Who Pays for Alternative Accommodation?

What you were told 10 years ago isn’t necessarily going to hold water (no pun intended) when it takes a decade to get a result.

To be clear, I have never heard yet of a defects settlement that has covered the full amount of the cost of remediation etc.  That’s not fair but it’s how these things work.

So let’s accept there is a short-fall of some kind but the OC still has to fix the defects.  But the money for emergency accommodation and storage has to come from somewhere. If everyone is affected then everyone will pay, one way or another, either directly or through their levies.

Getting individual owners to pay for their own emergency accommodation is actually quite smart because it gives you the opportunity to limit your spending if you want to, by not having to contribute through your levies to the cost of accommodation for a larger family, for instance, or one with more expensive tastes.

As for the storage and removals issue, I think you would have a case to take to NCAT that the Owners Corporation still has a duty of care, regardless of the level of the pay-out it received, and that your additional needs should be covered.

I’m not saying you would win, that’s a roll of the dice, but I’m pretty certain of one thing; making additional demands on the owners corp at this time will make you pretty unpopular with most of your neighbours.

This happen to us last year, the entire top floor lost all tenants due to major remedial works. None of the insurance policies covered alternative accommodation due the ” necessary remedial works to building “.

The OC’s Insurance only covered unlivable situations caused by the usual weather, fire, flood bomb,flooding, water pipes bursting etc incidents but not remedial works.  landlords insurance only covered ” unlivable ” conditions which were arguably as the apartments were ” livable” the works were predominantly on the balcony.

However, the noise , dust, removable of balcony doors ( in winter ) and builders in and out all day proved too much for the tenants.  I did remember reading somewhere that some Strata Insurance may cover alternative accommodation for owners living in the apartments but not tenants ( don’t hold me to that though ).

We checked with our broker and it was denied. So after paying $20k each in a special levy to raise $300k on top raising the standard sinking fund levy by $400 a qtr for 2 years. The owners of the top floor also lost rent for 5 months.

We spoke about getting some compensation at the EGM but nothing has come of it. I’m all for governments making it statute that Strata Insurance must cover all loss attributed to ” remedial Works “.

This may be a recommendation after the disasters of the Opal, Mascot, Cube and Honeycomb and other towers needing significant remedial / repair works, especially after warranty periods. You could try asking your insurer they might just surprise you.