Property syndicators and other firms have been given a hurry up by the

regulator to get licensed before the end of the year.

The Financial Markets Authority says businesses of all sizes providing property investment schemes or property syndication funds need to get licensed. Under new regulations brought in by the Financial Markets Conduct (FMC) Act, managed investment schemes (MIS) must meet new governance standards and managers of schemes need to be licensed before December 1, 2016.

The FMA has licensed four property investment schemes under the Act so far and, with a growing interest in property schemes recently, would like to start the process of licensing managers of any new or existing schemes that want to be doing business by December.

In general, the FMA considers that property schemes can and should comply with the same licensing and governance requirements under the Act as other MIS. However there are some specific detailed requirements wherein, given the characteristics of property schemes, the costs of full compliance may be unnecessary and are likely to outweigh benefits for investors.

To address these matters the FMA has approved class exemptions for property schemes and their custodians. These relate to the custody of real property assets and the frequency of cash reconciliations, which tend to be a lot lower in volume than for other MIS.

Individual exemptions for property schemes actively winding up their business over the coming months maybe available, but schemes should notify the FMA as soon as possible if they want to apply for these.