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I don’t see much difference between proxy farming and pre-voting. The issue with pre-voting is the strata committee have a disproportionate ability to circulate their opinion to owners, compared to a single owner. Owners pre-vote in alignment with the opinion of the Strata Committee members without ever hearing the view of anyone else.
In a recent example, we sued the OC for some pretty egregious acts against our property rights under the direction of the SC, we prevailed in NCAT and were awarded substantial costs. The SC circulated paperwork to owners making the arguments that NCAT soundly rejected as “unconvincing”, “without merit” and “flawed” yet they still circulated those same arguments to owners in order to entice pre-voting to pass their agenda and cover up their misdeeds. We now have no choice but to sue members in the supreme court.
I think it should also be noted that in my experience acoustic engineers have little or no ability to predict or correctly assess noise transfer through floors. All they can do is use prescribed testing to ensure the testing results comply with the BCA, the standard of which is ridiculously low, and/or any bylaws. Compliance will not necessarily result in resolution of the disturbance.
My view is that the entire strata industry is extremely poorly regulated. While mandatory disclosure of insurance commissions under SSMA 2015 was a start, banning them completely doesn’t necessarily resolve the underlying issue.
The fundamental problem with the strata industry is that it is by construction wrought with conflicts of interest. As @tina mentioned, commissions are based on the cost of the policy and in my experience many strata managers aren’t necessarily working hard enough to reduce premiums since this would reduce their commissions. A perfect example of the issue is/was the massive increase in insurance cost due to the combustible cladding issue. The strata manager wasn’t doing any extra work but in my experience policy costs generally doubled, so therefore commissions doubled. The strata manager clearly has a conflict here. Why would they try to negotiate down premiums, they’d do more work in order to earn less commission. Once the cladding was under remediation and the policy came up for renewal, how many strata managers negotiated for the policy to be pro-rated based on the completion date of the remediation. In our case I negotiated a clause into our policy before we signed it, that resulted in a refund on the policy once the cladding remediation was completed, pro-rated against the completed portion of the policy term. You’d expect our strata manager would have seen this outcome and tried to do the same for all their clients, I actually asked their principal if they did so. I was told it was “not our responsibility”.
Strata managers recommend trades to building managers or committee, where is the requirement to disclose those commissions? I know in 3 building in which we own, the OC pays a monthly fee to provide access to a portal where trades etc register, those trades are then recommended or sometimes even engaged by the strata manager. The trades pay a fee to be on the platform and the owners pay a fee to be on the platform. I’m a business man, I have no issue with making money from my clients, but where is the guarantee that the trades are being recommended/selected because they are the most suitable for a job, rather than because they pay to play.
A massive conflict of interest is where the same organisation owns the strata management company and the building management company, where are the checks and balances?
The strata manager and the building manager are generally determined by the SC, the owners generally follow the advice of the SC. So when the SC engages in bad behaviour, the strata manager should be expected to provide advice to the owners. In my experience they generally don’t, because that is a sure way not to have your contract renewed.
In my view the entire regulator structure of strata needs to be completely reconsidered, strata managers often manage and make recommendations in relation to multi-million dollar strata budgets. There needs to be regulation of their activities and just like the finance industry and the legal industry, they need to be appropriately qualified to manage these functions. Strata managers need a mandatory code of conduct, with real consequences to weed out the bad actors.
If you want to understand why FT is limp-wristed, one only needs to look at the industry as a whole and who provides them advice.
Spend 5 minutes looking at the CVs of the directors of SCA and compare them with the board of OCN. One organisation is made of up of those who profit from the status quo, the other is made up of individuals with a diversity of industry experience but notably not in industries that benefit from the status quo.
Not all “industry associations” have the same goals, the NRA (National Rifle Association in the USA) comes to mind.
I think the easiest solution is to check the bylaws in relation to the sharing of security devices. If the commercial lot owners are sharing / duplicating swipes/ fobs, take action against them in NCAT. It is often much less effort to just make things expensive and difficult for those who try to circumvent being a good compliant resident.
As an EC/SC member for many years and a dog lover and owner, I still take exception to new owners who present proposals for larger dogs in strata without first clarifying bylaws or seeking approval as a condition of sale.
People forget that strata committee members don’t make the bylaws yet they are tasked with enforcing them and it is pretty much impossible to keep all owners and residents happy. We also don’t get paid!
When a new owner moves in and then seeks approval for their pet that does not comply with existing bylaws, it puts committee members and all owners in a very difficult position. Any prospective purchaser has a responsibility to ensure that their requirements vis-a-vis pets, parking, parties etc will comply with exiting bylaws. If they do not then they need to structure their terms of purchase such that they can achieve required approvals or otherwise void the contract of sale. We call that “taking responsibility” and “making informed decisions”. Old fashioned ideas to be sure.
If the door is really in a bad state you could go to NCAT and argue that the OC is failing to maintain common property.
While this is a creative plan, in the case of Sydney City Council their policy is to limit the number of available parking spaces, the idea being to encourage people not to bring cars into the council area. If you allow residents to use visitor parking you have effectively increased the number of resident vehicles within the complex, which is not in line with council’s policy.
I enquired with the City of Sydney abount managing our parking space. Looking at their terms and conditions, you can have no existing issues with parking and parking must have unrestricted access. Try ticking those 2 boxes. I guess it is just easier to ticket cars for expired tickets on the street.
If you look at the Strata Schemes Management Act and associated regulations, Strata Committee member really don’t have any “Power” they have responsibilities. So if you feel that a chairperson is not reasonbably considering your propoosal, consider if they are fulfilling their responsibilites and following the correct processes. In my experience most Strata Committees do not correctly follow correct processes and are poorly advised by inexperienced strata managers
While I agree the stata’s fine is not legal, I do not agree that imposing a fine is a form of bullying. As the secretary of a large strata for many years, the law is woefully inadequate in this area. Building management and volunteer committee members spend a significant amount of time dealing with a small minority of residents, typically tenants, who consider that they are not required to comply with bylaws. This is time we should be spending on productive works. Making life uncomfortable for a tennant who considers themselves somehow exempt from bylaws is often a a more productive use of our time.
If a tennant stops paying rent for whatever reason, evict them and get a tennant who pays their rent.
As an alternative to imposing fines on late levies, one of the strata in which we own has a discount system. So if your levies are due on 1st May, you get a 10% discount if you pay by COB 31st April. So if we pay our levies on time we save nearly $600! We always pay on time 🙂
Strata committees can be a nightmare with some members more intent on attaining “power” than actually achieving anything. I wonder if the reason other owners don’t want to join the committee as they already know how things are working (not) and prefer to just keep out of it.
In my experience with strata committees and committees in general, you can always use the “lazy” strategy. Create work for the committee that requires members like the secretary to have to use their time to take care of strata work, or keep asking the treasurer to clarify things like expenditure, how contractors were selected, did they sight licenses etc etc. A lot of these power mongers are basically lazy and full of insecurities, give them a bit of work to do make them embarrassed because they don’t know what to do and they’ll scurry away like cockroaches.
Of course you can always ask the non-participant owners join the committee and appoint you to act for them at each meeting (NSW), that way you will hold more votes than just your own.
Your best tool is knowing the legislation and bylaws. Read the SSMA and the bylaws so you can quote them at meetings, it will often shut up people who have used the ignorance of other members in order to gain control.
These tactics have worked for me in the past so might be worth a shot.
I should point out that I don’t see that there is any “Power” in being on a strata committee, it’s just a lot of work, but it’s your best way to protect your property.