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My 82 year old mum has lived in her apartment block for 21 years. A young family (couple with baby) are renting the apartment above hers.
Up to 3 times a week they have upwards of 20 people (including lots of young children) in their 2 bedroom apartment. The adults are out on the balcony until all hours laughing and carrying on, while the children are running around and screaming on the floor above my mother. They continue until well after midnight.
They have been spoken to many times, the strata manager has written to them several times, but they pay no attention.
Today, when my mother arrived home after being out, these people along with 50 of their friends (and about half as many kids), had set up a BBQ in the underground car park & had the security door to the apartments propped open so that they could come & go between their apartment & the carpark BBQ without being hampered by having to open a door. The kids were running wild all over the complex.
When confronted and told they were not entitled to take over the common areas, they claim they are doing nothing wrong.
It is getting to the point were my mum's sleep is continually being disrupted as is any chance of any peace and quiet on the weekends.
Nobody seems to be able to do anything to get these people to understand how inconsiderate they are being.
It has gotten to the point were my mum thinks she needs to move.
I am so angry, as I can't understand why a quiet 82 year old women needs to be forced out of her home.
Would appreciate any help anyone can offer with what we can do to put and end to this nightmare.
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The Owner or Agent of the rental apartment is required to provide the Owners Corporation of your Mum’s Plan with details of the Tenant’s Name, the Term of their Lease etc (S109 Strata Schemes Management Act 1996); the Strata Manager would have that detail and of course the Landlord’s details.
It is also a condition of the Lease that the occupants of the rental apartment comply with the Plan’s By-Laws, and the frequency / duration of the noise that your Mum’s experiencing and the underground BBQ are clearly in Breach of those By-Laws.
So after taking into consideration the fact that the Strata Manager has already written to the problem tenants with no affect, I’d recommend a two-pronged approach:
- Contact the Strata Managers (SM) and request that they initiate procedures to issue the Tenants with two (2) Notices to Comply ; one for the noise and one for the improper use of the Common Property, and with the regard to the noise, ask the SM to additionally include a letter advising those Tenants that the Owners Corporation will additionally seek Noise Abatement Orders against them in the Local Court if they don’t comply fully with the terms of that Notice.
- Ask the Strata Manager to copy the above to the Rental Agent and to the Proprietor / Landlord of the rental apartment, and again include a separate letter advising the Proprietor that he/she may be held legally liable for any continuing Breach/s of the Plan’s By-Laws by the Tenants (there is a legal precedent for this), and requesting them to have their Agent follow-up with regard to their Tenant’s non-compliance with the terms of their Lease (which requires compliance with By-Laws).
Hopefully, that two-pronged approach will work, but if it doesn’t, I’m afraid that the only remaining recourse is to seek Police involvement as a back-up to the O/C actually seeking Noise Abatement Orders OR lodging an Application for Orders with the Strata Division of the NSW Consumer, Trader, and Tenancy Tribunal (CTTT) where fines of up to $550 may be imposed against the Tenants (as residents of a Strata Plan). Regrettably, an O/C is not currently able to lodge an Application to the CTTT’s Tenancy Division where eviction orders can be made, as it sounds to me like that’s what is really required in the circumstances that you describe.
Who thinks that idea floated a few months ago about 'Strata Police', who could be mobilised to check into a situation like this, would be a good idea?
OK but what would their powers and duties be? We're not even allowed to clamp or tow cars.
Fortunately I have a cunning plan. If there was a specialist strata security firm – kind of like strata private eyes who, with the permission of the Owners Corp (of course) set up video cameras and recording equipment and were expert in getting the right statutory declarations from neighbours, wouldn't that be something?
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Whale,
My mum followed your advice to the letter and has been rewarded with neighbours who are now quiet & respectful of those around them. Thank you so much for the wonderful advice you offered. This has been a great success.
Urban Spaceman said:
Who thinks that idea floated a few months ago about ‘Strata Police’, who could be mobilised to check into a situation like this, would be a good idea?
I tried to put a hypothetical post on this forum regarding how the strata police were deployed to a noisy swimming pool over run by uni students after dark … it was a simple and effective solution to the strata dweller’s problem if such a hypothetical ever became real.
It involved strata police being dispatched to the location, running checks on the lands data base to see a by-law did exist and issuing on the spot notices to comply to the offenders.
Strata police … definitely have their uses and i for one think they should be made real, even if only on a trial basis to see how effective or problematic the idea is.
I don’t think strata police is a good idea, nor do I think it’s simple nor would it be particularly effective. There are laws and by-laws and if they were enforced with a semblance of logic and fairness, we would all be a lot better off.
Also, I think the creation of StrataCops would just about finish off prospective strata buyers who are already nervous about the whole business of moving into communities.
That said, a strata Ombudsman, who could overrule some of the insanities that emerge from the CTTT and had the power to declare unfair contracts void would get my vote.
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Jimmy, my memory is the ‘strata police’ was originally your idea and you said you were going to register it, no?
One of the main issues is the length of time it takes to fix awful problems which can turn your life upside down at the drop-of-a-hat such as when the place on top of you lays a non-compliant wooden floor or a bunch of shift-working, party-hard teenagers move into your otherwise quiet building.
The strata ombudsman wouldn’t fix that fast enough.
Look, Strata Cops sounds like the kind of madcap idea I might have proposed, albeit ironically and after the dangerous third glass of red at 2am (although it was BB who said I didn't like it – so I assumed it wasn't my idea).
The StrataCops couldn't possibly have the power to tell someone to relay their carpet and the real cops have the power to shut up the party-hearty 'dudes'. But I reckon the bigger problem is the selective enforcement of by-laws that we've discussed elsewhere and at great length. If ECs weren't allowed to just say 'this is an issue between two neighbours' and chuck problems (except their own) into the too-hard basket, everyone would soon learn they either had to behave or face consequences.
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