[Fey Knows]

You and whoever else you can muster in your Owners Corporation need to go in hard and fast on this. It’s a straight out ‘land grab’. I’d sideline the Strata Manager and get your Strata Committee to go with you if you can… or just other owners who are being disenfranchised  –  had a lend of.

Have the Strata Committee (or alt-Strata Committee if need be 🙂 tell them in writing they have two weeks to remove the gate, fence and hedge (if deemed necessary). If they don’t, you need to get a tradie to do it – ‘at arms length’ to the OC.

Yes, this makes me cranky! Here’s why. Over about 10 years in our block, the 12 ground floor owners were allowed to have their own little gardens and outdoor areas on Common Property. It worked well and lessened the OC’s gardening spend. But then a few were sold, one by one, and the expectation was they were ‘garden units’. Of course real estate agents wrongly claimed they were. Noisy and disturbing gatherings, parties even, were held and this  building definitely was not designed with this in mind.

Then one day a couple of bollards joined by a cable went up. Two weeks later a fence with locked gate. Though these were bought to their attention, the Strata Committee did nothing. Predictably a month or so later at the AGM there was a fortunately badly researched, poorly written by-law on the agenda, attempting to give ground floor owners Exclusive Use of the land in front of their units without having to pay for it. It was painful for all concerned but this was headed off at the pass.

Act now Wondering, before it gets any worse. This land belongs to all owners, not the one owner. It’s not free land.

 

[Fey Knows]

To, in particular Bennifer and Attila the Strata Manager. I once spent a couple of days looking into all this. The one huge strata company with an even bigger parent company. Their arrangements with merchant banks, automatic payment systems, insurance companies  and such…

Now our problem is a little company set up by people who worked there who know what they can get away with and are twice as bad. Particularly when they have orchestrated a Strata Committee cabal takeover.

It’s all very immoral and even corrupt.I feel I should write it all down and give it to someone… but who?

 

[Fey Knows]

Very timely advice for me thanks. I’m considering going to NCAT right now; see the topic about the sneaky special levy under cover of COVID here under strata committees.

[Fey Knows]

Can I ask please, what if something really corrupt has gone on here in strata-land Western Sydney? Like…

The Chairman ushered through the contentious renovation in the unit below his, where a fellow committee member lived (by-law for reno failed at three specially convened EGMs but succeeded at a fourth).

Now those committee members have fallen out. The dodgy reno damaged the Chairman’s unit above. Chairman demanded five grand and got it, then demanded more. Their arguments about this have been overheard.

The Chairman of 5 years has ALSO had an insurance assessor in, a strata matter. He was the only one to meet with the assessor. He has form. He had a mysterious ‘water leak’ a couple of years ago, it seemed suss, and file emails show he peppered the Strata Manager with demands for speedy payment by the insurers.

How can we shine a light on this? Get them to step down maybe. The Strata Manager won’t help; think he knows which side his bread’s buttered on.

And as I say above, the owner of the reno’d unit who reckons they work in the local council’s planning department and insisted no council approval was needed. As JimmyT says, it was. Or is.

[Fey Knows]

That sounds terrible and I can imagine how it is for you as I’ve had a similar problem. I assume he’s an owner which makes things a bit more difficult, though you don’t say he owns. If he’s a tenant, I’d be pulling out all stops to find  the property owner and deal with it that way, via the owner.

Tenant or owner, I doubt you’ll have much luck with any Strata Manager or Strata Committee on this one. They just won’t want to be involved and what could they do anyway? Nothing.

The police? In my experience, even if the police know him, know about him and have incident reports and court cases with him coming out of their ears… they’ll do SFA.

The best advice I can give you is, since you’re tenants, move as soon as you can. I know, you probably like it where you are and are used to it. But do some research first and then get out while the going’s good. And keep your wits about you until then. Get a little CCTV WyzeCam 2 online, just in case. They are so cheap and absolutely fantastic. I have two, inside looking out which is legal. Can you set one up looking out, yourself?

Our nasty guy moved away two years ago but still comes back and sprays paint on our car and stuff, every now and again, believe it or nuts.

[Fey Knows]

Here’s a bit from the NSW Office of Fair Trading’s web site page headed Strata and community schemes under COVID-19. It sends shivers down my spine.

“If all reasonable efforts have been made to hold a general meeting under the above guidelines and the meeting is unable to achieve a quorum, the Chair can use the no quorum procedure to hold a valid meeting and pass the resolution.”

I reckon we won’t have a quorum and our inept Strata Committee and tricky Strata Manager will do their worst. Which means, in these COVID times, we’ll be getting an $8,000 per lot per annum Special Levy to cover 150 new windows with almost no information supplied and only the one quote for owners’ consideration (which has why this project hasn’t got up over the last four years, when it’s been sorely needed).

[Fey Knows]

We have the same issue here, ‘and then some’.

Our Sydney building’s AGM is ‘due’ and is next week; scheduled and notified after COVID-19 disruption was well known. It has been announced it’s going to be a ‘Zoom meeting’. We can vote on issues with a voting form or assign proxies. But there is a cabal of owners (the Strata Committee) with unpopular agenda items.

Just one is, they want to replace 150 windows in all units. They want to raise a Special Levy which will cost owners an extra eight thousand dollars a year or two grand a quarter. From now; with the full financial effects of COVID-19 not known. It seems ridiculous. I think they are deliberately trying to sneak stuff through.

Bearing in mind what Jimmy says, in this stream should this meeting be postponed? By a motion or something on the night? Or by lobbying the Strata Committee to vote to postpone?

 

[Fey Knows]

Jimmy-T says ‘the committee should… not be making any decisions that affect the scheme, owners, residents or common property in an “informal” setting.’

