I totally agree JT.
We are caught not only between the politics – but also between the legislation.
The horrendous inconsistency between the various Acts as to the meaning of “residential property” just adds to the confusion.
Conveyancing law, tax law, GST law, strata law, tenancy law, etc all have a different definition of “residential property”. These laws generally make no reference to the term of occupation.
Unless I am wrong, the only place where you see any reference to the term of occupation appears to be in some local council zoning laws.
For various reasons these are either not enforced or are inconsistently enforced. This begs the questions
(1) “Why have a zoning code if it is not enforced?” and
(2) “Are Councils afraid that they have created a zoning code that can be easily challenged and overturned if it was to be enforced?”
An interesting legal test will arise when a decision needs to be made as to which law must yield to another law.
This needs to be sorted out ASAP.