25/09/2026
7 min
An owner emails their strata manager. The message is confident, detailed and full of legislation. There’s just one problem: the legislation is from the wrong state.
It’s an increasingly familiar scene, and it ran through A Look at the Future of Strata Management, the latest Strata in Conversation episode. Host Steve Brisson was joined by Carrie McInerney, CEO of Horner Management and President of SCA (SA/NT), Kyra Murphy, Owner and Director of Richardson Strata Management and President of SCA (WA), and Frank Scamarcia, General Manager of Flex Insurance.
Why owners ask AI first
On opposite sides of the country, Carrie and Kyra are seeing the same thing: more correspondence that’s clearly written by AI, and often wrong. The issue facing Strata is that because owners can watch their dinner travel across town in real time, they expect the same visibility and speed from everything in their life. Kyra pointed out that they are applying this to how they judge strata services. When a strata manager gives an answer without explaining why, Carrie said, owners look for the why themselves, on Google, Reddit, Facebook,
Strata managers work office hours. Owners usually deal with strata issues after hours, when the answer closest to hand is a chatbot. And when a strata manager gives an answer without explaining why, Carrie said, owners go looking for the why themselves, on Google, Reddit, Facebook or AI.
“The strata managers I’ve got in my office end up in a fight with AI, almost via a unit owner.” – Carrie McInerney
There’s also a knowledge gap. Many owners assume the strata manager makes the decisions when the vote belongs to the owners. And Kyra noted that strata managers often only hear about a new owner after settlement, by which time many buyers still don’t fully understand what they’ve bought into.
The cost of a confident wrong answer
AI-generated correspondence often cites the wrong legislation or gets the facts wrong entirely, and correcting it takes time. It can also turn a simple query into a stand-off, with the strata manager cast as the person who “got it wrong”.
“Most of the work that strata managers do is invisible if we do it well.” – Kyra Murphy
That matters in a profession already dealing withconflict. Strata managers are often the messengers for decisions that aren’t theirs, and they bear the brunt of the reaction. Frank said some of the stories he’s heard, particularly from newer strata managers, were hard to hear. Kyra said conflict management is now a big part of the job, yet strata managers aren’t trained as conflict specialists. Carrie’s firm now gives every staff member the right to end a call or escalate an email when a conversation turns abusive.
How strata managers are responding
The panel’s answer isn’t to fight AI. It’s to out-explain it.
- Show your working. Kyra points owners to the exact section of the legislation or by-laws that applies, turning every reply into a chance to educate.
- Explain the why. Carrie said an extra five or 10 minutes of explanation can stop an owner from turning to AI at all.
- Make progress visible. Kyra sees promise in tools that let owners track a maintenance request from lodgement to committee vote, much like a delivery app.
- Set expectations early. Kyra’s firm holds meet-and-greets with selected clients to explain roles and response times. Carrie’s shares its staff response times with every client.
- Use AI yourself. Carrie uses AI to write short summaries for owners who just want the headline. Kyra encourages strata managers to find their biggest frustration and see whether technology or automation can take it off their plate.
What AI can’t tell you about your building
A chatbot can recite general rules. It can’t tell you whether your building’s budget is keeping up. As Kyra put it, a strata building is no different from a house: if you own it, you have to maintain it.
Carrie described a “COVID hangover”: many schemes held or cut levies during the pandemic, then cost-of-living pressure kept them low. Meanwhile insurance, building and maintenance costs have outpaced CPI. The result is budgets that are out of step with building needsand works keep getting deferred.
Those decisions are made at meetings. Yet in one of Carrie’s client surveys, around half of owners said they skipped their last meeting because they didn’t see the point.
AI can’t fund your upgrades either. For schemes looking to invest in their buildings, the CHU Green Grant offers $50,000 in resident-led projects to be won. Past winners have funded solar, new hot water systems, accessibility upgrades and native planting. Applications for 2027 are open to buildings insured with CHU.
Better answers, from the start
It’s no surprise owners turn to AI. Most have never sat on a committee before, and many simply don’t know where to start. The answer isn’t to discourage them from looking, but to give them better sources to draw from. Shaped by feedback from the Leadership Exchange, the CHU Strata Owner Education Portal offers simple, one-page guides on owner rights, committees, maintenance and resolving conflict, so owners start from the right information and feel more confident making decisions about their homes.
AI isn’t going away. But the panel’s message was clear: the most reliable source on your building is still the strata manager who knows it.
Why these conversations matter
CHU works with strata communities, strata managers, insurance professionals and industry stakeholders across the country, so we see these challenges from every side. Strata In Conversation is our way of highlighting issues from across the country, to make sure the people closest to communities are heard. The Strata Manager Leadership Exchange is another way CHU is supporting the sector. Launched this year, it brings together group of strata management leaders to strengthen communication and collaboration, drawing on their expertise to develop, promote and support the strata industry.
Don’t miss the next conversation. Subscribe to our mailing list to be the first to hear about upcoming Strata in Conversation webinars.
