Sectional title blocks
Walk-ups and low-rise schemes, where geysers and roofs drive most of the claims history.
For trustees, chairpersons & managing agents
Protect your asset.Educate your trustees.Simplify compliance.
The Ecosystem is your turnkey partner for compliance, education and asset protection. We simplify complex regulations, coordinate trusted professionals and deliver practical solutions that protect your property and enable better decisions.
Why it matters
Nothing here is bad luck
None of these are freak events. Each one is a foreseeable consequence of a document that is missing or out of date — which is the whole argument for looking now rather than later.
At claim stage
If the sum insured is short because the valuation is out of date, an insurer can apply the average clause and settle the claim in the same proportion as the shortfall.
After a fire
Where fire compliance cannot be evidenced — escape routes, signage, extinguisher servicing — an insurer has grounds to reduce the claim or decline it.
At the AGM
Without a maintenance plan and the reserve fund it feeds, a roof replacement has nowhere to come from except a special levy on owners.
How it works
Three minutes to a number you can take to a meeting
- 1
Answer the questions
11 weighted questions covering insurance, maintenance, fire, building and governance. About three minutes.
- 2
See exactly where you stand
A compliance percentage with every item marked in place, missing or unconfirmed — and the weight it carried, so you can defend the number.
- 3
Act on it, or don't
Where we can price the fix, you get a quote on the spot. The report is yours either way.
Who we work with
Every kind of scheme, and what tends to bite each one
Townhouse complexes & HOAs
Shared boundary walls, gates and roadways — common property that nobody individually owns.
High-rise schemes
Lifts, fire systems and pressurised water, each with its own inspection and replacement cycle.
The score
Weighted, not counted
Eleven checks, one hundred points, allocated by what each gap actually costs a scheme. Fire compliance carries twelve. Trustee training carries five. A scheme with no trustees is not penalised for cover it cannot hold.
Well managed
85–100%Your scheme is in good order. The gaps that remain are refinements rather than exposures.
Broadly on track
70–84%The essentials are in place, but there are gaps that an insurer or the CSOS could reasonably question.
Needs attention
50–69%Several statutory or insurance requirements are unmet. These are the items that turn into repudiated claims.
High risk
0–49%Core obligations are missing. Trustees are carrying personal exposure that is straightforward to remove.
Why The Ecosystem
Built around the questions a trustee is actually asked
You are a volunteer carrying a legal duty, or an agent carrying forty of them. Either way the job is the same: know what is missing, know what it costs, and be able to show your working.
Weighted by consequence
A missing fire certificate does not count the same as untrained trustees. Your score reflects real exposure, not a tick-box tally.
One view of the whole scheme
Insurance, valuation, maintenance, fire, building and governance in a single picture, not six separate conversations.
Accredited professionals
Valuers, assessors and trainers are vetted before they touch your scheme, and they answer to us rather than to you.
Reports built for the AGM
Every deliverable is formatted to go straight into a trustee pack, because that is where it has to survive questions.
Pricing you can see upfront
Quotes are calculated on unit count and shown before you commit. No discovery call required to learn the number.
Your data stays in South Africa
Owner and scheme information is processed and stored locally, in line with POPIA. It is never sold or shared.
What we do
The work behind the report
Everything a scheme is required to hold, plus the things that quietly determine your next premium.
Replacement ValuationAn independent replacement-cost valuation so the scheme is insured for what it would actually cost to rebuild.
The scheme must be insured for replacement value and that value reviewed at least every three years. Where a valuation is out of date and the sum insured falls short, an insurer may apply average — settling a claim in the same proportion as the shortfall — so a scheme insured for 70% of its value can recover 70% of its loss.
- Measured replacement-cost valuation of all buildings
- Common property and boundary wall values
- Sum insured recommendation for the policy schedule
- Certificate for your broker and insurer
Health & Safety FileThe Construction Regulations file the scheme should hold when contractors work on site.
Once a contractor works on common property, the body corporate carries duties as a client under the Construction Regulations. The file is what discharges them: appointments, risk assessments, method statements, contractor vetting and incident procedure, kept current and available for inspection.
- Baseline risk assessment for the complex
- Appointments and legal appointment letters
- Contractor vetting and induction pack
- Emergency and incident procedures
Fire Compliance AssessmentInspection against SANS 10400-T and the local by-laws, with a costed schedule of what needs to change.
Unconfirmed fire compliance is a live exposure: an insurer can question a fire claim where escape routes, signage or servicing records cannot be evidenced. An assessment establishes where the scheme stands on escape routes, signage, extinguishers, hydrants, hose reels and emergency lighting, and what it takes to close each gap.
- Inspection against SANS 10400-T and local by-laws
- Gap register with photographs
- Costed remediation schedule
- Re-inspection on completion
Insurance & Cover ReviewAn independent read of your policy schedule against what the Act requires and what the scheme actually faces.
Covers sums insured, fidelity cover, public liability limits, excess structures and the exclusions that matter. Where cover falls short of the statutory minimum, we say so plainly and quote the correction.
- Policy schedule reviewed against statutory minimums
- Fidelity and public liability adequacy check
- Claims history and loss-ratio analysis
- Written recommendations for renewal
Trustee Indemnity CoverCover for trustees held personally liable for a decision taken on behalf of the scheme.
Trustees act in a fiduciary capacity and can be pursued in their own names. Indemnity cover responds to the defence costs and any award, which is what makes it possible to recruit competent trustees at all.
- Cover placed for the current board
- Retroactive cover reviewed
- Annual renewal handled with the scheme's policy
Geyser Management ProgrammeA managed register and replacement cycle for one of the most preventable sources of claims.
A burst geyser is a preventable loss: age and condition are knowable in advance. We build the register — age, make, location, last service — and replace on a planned cycle rather than on burst, which moves the cost from an emergency claim to a budgeted line item.
- Full geyser register with age and condition
- Planned replacement schedule
- Managed installer panel and rates
- Claim support when a loss does occur
Trustee & Body Corporate TrainingPractical grounding in the Act, the rules and the meetings, for people who did not ask to become property managers.
Most trustees are volunteers who inherited a legal duty they were never briefed on. A short, plain-language course covering the STSMA, the prescribed rules, budgets and levies, meeting procedure and the CSOS dispute process removes most of the avoidable mistakes.
- Half-day session, on site or online
- STSMA and prescribed rules in plain language
- Budgets, levies and reserve fund basics
- Meeting procedure and CSOS dispute process
Find out what your scheme is missing
Free, no obligation, and you keep the report whether you use us or not.
Prefer to read first? How we think about compliance