The Best Strata Committee Software in Australia: Our Case for UnitBuddy

We make UnitBuddy, so treat this as a vendor's argument. We think it's the best software in Australia for a strata committee, and this post sets out why, where it falls short, and how to test the claim on your own building.

If you want a comparison of the platforms on the market, our buyer's guide has one. This post is only about us.

The short answer

• The record belongs to the building. It stays when the secretary resigns or the manager changes.
• Email files itself. Mail to the building's own address becomes a quote, invoice, report, vote or work request, with nobody re-keying it.
• One flat price covers everyone. The committee and every owner are included, with every feature on every plan, from $199 a year plus GST.
• It works in every state and territory. Terms follow your state's law, so a Brisbane committee doesn't have to read NSW wording.
• You can leave whenever you like. CSV, JSON and PDF exports have no fee, no quota and no support ticket.

What "best" should mean for a committee

Most committee work happens between meetings, and it's unpaid. So we'd judge committee software on one question. When an owner asks why the levies went up, can whoever is on the committee today answer from the record, without chasing the last treasurer?

That rules out a long feature list as the test. A committee needs its own record, kept up to date with little effort, visible to owners, at a price that doesn't punish a bigger building.

Why we think UnitBuddy is the best

The building owns the record

UnitBuddy is standalone software for the scheme. It isn't a manager portal and doesn't need the manager's data feeds, so you can run it with a manager, alongside one or without one.

That decides what happens at handover. Motions, minutes, by-laws, contractor files, asset histories and incident logs stay in the building's workspace. The next committee logs in and reads them.

Email becomes the record

A committee's records usually fail at the same point. A quote lands in someone's inbox and stays there.

Every building on UnitBuddy gets its own email address. The system reads mail sent there, writes an overview, keeps the attachments, pulls out amounts and dates, and creates the record the email describes. Forward a whole chain and it counts each vote against the motion, and quotes line up side by side for comparison.

This is the feature we'd point to first, because a record only stays complete if keeping it takes no effort.

Everyone is on one price

There are no per-user fees and no feature tiers. A new committee member costs nothing, and owners are included.

The per-lot figures assume a full bracket. The price stops rising at $1,999, however large the tower is.

Money questions get answered during the year

Admin and capital works balances, levy income against budget, spending by category and contractor, and arrears all sit in one view. Levy forecasting puts proposed levies beside the ten-year capital works plan, so owners can see what gets deferred if levies stay low.

Plan contributionLevy if held flat

UnitBuddy also compares your levies, insurance and contractor spend with similar buildings by size, age, location and facilities. "Is our insurance too high?" stops being a matter of opinion.

Owners see the same record

Each owner gets a My Lot view of their share, their levies and what's happening in the building, plus PDF lot reports. Notices carry read receipts and acknowledgements, so the committee can show what went out and who saw it. Owners don't get committee controls.

State rules are built in

Compliance tracking covers NSW, Victoria, Queensland, WA, SA, Tasmania, the ACT and the NT. Each date keeps its certificate, reminder and completed action together, so the record is there if a complaint reaches a tribunal or regulator.

You can leave

Export finances, owners, decisions, notices and the rest of the record whenever you want, as often as you want. Software that keeps a building's history should make it easy to take that history elsewhere, including away from us.

Where UnitBuddy is the wrong choice

• You want trust accounting in the same tool. We don't do it, by design. If you keep a manager, the manager keeps running it. If you self-manage, many committees pair UnitBuddy with Xero and a bookkeeper. If you want it all bundled, we're the wrong product.
• You want a native app from the App Store or Google Play. UnitBuddy is a mobile-ready web app. It runs on a phone, but there's no store download.
• You want one combined platform run by your manager. UnitBuddy sits with the committee, on purpose.
• Your building has an on-site manager handling a high volume of daily requests. You'll probably want a dedicated building operations tool as well, with UnitBuddy covering finances, decisions and compliance.
• You have fewer than five lots. A spreadsheet may do the job.

Test it on your own building

Don't take our word for it, or any vendor's. Whichever software you're considering, try this:

1. Load last year's AGM pack.
2. Take one open problem, such as a leak, and rebuild its history: who reported it, who quoted, what was approved.
3. Answer the questions a buyer's lawyer would ask about one lot.
4. Export everything, then open the files without the software.

If the committee can't finish that in an hour or so, the software isn't doing the job.

You can see the pricing or book a demo, and we'll set up your building so you're testing with your own scheme. The demo building is free and needs no credit card.

Further reading

What changed in strata this month? Read the strata news for your state, with every figure sourced.

Keep the scheme file in one place the committee and the manager can both open. Features, pricing, or book a tour.