Serbian craftsmen educate Austrians - Belgrade to become Rustler Gruppe's center in Southeast Europe

The annual meeting of the Board of Directors of Rustler Gruppe has been held in Belgrade. The capital city of Serbia hosted the International Days of Rustler Gruppe, which were held under the slogan "Housemasters of Europe in Serbia" on November 11 and 13 at Holiday Inn hotel.

Managers from abroad also came to Belgrade to be trained by Serbian "craftsmen".

Austrian Rustler Group, which has a 75-year-long tradition in maintaining, managing and trading real estates and developing and managing projects under construction, has learned from Serbian craftsmen the concept of "operational property management".

- Property management without an operative unit is not synchronized. Rustler Gruppe manages properties and hires subcontractors to do most of the repairs, while Hauzmajstor is focused on the operational part - small repairs, maintenance, emergency interventions. Austrians have recognized the quality of our model and came to Serbia to complete the training in order to incorporate our model in their network - Hauzmajstor CEO Bojan Stevanovic explained for eKapija.

Hauzmajstor is one of the best-positioned companies within Rustler group, while investing in the Belgrade-based company is Rustler's most successful investment outside Austria. Rustler Gruppe, with the headquarters in Austria, which bought the Belgrade-based company in 2005, also has branch offices in Germany, Hungary, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Serbia.

– When we made the decision five years ago to invest in Serbia, we sought companies whose primary field of work is the property management and maintenance. We were unable to find such company in this market, but then we found competence, good organization and educated staff with exceptional energy and creativity at Hauzmajster, which was providing services only to private persons at the time. The company was already well-positioned, it operated in accordance with European standards and had the satisfied clients. Together we have managed to become the leaders in this field of work in the market of Serbia. Today, Hauzmajstor in Serbia is one of the best-positioned companies within our group so that managers from other countries are coming here to receive the training. Rustler Gruppe plans to become one of the European leaders in property management prior to 2015, as well as to open companies in another five countries. In these plans, Belgrade is seen as the regional training center – said Rustler Gruppe CEO Robert Wegerer.

New services launched by Hauzmajstor

Bojan Stevanovic announced for eKapija that Belgrade would become the center for the countries of former SFRY, Bulgaria and Romania. He also announced two new services in the fields of real estate trade and public utility service.

– We have managed to grow from a small company for house repairs into the leader in maintenance of business facilities in Serbia, but so far we have not concluded a single contract with any assembly of tenants, although the citizens are interested in that. There is no such thing as professional management of residential buildings in Serbia, while the existing legal obligations of the owners to have their building maintained are impossible to fulfill because there are no functional mechanisms for sanctioning those who fail to fulfill them. In order for private companies to get interested in this field of work, it is necessary to liberalize the market, adopt a clear law that defines the obligations of tenants, as well as to introduce professional managers in this field – Stevanovic stated.

Over 100,000 services provided

Hauzmajstor, with the headquarters in Belgrade and offices in regional centers of Serbia, registers 2 million euros worth of annual revenues, providing services to few thousand clients. This company maintains over 200,000 square meters of space and has, so far, had a total of 100,000 interventions.