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The strata manager of a villa complex has just given approval for a gardener to be employed to maintain the private garden belonging to one villa owner on the basis that it contains a stormwater retention pit which is common property. I have objected because even though the unkept garden is overgrown with weeds it does not interfere with the functioning of the pit. The garden itself is the owner’s responsibility while the OC is responsible for the pit and it is improper for the gardening to become an OC expense. Am I correct?
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Nothing ‘naive’ about getting tripped up by the differences between Qld and NSW strata law – at least I hope there isn’t because I do it all the time.
The only thing missing from ChrisJ’s story is the question of whether or not the Strata Manager or Owners Corp is going to bill the gardening freeloader for the use of the OC gardener – and it sounds like it wasn’t even the owner of that property who asked for the garden to be cleared. Nothing sinister here, I reckon, just a lack of communication that could be fixed with a phone call.
But I reiterate, it looks to me that the SM was perfectly entitled to make that decision – they should, however, have explained to owners why they did what they did.
You have a very different strata system in Qld that was based originally on holiday lets. It also has a long history of corrupt behaviour by on-site managers (hence the specific laws you have referred to).
Strata in NSW was originally based on residential use so we often come at the same problems from completely different directions.
These days Qld is struggling to cope with owner-residents who have different priorities from holiday flat owners. In NSW, we have an ongoing battle with holiday let companies who are trying to bring the Qld way of doing things into residential buildings in NSW.
There are elements of Qld law (like limits on proxies) that we could do with here. But there are also fundamentally corrupt practices – like the sale of management rights by developers – which are enshrined in law North of the border but which have been effectively outlawed here.
Like I said before – not just different laws, different planets.
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