30 years of Resort News: Time flies!

On this, the 30th anniversary of Resort News, the management rights industry bible, I thought it a great opportunity to take a look through the rear-view mirror.

What follows are more observations and reminiscences than a chronological history of events. Forgive me, my fading memory and vague recollections.

Read the latest edition of Resort News HERE

It all started for me in about 1997. I was working as a commercial lender for a bank and got a call from a client. He wanted to buy something called management rights in Hastings Street, Noosa. He knew not much about the industry, and I knew less, but we got the deal done and Big Chris, the ex-NZ copper, was my first management rights client.

He loved the industry, became the quasi-mayor of Hastings Street and ended up writing a book about how to run an MLR. In the process he caused me to fall in love with the industry. Okay, to be honest I fell in love with visiting him in summer and sitting on his balcony drinking beer, and watching the passing parade.

Anyway, getting his deal approved had forced me to actually learn a bit about the industry, just as the BUGT Act Act was being replaced by the BCCM Act. I had the bright idea that if a few of us at the bank could become experts in management rights, there just might be a nice market niche for us. Somehow, I convinced the powers that be to let me set up a specialist unit and have a serious crack.

Having now placed the cart firmly in front of the horse, I scrambled to build some actual legislative knowledge and broader industry support for the idea. The industry body at the time was QRAMA (Queensland Resident Accommodation Managers Association, now ARAMA (Australian Resident Accommodation Managers Association), and I had the immense good fortune to connect with John Anderson (RIP) and Kim Cox, the main drivers behind advocacy for and understanding of the industry. John was invaluable in helping me build arguments supporting a decent credit policy in the bank, and Kim became a constant source of practical tips and feedback.

I joined QRAMA that year and convinced the bank to support the organisation in any way we could.

It became clear pretty quickly that to have any chance of establishing the bank as a viable option, we needed to get out there and meet the centres of influence in sales, law and accounting. ResortBrokers looked like the biggest brokerage around, so early in the piece I went to see ResortBrokers founder and chairman, Ian Crooks. Considering how wet behind the ears I was he treated me kindly.  It was clear, however, that Ian had a very strong relationship with his bank, and more importantly his bank manager.

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Any chance of eroding that relationship evaporated when I met Mick from NAB and discovered a genuinely lovely bloke, who was more than happy to share his knowledge of the industry. To no great surprise ResortBrokers continued to evolve into the brand we see today, all while inspiring others to compete on that playing field. A rising tide lifts all ships, as they say.

This encounter became a bit of a trend where, to my surprise, all manner of people including other bankers seemed supportive and friendly. Paul Geary, if you are reading this… respect.

While I was based on the Sunshine Coast, I had global ambitions (ha ha) and had promised outcomes that dictated we needed a wide reach. I went to see Steve Burton (RIP) of PCS Finance and convinced him to at least give us a shot at a few deals. To his credit he did just that, which helped us get off the ground on the Goldie.

Years later, Steve, Colin, and the Dreamtime guys did a promo tour of New Zealand to spruik management rights to Kiwis. Remarkably, the bank agreed that I should accept their invitation to join the tour. I am reliably informed it was a great success, surely proven by the number of New Zealanders now running management rights here in Oz.

John Punch and Col Myers were incredibly helpful in the early days. Together with John Mahoney, these were the guys I could call when some troublesome credit manager wanted to argue a point of law or legislation just to make my life difficult.

I think it’s fair to say that without the support of the above-mentioned and others including Kim Christie, Frank Higginson and Damian Quinn, we would have struggled to argue a competitive credit policy within the bank.

One of the hurdles we faced in convincing the bank to sign off on credit policy was the reliance on a single-year profit and loss statement. I went to see Ken Window, the recognised accounting guru at the time, Ken in his inimitable way, explained the assumptions used and assured me it had always been that way. For a banker used to analysing three years’ financials, this news came as a bit of a shock, but on the positive side, it sure made presenting a deal to credit pretty simple. It says much about management rights as a business model that even with a single year’s reliance very few go broke, and the so-called adjusted P and L survives to this day.

It became clear from the outset that we needed to develop relationships with the agents. Back then there were lots of them across many agencies, and I had no idea who to start with. Resort News proved a valuable reference point while someone mentioned I should catch up with Rusty Lush (RAAS) and Bob Love (Property Pacific) on the Gold Coast. After the initial panic of thinking I’d stumbled into the adult film industry, I found both these blokes easy to talk to and happy to teach me the ropes. Sadly, Bob is no longer with us, while RAAS is now a formidable market presence as RAS360.

