Angor.
so far 2 complexes i have lived at have used Hanco they a small family firm (almost everyone who works there is some how related :) ) i won't lie they not great but compared to some of the others i have dealt with they ok.

best bet is get a few quotes and try and get references and google each company.
 
Cius said:
My issue is we as trustees are not professionals at building maintenance, law, insurance etc. So often what we really need is people with experience in that space to tell us stuff ahead of us making mistakes.
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That's almost never going to happen. Trustees are nominated / volunteer from that pool of owners & residents available to you - chances of there being people knowledgeable in those areas just isn't a reality most of the time. That's the job of the managing agent - to use their experience to present to the Trustees the best options. And it's the role of the Trustees to elect Managing Agents they can trust and build a relationship with.
 
So after an interesting last month or two the chairman decided to ask for a new Angor team and for the cancellation process with Angor. Their response was to terminate our contract with 30 days notice. Nice treatment there. Anyways, we are now in desperate need of a decent managing agent so if anyone has any other recommendations for us to quote I would appreciate it!
 
Cius said:
So after an interesting last month or two the chairman decided to ask for a new Angor team and for the cancellation process with Angor. Their response was to terminate our contract with 30 days notice. Nice treatment there. Anyways, we are now in desperate need of a decent managing agent so if anyone has any other recommendations for us to quote I would appreciate it!
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Diy ftw none of these so called managing agents ever make people happy for long again it is area specific and for example old old established firms in the cape like Steer and co do get things done but ymmv in one case they couldn't find me a tenant for a year until I gave up.
So I suggest try do it yourself or hire a part time individual obviously with experience to get things done as and when needed
I am of the opinion relationships with managing agents are doomed at some point
 
Hosehead said:
Diy ftw none of these so called managing agents ever make people happy for long again it is area specific and for example old old established firms in the cape like Steer and co do get things done but ymmv in one case they couldn't find me a tenant for a year until I gave up.
So I suggest try do it yourself or hire a part time individual obviously with experience to get things done as and when needed
I am of the opinion relationships with managing agents are doomed at some point
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I don't think you understand the issue, I don't think large body corporates manage their own affairs to the extent you are suggesting.

You are speaking as if this is a landlord/agent issue when its a Body Corporate/agent issue.
 
We got Angor at our estate (clearly the trustees didnt review the applicants, but they won the job).

What can I say, our top 2 defaulters are R1 000 000 in arrears.

They do as trustees instruct them, but they cant follow the law or common sense

Stay away from ANGOR (my honest advise).

Read the top remarks, while they milk you they are all smiles! And when the playing gets ugly they just terminate! (how pathetic to say the least)
 
They are all a bunch of cnuts, especially the big ones ( Angor, Trafalgar, Whitfields etc.) and cum laude graduates from the slimy school of slithering estate agents (for details on the latter just ask @RedViking).
 
RonSwanson said:
They are all a bunch of cnuts, especially the big ones ( Angor, Trafalgar, Whitfields etc.) and cum laude graduates from the slimy school of slithering estate agents (for details on the latter just ask @RedViking).
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Re: asking RedViking, did you mean Whitfields (our new-ish managing agents) or slithering estate agents in general?
 
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