Some community schemes pride themselves in having ultra-low levies, while others struggle to garner the funding to keep themselves afloat. Both situations are undesirable from a financial viewpoint, and there is significant value in keeping a close eye on your sectional title scheme’s admin fund budget and 10-year maintenance plan at all times.
The cost of maintenance for a sectional title scheme is commonly determined by its size, the current state of repair and the extent of maintenance required. To gauge these costs, the body corporate needs to obtain quotes from the relevant contractors.
Did you know that many bodies corporate lose money on insurance premiums by skimping on the valuation? In some cases, the reason might be that the body corporate has not met its obligation to obtain the mandatory 3-yearly replacement cost valuation – this usually leads to over-escalating the sum insured by applying the same “on-the-safe-side” escalation rate of 10% year after year.
Sectional title levies can be the source of a great deal of debate and conflict within a body corporate. The process of determining body corporate levies should be transparent, methodical and done without any bias.
It has become the norm to increase insurance cover for community schemes by 10%, or even 15%, per year. On the other hand, some bodies corporate choose not to increase cover at all. However, how often do bodies corporate consider decreasing cover?