Our committee of seven (yep seven! in a Sydney block of 42) almost never meet but when they do it’s at the local pub. Some owners feel uneasy about turning up to observe in a pub and just as uneasy about important decisions Strata Committee decisions made in such an “informal” setting. I won’t engage in any character assassination here.

How might we put a stop to SC meetings taking place at such a venue and make them have more, proper minuted meetings?

 

[Fey Knows]

Is SCA the one who looks after the interests of strata managers as opposed to the OCN? Anyhow “How hard can it be” you ask? I’m taking that as a rhetorical question and thinking ‘not very hard at all’ but then…

I reckon the strata management industry must be a squillion dollar industry, in fact I know it is, with one giant internationally owned company slowly eating up other ones it thinks are worth it.

There are wheels-within-wheels too, such as arrangements with investment banks for vast amounts of OC funds, fee transaction systems and such.

The minnow strata managers trying to build an attractive business to be taken over don’t have owners interests at heart either. “Body Corporate work? It’s like a license to print money!” a trade living in our building once said memorably.

A young bloke I know who spent about five minutes working for a small strata manager said: “I just did not believe the largesse being handed out by suppliers and it wasn’t even Christmas.” Commissions? Of course not! Corruption? No way!

Oh, you’ve read this far? I’ll sign off by saying make sure you’ve got a super-attentive Strata Committee. And yeah! How about a Royal Commission! Or better still, a 4 Corners two-part expose.

 

[Fey Knows]

Thanks for posting this though I’m not going to be able to be any help, however I will watch this thread carefully.

Sensitivities and straight-out allergies to some of the modern and usually cheap’n’nasty perfumes in washing powders, cleaning agents and even actual ‘perfumes’  / fragrances is very common and be debilitating. I suffer from this and always have to be careful. Something has to give.

I don’t know what you might do. Good luck.

[Fey Knows]

Thanks Sir Humphrey and BonnieL.

I’m now told a ‘voting paper’ could have and should have been included along with the agenda since we’ve gone electronic. There was a proxy form but no voting paper.

If there was that voting paper, it could be sent in on it’s own unaccompanied by a human 🙂

In the absence of of the voting paper I will be permitted to use the proxy form unassigned to a human and just send it on in 🙂

One wonders how far he process can be trusted. And how close the vote is likely to be.

 

[Fey Knows]

I acknowledge your air of authority, Redcali and I don’t want to digress too much, but here goes.

There’s supposed to be a designated Community Liaison Officer in every police station in NSW but in practice that means the big, main stations not the minor ones. (For example, there is one at North Sydney and one at Chatswood but not at little old Mosman.)

My experience is these officers can be very understanding, caring and helpful if you can’t get help at the front desk.

A highly experienced, decorated Police Inspector told me how to get coppers to help you. Be unfailingly polite, but don’t be afraid to put your point across forcefully. Write down their name, make them take out their notebook and write stuff down. Insist on an Incident Report Number which, in my experience, they write on a little card. The Police Inspector said NO copper likes being the subject of a complaint so if you have to threaten that as a last resort, you’ll probably get their attention.

By the way, JimmT’s linked story is uncomfortably similar to our experience. A psychopath is a psychopath whether they’re in the USA or Australia.

[Fey Knows]

There is some very worthwhile advice here.

I would like to reiterate that the police will be reluctant to listen, reluctant to write anything much down, and say they can’t do help much. Make sure to write down the name of the police person you speak to and it must be a police person , not the desk person who is often a volunteer, not a copper. And you must leave with an ‘incident number’. As I said, if you jump up and down politely and are upset enough, they may offer to contact the harasser.

Also, remember the threat of a complaint that they wouldn’t help you often works.

 

[Fey Knows]

First, have you told neighbours? You really should. It might be hard but you need to.

It’s my experience, see my post above, if you go to the police with a few bits of film showing the behaviour (you are allowed to film but not record sound without permission) make the police watch it, insist on leaving with an Incident Report Number, they may talk to this person forcefully.

If you can’t get them to do anything, ask to speak to the Community Relations Office (in NSW at least every police station is supposed to have one) and tell them you really need help.

If they are still reluctant, tell them you are going to complain via a Complaints Form (P964 I think, look it up anyway) and identify by name all of the police who haven’t helped you. A copper told me NO COPPER LIKES TO HAVE A COMPLAINT MADE AGAINST THEM.

[Fey Knows]

It’s good you have your apartment on the market. I can relate to your problem. My family and I had something similar but much worse happen to us in our apartment block.

If you are able to move, that’s best. Meanwhile, get a couple of WyzeCam 2 small and ridiculously cheap (and fun) CCTV cameras (only 20 bucks in USA, sadly about 100 here online). Easily researched. They are excellent! Have one trained from your windows looking out if that makes sense. We do that and we also have one at out front door; no OC permission but our neighbours who benefit from them are happy enough, what with parcel and food deliveries and tradies coming and going.

It’s good you have videos, keep at it; get used to walking round with your phone video turned on so you can press ‘record’ instantly. If your apartment is for sale and your stalker knows, his behaviour may ramp up.

Get your computer and phone checked for incursions. This may sound over-doing it and it may be. Our psychopathic ‘harasser’ was in the tech field though, and hacked us easily, we discovered.

In short, again, it may sound alarmist but leave nothing to chance.

Do your neighbours know? If not tell them.

There is a lot on government and police web sites about this sort of intimidating behaviour, if you haven’t seen it already.

You’re right, the police may not be able to do anything but if you edit a few clips together and take them to your local Police Station, jump up and down, be very polite but make a bit of fuss and have a copper watch the video, they may undertake to pay the stalker a visit. Certainly DO ask them for a numbered Incident Report as a record of your visit.

Finally, a solicitor may write a letter to this stalker for you putting your fears and feelings in writing.

 

 

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