Two signatories and a lawyer: the rules I run every company by

Rule one: two signatories on every account

In 2011 I left a 40-person solar company with managers I could not see while I rebuilt a resort in Bali. They took customer deposits for systems that were never ordered. I closed the company, refunded the customers and was prosecuted in 2015. Since then no company I run allows one person to move customer money. Two signatures, every time, including mine.

Rule two: a lawyer reads it before money moves

Eco Boss had a licence agreement with a UK supplier that had been signed electronically. When the relationship soured the supplier said it had never been validly signed. Fighting it would have cost around $200,000 and could not have undone the damage, so I closed the company. Every distribution, agency, development and sale agreement I sign now goes through counsel first, and the important ones are signed in ink.

Rule three: never own what you cannot supervise

This is the lesson underneath both failures. If I cannot watch a business, I should not own it. It is why I live in Indonesia rather than managing it from Australia, and why Kinnara Capital has a site office in Buwun Mas rather than a desk in Bali.

Rule four: buyer money never sits with the marketing business

Kinnara markets property and does not hold funds. A buyer's money belongs with the contracting developer or in escrow, released against milestones. In 2025 a project Kinnara was marketing went wrong, and the fact that Kinnara had never held buyer money was the difference between a hard decision and a catastrophe. The account is in my Marina Bay City statement.

Rule five: check the people before the project

Since 2025 Kinnara runs background checks on every development partner and its directors before it lists a project. Renders are cheap. Directors have histories.

Rule six: build to the standard, not the local norm

Building the Elysian display villa for Saraya showed that some locally available steel, concrete and electrical components did not meet the specification. We changed suppliers and raised the specification for every villa. It cost money and it was not optional.

Rule seven: tell the story yourself

The worst version of your failures will be written by someone else if you do not write it first. This site has a record page with the fines, the restitution and the dates. Anyone who deals with me can read it before they do. I would rather that than have them find it elsewhere.

What the rules cost

Each of these slows a company down a little. A payment waits a day for a second signature. A deal waits a week for counsel. A land purchase waits a year for a certificate. Set against what the alternative cost me, it is the cheapest insurance I have ever bought. The full list, with the land rules from Lombok, is on how he runs companies.