Management Rights, Industry Publication
Aim for ‘no surprises’ with any change in ownership or control
Article by Frank Higginson
Current as at May 7, 2026
This article appeared in Resort News, July 2026
One of the greatest challenges in operating a management rights business is knowing when to choose your battles but also recognising which battles shouldn’t involve you at all.
This is a people business, and people are not always rational.
It is a truism in management rights matters that there is always one challenging person in your body corporate. Every village has one, as they say.
If you are unlucky, they will be on your body corporate committee.
If you are very unlucky, there might be more than one and they might all be on the committee.
The absolute worst-case scenario is that they are the chairperson and your committee representative.
In any event, there is more than likely to be one, and you have to deal with them.
In the closed relationship that is a body corporate engagement of a management rights operator, under the management rights agreements they cannot escape you and you cannot escape them. It is a contractual commitment that neither party can just walk away from.
When people act irrationally or display poor levels of governance, the natural temptation is either to intervene or point out where poor practice is occurring.
This is where doing the ‘right’ thing is often not the ‘smart’ thing.
Dealing with challenging people is never easy, but there is one thing you can do: stay in your lane. Don’t pick fights where you don’t need to or aggravate people unnecessarily.
Some examples we have seen from clients through our years of practice include:
In most of these situations the conduct complained of was not right – and in some cases may have been unlawful – but had no impact at all on the resident manager’s business or income.
The resident manager had absolutely nothing to gain by raising the issues, other than maybe a notional win on the point-scoring ladder.
On the other side of the coin, they had plenty to lose.
At a minimum, the resident manager has opened themselves for a square-up when they do something incorrectly, which will happen at some stage.
It is a reality of life that no one is perfect and things will go wrong – whether intentionally or otherwise.
It is up to you how you run your business.
You can be a crusader for strict and proper practice and adherence to every rule; there are certainly plenty of them to adhere to in a body corporate and management rights context.
However, you must be ready for that same standard to be applied to you.
Being a champion for all that is correct is not always in your interests.
You should assess the commercial benefit (or risk) before charging into something that does not necessarily hurt or concern you.
Rock the boat if you must, but be ready for what may follow.
Read more from industry experts in Resort News:
People often tell us that we don’t seem like lawyers. We make a point to have real conversations with our clients in everyday language. At our core, we know that success is built on relationships.
