The following Management Rights questions were submitted to our site via email from a Queensland lot owner. Thanks to Frank Higginson, Hynes Legal for providing a response.
Our body corporate has two agreements (caretaking and letting) with our manager, which is a company, and both the agreements are signed by the sole director of the company, who is also the guarantor.
An ASIC check of this company reveals that the sole director is the only shareholder. This sole director and their spouse claim to be the joint owners and joint caretaker managers, and we are aware that at least one other person openly claims to be a partner/owner in the caretaking/management rights.
I have been told that this arrangement is a common practice in Queensland. Also none of the above people own a lot in the scheme.
My questions are:
- Who is the legal owner of the agreements? My assumption is that it is the company and ultimately the sole share holder.
- What legal standing does the spouse have in claiming to be a joint caretaker and exercising the rights and responsibilities of a caretaker/manager?
The company clearly owns the management rights. Short of there being some structure behind the scenes that we don’t see, it is what it is.
People claim lots of things that they may not be entitled to! The responsibility for the services rests with the company via its sole director.