Taking over the Management Company

Hey All

Apologies if there is already a post on this, I did search but couldnt locate one specifically related.

Anyway we had a residents committee meeting last night and we are thinking of getting the directors (developers) of the management co off the board and getting ourselves on and then getting rid of our agent and doing the work ourself (it seems we already are doing it ourselves anyway so why are we paying someone €8k a year).

Has anyone done this?
Any advise for me at all?

Cheers

Get some advise from a solicitor - our residents committee did this last year and there are a number of criteria you have to conform to -
I don't know the specifics - solicitor should be able to give proper info (regarding company law)
To kick off (from what I recall)
You need to get > 80% of shareholders to sign a petition to call an EGM.
You need to give all shareholders and directors proper notice of EGM (30 days ?)
There needs to be a proper agenda.
At the meeting the vote to remove the directors has to reach a certain majority.
You need to vote in a new board of directors.

and so on ......

Hey Nai, thanks for that. How do you feel it worked for you guys? Did you continue to employ an agent or did the residents look after that themselves?

It could be a bad move if there is a bunch of people who are afraid of doing hard work, as its not easy. This happened in my estate and it was left to the same individuals to do all the work, who then in turn got a pain in their backside with it, and it started to go down hill. If you dont think ur getting good value for your money then look into appointing another management company. It may cost a bit per year but the money you would save might not be worth the hassle.

has worked out fine so far.
I live in a largish estate (150 houses) and we are all paying approx €450 per annum for maintenance of public areas/public liability insurance/lighting/water pump maintenance/sewage maintenance/estate improvements etc.

The reason we did it was we (residents) wanted control over the decision making process and the ability to dictate to our management agent what work we wanted doing and when. (eg Road signage/tree planting etc) We have retained the original management agent and they are doing a great job (eg lawns are cut 42 times per year under the contract with them) - everyone who visits the estate comments on how well the estate looks.

Our estate is 52 apartments so hopefully it would work out well. We are currently paying 1,800 a year - we also have a commercial unit which is paying a very unfairly weighted 4,100!

Going to look into the EGM and getting the developers off the Management Company then we can make the decisions ourselves

Are you sure you can legally get rid of the developers? In many cases, the developers put a clause in the contracts allowing them to retain control until the last unit in the development has been sold. In principle, this isn't a terrible idea, as the developer can start managing the development once the first tenants move in. However, in practice, the developer often retains 1 or 2 units as a personal investment, and can therefore legally retain control indefinitely.

have to agree with Clubman there - hence the reason to get a solicitor (company law etc,.) involved to check all that stuff.