Ross Venz is also gone now (RIP), but there was a time where Venz Management Rights was a force on the Gold Coast. I always found Ross a gentleman who would gladly provide advice and feedback. He was a strong supporter of a local finance broker but was none the less happy if we ultimately won the deal.

I found the industry full of colourful characters and none more so than Liz Lavender, the self-appointed queen of management rights.  My memory may have this wrong but I’m sure Liz actually had that emblazoned on her pink Audi convertible. For my part I always found Liz great company and man, she could sell! Like Narelle and Paul Filmer on the Gold Coast, and Wayne and Linda Stoll on the Sunny Coast, Liz had actually owned management rights and it showed.

They weren’t the only ones of course and I always thought having that operational experience as an agent made a lot of sense. At least that way the agent could encourage the buyer to envisage strawberry daiquiris by the pool, as long as they could hold a glass with one hand and a leaf blower in the other.

No mention of colourful characters would be complete without a shout-out to Jake Clarke. He and Lyn kicked off MR Sales on the Gold Coast and while Jake is no doubt fishing down at Yamba these days the brand, under Michael Philpot, continues to this day.   Jake could sell ice to an Eskimo and did not tolerate fools or valuers, and one might suspect placed both in the same category. His debates with Chris Kennedy, the now-retired doyen of management rights valuation, were the stuff of legend. I had my own occasional robust discussion with Jake, but as often happens in our old age, I think we’ve mellowed and now get on really well.

As my ambition to grow the management rights unit grew (disproportionately to my talent but you gotta fake it till you make it), I started thinking about the big fish. At the time, that was Tony Smith at Breakfree and Chris Scott at S8.  I got meetings with both and walked away unsure of what had just happened. As luck would have it the bank I worked at provided some funding for a diversified investment fund called MFS. Breakfree got gobbled up by MFS which subsequently collapsed in 2008.

From memory S8 ended up at MFS as well. Out of the ashes emerged the Mantra Group. On the way through, my dealings with MFS opened my eyes to the potential for listed MLR asset management, and the pitfalls that await the unsuspecting or greedy. The relatively recent emergence of large multi-site syndicates may well herald another look at the MFS model, sans the obvious flaws.

Along the way, we pioneered the idea of industry breakfasts designed to encourage debate and discussion among industry professionals. We got a budget approved to support Resort News, and we were the first bank to include a management rights-specific resource centre on our website. We sponsored many ARAMA events, to say nothing of the occasional golf tournament or day at the races.

As a Sunshine Coast boy, I formed close relationships with the salespeople here and will never forget the support I received from people like Barry Davies, Maria Duke (RIP), Gerry Lewis, Ian Brookes and Matt Campbell. In fact, Barry sent me my very first deal as a broker. Glenn Millar has been a staunch supporter for many years, and it’s a bit sad to see Glenn retiring after such a spectacular innings.

We built a great team of management rights specialists, wrote business volumes way above our weight class, and had a ball doing it. Then the music stopped. We were a relatively small bank and by 2009 the GFC had us on our knees. With little money to lend, a specific business unit built entirely on one industry and lending predominantly on agreement-based security was never going to survive. I got offered a different gig or a cheque. I took the cheque.

Miraculously a poorly educated bloke with a reasonable gift of the gab and a hell of a lot of goodwill and support from this amazing industry is still around to celebrate 30 years of RN.

I started writing these Resort News columns when I was still at the bank. Needless to say, to comply with bank policy they had to be finance related, include no personal opinions, offend no one and, as a consequence, be boring. No longer constrained by such guardrails, the column has morphed into a broader contemplation on life, the industry, and the motivations of the MD.

I must thank Mandy for being the voice of reason when I submit something too crazy even for this audience. I know when I’ve stepped over the line, as the email back always starts the same…” Mike, we don’t want to get sued, I’ve made a few small edits”.

To Mandy and all the great crew at Resort News… more power to you.

Of course, management rights have evolved over the past 30 years, and I think there’s little doubt that levels of professionalism have continued to improve as the industry matures. We now see sales agencies setting benchmarks for marketing and research that are the envy of other industries, while legal and accounting processes have become ever more regimented and predictable. Much as I hate to say it, there seems to be a correlation between the relative youth of industry professionals and the robust good health of management rights.

Of course, there’s still a need for the wisdom that comes with age… I guess.

Postscript: I’ve missed a stack of people who’ve been super supportive over the past 16 years of MPF. You know who you are, and you’ll all get a mention when I write the 60th anniversary article. If you think my memory’s bad now, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!

No AI or ChatGPT has been used in the writing of this article.

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First published in Resort News HERE