Pardon me for being very old fashioned, but given my experience, the issue is clear as a bell.
A landlord for his/her own good would want to be seen (by NCAT etc) to have behaved from the get go in a reasonable manner.
As a landlord I lease out one apartment with a car space, but always priced it transparently with and without a car space. If I didn’t do it transparently, I would at least have an idea of what the car space is worth per week.
To follow Jimmy’s train of thought, AGH leased a premises with a car space. If that car space is denied her for any reason, (other than something she did), then she should be given a reduction in rent by the amount of the car space for the duration of the works. After all, if she paid for a 2 bedroom unit and all of a sudden 1 bedroom was say flooded by common pipes, then on what grounds must she continue to pay the rent on 2 bedrooms?
As to 86_strata’s point of “it’s nobody’s fault” and “Sometimes stuff just happens and we need to deal with it”, let me share a similar incident.
In one premises I am involved in, there was a NCAT hearing. The tenants took action seeking rent reduction for the noise and dust a neighbour created when renovating his unit. They also sought compensation for “hardship” the renovations caused them and sought to exit the lease w/out paying the early vacating fee. Quite a laundry list I thought! At the time I chatted to a recently minted lawyer as I was not interested in spending thousands on an established lawyer as that would have exceeded my expected downside at NCAT or court.
I argued like 86_strata does: “sometimes stuff happens”, implicit in that comment was that whatever happened was beyond the landlord’s control. The young lawyer I spoke to was confident that such external disturbances were not matters that required compensation as it was not the landlord who created or controlled the disturbances.
I reminded the tenants that “it’s not me renovating and disturbing you (the tenants). I am not only involved in the building works, I don’t even have influence over the neighbour, I am not on the strata committee or building committee and I was not given advance warning of the renovations”. I proved all of the points to the tenants before we went to NCAT.
NCAT was a win for the tenants, so I raised the stakes and went to the local court. It too sided with the tenants, finding, from memory that “sometimes renovations at neighbouring units or building take place and we can’t stop that disturbing our peace”. And here’s the kicker, the court summarised its view along the following lines: “a tenant has a right to peaceful enjoyment and sometimes a landlord, not involved in creating the disturbance or having any benefit from the disturbance, has to pay the price”. His Honour did not say “an absolute right to peaceful enjoyment” but it sure seemed that was his leaning.
Long story short, the tenants exited the premises w/out paying the exit fee and had a rent reduction. To finalise the matter very quickly I managed to get them to drop the compensation element of their claim.
Back to AGH, ideally before the works begin, I suggest AGH calculates how much she pays per day for the car space day and email the person she deals with: be it the property manager or landlord, that she seeks rent reduction of that amount multiplied by the number of days she is denied unrestricted use of the car space. Ask for a confirmation that your email was received.
In the interim AGH is to pay the usual rent, and not make any unilateral offsets/deductions for the inconvenience.
Regardless of whether AGH receives a confirmation that her email was received, when the works are over and she can access her car space, she should email the property manager or landlord that she have been denied the car space for so many days at some many dollars per day and that sum should be deducted from the next rent payment.
If she does not get a positive response then as Jimmy suggested, she should call NSW Fair Trading on 13 32 20 and ask what steps she can take to assert her rights. Mediation? NCAT?
Jimmy says that he’s sure she’d get a rent reduction if she went to Fair Trading. I am sure she would. She may even get more compensation if she argues that she suffered great inconvenience by having to find the time to scour the streets day and night for a place to park, every time for the period of the works. And possibly more still (by way of reimbursement) if she ends up receiving a parking fine(s) from parking on the street in the only available place within reasonable distance from the premises (where regrettably she exceeded the permitted stay in that car spot).