Why I Built BlockHub52

Trish Riedel, Founder

BlockHub52 started with a hopeless managing agent. My own building was being run on individual emails and bits of paper, with overdue charges that never got followed up. I went looking for a piece of software I could recommend to them — and found nothing that fit. I've spent the last eighteen years working online, using the internet to solve problems, and I could see straight away how much easier, more accurate and faster the whole thing could be.

But the more I looked, the further I fell into it. I ended up deep in the state of leasehold and freehold in this country, and I genuinely could not believe how unfair it is — or that a system this stacked against ordinary leaseholders is actually legal. I hate injustice, and this is one of the biggest I have ever come across.

It may not be the real fix — that needs the law to change — but the best option leaseholders have right now is Right to Manage: taking control of their own building through their own company. When I went looking for software built properly for RTM and RMC directors, though, there was nothing that did the job. So I decided to build it myself.

Why It Matters to Me

The more blocks that can take control through their own RTM company, the better. And now they can — with software that already knows the laws and the compliance schedules, automates most of the work, and sends the alerts that keep a building on track.

That means the people who step up as directors — volunteers, nearly all of them — can stop worrying they've got something wrong, and win back the many hours this work usually swallows. That's the whole point of BlockHub52: to make an unfair system a little easier to live with. Changing the law will take years — but at least the RTM directors holding these buildings together can finally get some real help.

Every early building shapes what gets built next. The platform is better because of the buildings already on it, and yours will make it better again for the ones who join after you. That's the kind of company I want this to be.

— Trish Riedel