BOTTLENECKS in licensing that have left a shortfall in the number of property managers is worrying newly installed Realtors’ Association of Jamaica (RAJ) President Gabrielle Gilpin-Hudson, who is concerned the gap is being exploited by others.

She cited the recent arrest, during an $80-million drug bust, of 63-year-old Allan Patrick Constable who was identified as a property manager. According to Gilpin-Hudson, RAJ checks revealed that Constable was not licensed to conduct any such business.

Her fear that the boom in apartment buildings has outpaced the country’s ability to train individuals who can effectively manage these properties was borne out by data from Real Estate Board (REB), which does all the training for the sector. There are currently 202 licensed property managers and about 2,000 strata complexes in Jamaica. It takes between four and five years to go through the training needed to be licensed.

“It’s something that we’re very much concerned about at the RAJ level, where persons are providing property management services and they are not requisitely licensed with the Real Estate Board. Under the Real Estate Dealers and Developers Act (REDDA), property management is real estate business, and once you’re providing it as a service to somebody — meaning you’re not managing your own property — then you’re supposed to be licensed and registered with the Real Estate Board,” said Gilpin-Hudson, an attorney who was elevated from first vice-president to RAJ head on January 1.

Gilpin-Hudson has also been a member of the REB since mid-2024.

She said it’s becoming increasingly prevalent for smaller apartment complexes looking to cut costs to hire unlicensed individuals to provide property management services.

“These persons are collecting people’s funds and running an apartment complex, a strata, and they don’t necessarily have the requisite training. Sometimes that can be millions of dollars that they are handling on behalf of other people, depending on the size of the development,” the RAJ president told the Jamaica Observer.

She explained that trained property managers would have skills such as dispute resolution, accounting and budgeting, as well as being au fait with rules and laws related to strata corporations.

“Apartment complexes have laws that they need to comply with. You’re supposed to get your accounts audited; there’s a special process that you have to follow for calling your annual general meetings and how people vote; there are rules about how you go about apportioning how much maintenance fee each unit owner is responsible for paying; what you do if there’s a dispute there, and things like that,” she pointed out.

Dr Tina Beale, principal of the REB’s training arm, Real Estate Training Institute (RETI), agreed that more property managers are needed but said it is difficult to say exactly how many are required.

“We have to look at what are the characteristics of these stratas that are being developed, because some stratas probably just have five, six, maybe up to nine units. For individuals who are living in a strata complex with, say, less than 10 units, it might be a bit of an economic burden on them to hire a licensed property manager in order to ensure that they adhere to the requirements,” she reasoned.

Beale explained that legislation stipulates that property managers are required for complexes with 20 or more units, but the Commission of Strata Corporation (CSC) monitors them all, despite size and whether the property manager is licensed or not. She assured that measures are in place to address the concerns Gilpin-Hudson raised.

“The REB, through the CSC, monitors strata complexes and ensures that they adhere to the requirements that are set out in the Registration of Strata Titles Act,” the RETI principal told the Sunday Observer.

She also said efforts are underway to train and license more property managers in half the time it now takes.

“The board recognises and is currently actively exploring different pathways that can be used to ensure that we have more property managers coming on stream in the market, that are licensed through the board. And, while we reduce the duration of time needed, we ensure that they have the requisite skills and competence needed in order for them to function effectively in the market,” Beale said.

The change will see professionals whose previous studies covered content in the property manager course, skip some of the time-consuming steps now required. Under the current system there are two ways to become a property manager: study for four years at University of Technology, Jamaica to get a Bachelor of Science in Land Economy and Valuation Survey, followed by a one-year attachment/apprenticeship with a property manager; or after completing RETI’s salesman course, work your way up to being eligible to do a property management course. To get to that step, you have to first become a real estate dealer.

“We are exploring how professionals — persons who are competent but are probably not interested in doing real estate sales yet they’re interested in doing property management — depending on their qualifications, how we can help to close that gap by creating an avenue by which they can come through in a fast-track way,” said Beale.

Accounting and budgeting are included in the tasks performed by a competent property manager.

A property manager needs to be skilled at dispute resolution.