Management Couples — Remote Properties

What this listing is

We are not advertising one specific job here. This is a standing listing for couples who want to run a remote property together, so that when one of these roles comes up we already know who you are, what each of you does, and where you’ll go.

Couples come up often in our conversations with operators. They are also the hardest brief to fill, which is exactly why we would rather know you before a role exists than start looking once one lands.

The work

A lot of remote Australia is run by two people. Manager and chef. Manager and head housekeeper. A caretaker pair on a property with no guests for half the year. A roadhouse where one of you runs the kitchen and the other runs the fuel, the rooms and the books.

We ran a property that way for years, so this listing is written from the inside.

The appeal is real: one house, two incomes, almost no cost of living, and a property the two of you genuinely run. So is the rest of it.

Two jobs, one house. Work does not stop at the door. You will talk about the generator over dinner.
You are each other’s colleague. Disagreements at work follow you home, and the staff can always tell.
If one of you leaves, the property loses two. Operators know this, which is why they screen couples harder than individuals. It is also why the good ones look after you.
Check that both roles are real. Some couples’ roles are two proper jobs with two proper salaries. Some are one job and a partner expected to “help out” for accommodation. The second kind is worth walking into with your eyes open, not by accident.

Living on site

Couples are usually housed better than anyone else on the property — a cottage or a house of your own. Meals are commonly included, often power, internet and a vehicle for property use as well.
Days off are days off on the property. The two of you will need something to do that isn’t work.
Connectivity ranges from Starlink that runs fine to a satellite service you plan your evenings around.
Your social world for the season is the people on site. For a couple that is easier than it is for anyone else, and it is still an adjustment.

The shape of the year

Remote hospitality hires ahead of its seasons, usually by two to three months. Roughly how it runs in Australia:

Southern summer — Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, Kangaroo Island, the NSW coast. Trading December to March, hiring September to November.
Top End and the Kimberley — dry-season operations April to October, hiring February to May.
Islands and boat-access lodges — the lift starts around June and runs through September.
Outback stations and caretaker roles — often hired January to March for the April-to-October cycle, and sometimes at almost no notice when a pair falls through.

Couples’ roles in particular are usually filled by a phone call before they are ever advertised, because operators want to talk to someone who has already met you both.

On money

Look at a couple’s offer as one number, not two.

The usual shape is two salaries and one house. Sometimes it is one salary with the accommodation carrying the rest, and that is the arrangement to look at hard — it is the one that leaves the second person with no separate employment, no separate super and nothing to point at if it doesn’t work out.

We won’t publish bands for couples’ roles, because the shape of the package varies so much — and we’d rather give you no number than one we made up. When we have an actual role for you, you’ll get the real numbers for both roles, the roster, and what comes out of your pay for accommodation, before either of you goes forward.

Who this suits

Couples who have worked together before, or who are honest with themselves about whether they can. One of you with a trade, a kitchen background or a maintenance ticket makes a pair considerably easier to place.

You do not both need to be senior. A capable manager and a strong all-rounder is a common and very placeable pairing.

If you’re applying from overseas, tell us both your work rights when you register and we’ll be straight with you about what your situation opens and what it closes. A pair where only one of you can work is a much harder placement, and it’s better known early.

How this works

Register on our find-work page — choose “working couple” as the role type, and tell us what each of you does, where you’ll go and when you’re free. There are two of us and we read every registration ourselves. If something fits, we’ll call you. If nothing fits for a while you stay on the register. We’ll check in about once a year to ask whether you still want to be on it — you come off whenever you ask, and also if we check in and hear nothing back.

Registering here is not an application for a named job. We will always tell you which property a role is at before either of you goes forward for it.

About Wild Ops

Wild Ops is a recruitment agency for remote and regional hospitality in Australia. Cindy is a chef by trade and Jordan is a carpenter who moved into managing properties. Between us we’ve run remote and regional properties here for the better part of fifteen years — luxury lodges on the Great Ocean Road, a boat-access lodge in NSW, a wilderness lodge in the Top End, a motel on the south coast of Western Australia. For several of those years we were the two people running the place.