In our latest Spotlight Interview, we spoke to Vish Sobti, Business Development Director, ItBox. Vish shares how ItBox was created to tackle the complexities of resident engagement under the Building Safety Act, and how their compliance-first platform is helping property managers and landlords meet evolving regulatory requirements. “Resident engagement is no longer just best practice; it’s a legal obligation. The findings of the Grenfell Tower enquiry highlighted the tragic consequences of dismissing resident concerns .In response to the failings at Grenfell, the Building Safety Act requires duty holders to ensure residents are actively involved in decisions around  fire and structural  safety. This includes providing timely, accessible information, consulting on key safety matters and maintaining clear channels for feedback and complaints.”

Q1: What inspired the creation of ItBox and what key problem in the real estate sector were you aiming to solve?

ItBox was born out of our experience advising landlords and property managers in relation to building safety,  where we saw they were struggling to meet the  regulatory requirements around resident engagement .

Following the Grenfell tragedy, the Building Safety Act introduced prescriptive requirements around resident engagement, in higher risk buildings (HRBs) over 18 metres or with seven or more storeys. While the intent of the legislation is clear, many housing providers, managing agents and freeholders were struggling to implement these complex obligations.

In our consultancy work, we saw clients investing commissioning consultants to write one off Resident Engagement Strategies with no systems in place to help deliver and track actual resident engagement,  or evidence compliance. This left duty holders exposed to significant risk of enforcement action or even prosecution should the Building Safety Regulator investigate.

We knew there had to be a better approach, so we created ItBox, a property management platform and resident app designed  by former property managers professionals who understand the the problem and were well placed to design a solution.

Q2: How does ItBox help clients meet their obligations under the Building Safety Act?

The Building Safety Act introduced a complex set of resident engagement duties,  contained in Sections 91 to 98 and in the linked regulations, which landlords  to meaningfully engage residents in matters relating to fire and structural safety.

ItBox was designed as a tool to help make it easy to meet the challenging compliance requirements in the Act.  ItBox helps residents to understand the risks of living in an HRB and gives them a clear route to report and engage on building safety, whilst for property managers it helps them deliver against each requirement in the BSA. This includes:

• Creating and updating building specific Resident Engagement Strategies (RES).
• Enabling two-way engagement in multiple languages and accessible formats.
• Centralising safety communications through a Resident Safety Hub.
• Capturing and escalating feedback, questions and complaints in a structured, reportable way.
• Maintaining audit ready records that form part of the Golden Thread of building safety.

Put simply, ItBox gives clients a structured, scalable way to meet their duties without unnecessary administrative burden, whilst helping to keep residents safer.

Q3: Why is resident engagement such a critical part of building safety and compliance today?

Resident engagement is no longer just best practice; it’s a legal obligation. The findings of the Grenfell Tower enquiry highlighted the tragic consequences of dismissing resident concerns .

In response to the failings at Grenfell, the Building Safety Act requires duty holders to ensure residents are actively involved in decisions around  fire and structural  safety. This includes providing timely, accessible information, consulting on key safety matters and maintaining clear channels for feedback and complaints.

But engagement is not just about compliance, it is also a critical safety mechanism. Residents are often the first to spot potential hazards and their input can prevent issues before they escalate.

At its core, resident engagement is about building trust, strengthening communication and creating a shared sense of responsibility for building safety.

Q4: What sets ItBox apart from in house solutions or generic communication tools?

Many property managers still rely on in-house portals, email updates, SharePoint folders or legacy ways of communicating with tenants  (such as paper through letterboxes!). While these can deliver general communications, they were not built to support the detailed, auditable, and inclusive requirements of the Building Safety Act.

ItBox is purpose built  to help property managers deliver compliance, with features designed specifically to meet the statutory duties around resident engagement. Key differentiators between  ItBox and legacy systems include:

• Automated generation and maintenance of RES documents for each Higher Risk Building.
• Structured workflows for consultations, feedback and complaints with timestamped audit logs.
• Multilingual and accessible communication tools that reflect diverse resident needs.
• A seamless handover process when managing agents change, ensuring no retraining is needed, no data is lost, and the golden thread of resident engagement is fully maintained.

Unlike generic health and safety or building portal tools, ItBox was built to reflect how the exact steps and actions that need to be taken to meet compliance requirements. It enables clients to deliver and demonstrate compliance consistently, even across large or complex portfolios.

That’s what sets ItBox apart and why it’s becoming the go-to platform for housing providers, freeholders and managing agents focused on safety, compliance and building resident trust.

Q5: Looking ahead, how do you see the relationship between technology and regulation evolving in real estate over the next few years?

Technology is an essential enabler in helping landlords and property managers more easily meet the regulatory requirements in the sector. The relationship between technology and regulation in real estate is becoming stronger as the benefits become clearer. As the sector faces more challenging regulatory hurdles around building safety, ESG and governance, technology is shifting from a support function to an essential tool.

Regulators are increasingly demanding real time visibility, clear audit trails and inclusive engagement — things that are difficult to deliver through static documents or manual processes. This opens the door for a smarter, more proactive approach to compliance.

We expect the future of compliance to be embedded into day-to-day operations, not managed retrospectively. Platforms like ItBox make this possible by automating engagement, tracking outcomes and creating a permanent, auditable record of compliance activity.

It is not about replacing people, it is about giving teams the tools to work more effectively by helping to make complex tasks more straight forward and to meet the requirements of regulatory requirements.  With the right technology in place, compliance becomes less of a burden and more of a competitive advantage, supporting safer buildings for building owners and better outcomes for residents.