Sooner or later, every building faces a big one — concrete remediation, lift modernisation, a full repaint, waterproofing the basement, replacing the roof. These projects run into the hundreds of thousands, disrupt residents for months, and are where committees feel most out of their depth. After thirty years running works across Sydney buildings, I can tell you the projects that go smoothly and the ones that become a nightmare differ less in difficulty than in preparation. Here’s how to run a major capital works project without the pain.
Major Works Are a Different Animal
Routine maintenance keeps a building ticking over. Major capital works are one-off projects — large, expensive, disruptive, and usually involving specialist contractors and consultants. The skills that handle day-to-day maintenance well don’t automatically translate to running a six-figure remediation. These projects need scoping, procurement, supervision and disciplined cost control, and the absence of any one of those is where money and goodwill leak away.
Step One: Scope It Properly Before You Price It
The single most common mistake is pricing a job before it’s properly understood. A vague brief gets vague quotes that can’t be compared, and almost guarantees variations and cost blowouts once work starts. For significant works, the right starting point is usually an independent consultant or engineer who diagnoses the real problem and writes a detailed specification — so every contractor is quoting the same defined scope, and you’re comparing like with like.
This matters most for remediation. Water ingress and concrete spalling in particular have a habit of being worse than they look; a proper investigation up front prevents the nasty mid-project discovery that doubles the budget.
Step Two: Sort the Funding
Major works are funded in one of three ways, often in combination: from the capital works fund if it’s been properly built up over the years, through a special levy raised for the project, or via a strata loan that spreads the cost over time. Each has trade-offs in fairness, cash flow and interest cost, and the right mix is a decision for the owners corporation with its strata manager and, where relevant, financial advice.
This is also where good preventative maintenance pays off years later: a building that has planned and funded its capital works fund faces big projects as budgeted events, not as panic special levies that land on owners all at once.
Step Three: Tender Properly
With a clear specification in hand, go to competitive tender. The discipline that protects the building:
- Obtain multiple quotes against the same written specification — not each contractor’s own version of the job.
- Check licences, insurances and references for work of similar scale and type — a contractor who is excellent at small jobs may be out of their depth on a major one.
- Compare on scope and value, not just headline price; the cheapest tender often excludes things the others included, which reappear later as variations.
- Put the agreement in a proper contract with defined milestones, a payment schedule tied to progress, and a clear process for handling variations.
Step Four: Supervise the Work
A signed contract doesn’t build anything — supervision does. On larger projects, an independent superintendent or project manager oversees the contractor, certifies that work meets the specification before payments are released, and manages variations so they’re justified rather than waved through. Unsupervised major works are where budgets quietly run over: progress claims get paid without anyone confirming the work behind them, and variations accumulate without scrutiny.
Step Five: Manage the Disruption
Major works happen in a building full of people who still live there. Scaffolding, noise, water shut-offs, restricted access and dust go on for weeks or months, and how that’s handled determines whether residents are patient or furious. Clear communication — what’s happening, when, and how it affects each resident — is half the job. So is sequencing the work to minimise the worst disruptions and holding the contractor to agreed site conduct.
Step Six: Don’t Forget the Handover
When the work finishes, the project isn’t over. There should be a defects and completion process: a proper inspection against the specification, a list of anything not up to standard, retention of part of the payment until defects are fixed, and the warranties, certificates and as-built documentation handed over and filed. Skipping this step is how a building ends up, two years later, unable to prove what was done or claim on a warranty for work that failed.
Where a Building Manager Fits In
A capable building manager is central to all of this, without replacing the specialists. We help the committee scope the work and engage the right consultants, coordinate the tender and contractor management, supervise the day-to-day work on the ground, manage the resident communication and disruption, and run the defects and handover process at the end — keeping the project moving and the committee informed throughout. The owners corporation and strata manager handle the funding decisions and formal approvals; the engineers and superintendents handle the technical certification; the building manager makes sure the whole thing actually runs, on the ground, day after day. On a project that lasts months, that continuous presence is often the difference between a controlled job and a runaway one.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do we know what major works our building needs?
A well-maintained building knows, because its asset register and maintenance records show what’s ageing and due. Where that’s unclear, a building condition assessment or capital works fund review identifies what’s coming and when, so projects can be planned rather than sprung on the committee by a failure.
Should we just accept the cheapest tender?
Rarely. On major works, the cheapest tender often prices a narrower scope, and the difference reappears as variations once work is underway. Compare tenders against the same specification, check the contractor’s track record on similar projects, and weigh value rather than headline price.
Do we need a project manager or superintendent?
For genuinely large or technical works — remediation, lift modernisation, structural work — independent oversight usually pays for itself by catching defective work before it’s paid for and keeping variations in check. For smaller projects, an experienced building manager coordinating the work may be enough. The scale and complexity of the job decides.
How do we keep residents onside during the works?
Communication and sequencing. Tell residents clearly what’s happening, when, and how it affects them, before it happens; sequence the work to limit the worst disruptions; and hold the contractor to agreed site conduct. Most resident anger during works comes from surprise and silence, not from the works themselves.
Facing a Big Project?
Building Management Australia is a Sydney building management firm — not a strata agent. We help committees run major capital works without the chaos: scoping with the right consultants, coordinating competitive tenders, supervising the work on the ground, managing resident disruption, and running a proper defects and handover process — alongside your strata manager, who handles the funding and approvals. If your building has a big project on the horizon, request a proposal at bmaus.com.au or email Andrew directly at [email protected].
About the Author
Andrew Veron is the founder of Building Management Australia (BMA), an independent Sydney building management firm established in 1995. BMA is a building management company — not a strata agent — providing on-site and visiting building management, facilities management, concierge, cleaning and valet services to residential, commercial and mixed-use properties. Over the past 30 years, Andrew and the BMA team have managed buildings across the Eastern Suburbs, North Sydney, Inner Sydney, Parramatta and the Sydney CBD, with assets currently valued in excess of $3 billion under management. Because BMA is independent of any strata management firm, committees receive unbiased advice and transparent contractor relationships. Reach Andrew at [email protected] or bmaus.com.au.