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Limit on tenants – but who’s counting?
“Can bylaws be put in place to restrict the number of residents in a unit,” asks Bearforce1 on the Flat Chat forum.
He has a two-bedroom, two bathroom flatin NSW and he reckons there’s enough room for five people. However, his building has a by-law restricting occupancy to two adults per bedroom.
“I wanting to rent out the spare room and have placed two bunk beds in the room,” he says. “I have at present three people there making the total apartment occupants 4. I would love to have another person in the room.
“The building has passed a by-law imposing a two person per room limit on residents over 18. I have been to Fair Trading and they advise that they do not believe by-laws have the authority to determine number of residents.”
Not so, say Flat Chat’s resident strata experts.
“As long as it’s done via a by-law passed at a General Meeting, you can impose a limit,” says Suzie Broome, a strata lawyer with Makinson d’Apice. “Councils are generally supportive as it limits the fire risk by adding some certainty to the numbers in occupation of a building at any one time.”
Strata manager Jim McDonald of StrataChoice agrees but adds, “the problem is how to police it. How do you know who’s a resident and who’s a visitor?”
Overcrowding apartments can have tragic consequences, as the apartment fire in Bankstown last year showed.
But even when Owners Corps restrict the number of keys, tenants use “dead letter” drops, jam fire doors open and use mobile phones to operate the intercom entry button when its number is rung.
It’s hard to prove a flat is overcrowded and there’s no law that allows for access to the unit … except for Owners Corps’ obligation to conduct quarterly fire inspections. Make occupancy a part of fire checks and everyone would be a lot safer.
By the way, to the best of our knowledge, strata laws across Australia allow owners corporations, bodies corporate or strata companies – whatever they are called where you are – to impose limits on the number of adult residents per unit and, of course, landlords can impose their own limits on numbers via their residential tenancy agreements.
You can read the whole of Bearforce’s posting and various responses HERE.
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