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The NSW strata Act says the owners corporation “must insure the building and keep the building insured …” and that has to be your focus, rather than worrying aboutvacating the building.
Your insurer may have a policy to cover the renovations or might even say you will be covered anyway.
Leaving the building uninsured, especially when it is undergoing major physical changes, isn’t just a breach of strata law (with a $550 max. fine), it is a huge risk should anything go wrong and a member of the public, for instance, is injured or killed.
If that happened, owners would be personally liable for their share of what could be very serious financial damages claims.
Get insurance.
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You’d certainly have rounds for applying for a compulsory manager but, as we have said many times in the pages, be careful what you wish for.
Oddly enough, your plight echoes the scenario I outlined in a recent column about the need for “social profit” strata managers for small strata schemes.
I can totally understand your new strata manager’s reluctance to take on the contract, given the potential cost of managing your scheme compared to the low income from a small number of units.
So I have a radical suggestion: Talk to two of our sponsors – Strata Answers and Stratabox – about what you could do to become at least partially self managed and to help you past the current hump.
As far as the old strata managers refusing to hand over the records goes, tell them that unless they comply immediately, you will take action against them at Fair Trading and NCAT under Section 181 which carries a maximum fine of $2200.
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Well, yes, it would be good to get some advice but there’s a limit to what that advice might be.
Basically, it comes down to whether there is enough spare cash in the kitty to carry non-payments and still pay all the block’s outgoings. Since most strata schemes run on having very little excess cash in hand, it might be difficult to give the whole owners corp a ‘levies holiday’.
However, theoretically, if your maintenance (sinking) fund was in good shape, with no imminent projects about to drain it, you could use that money to keep the building going once you had legitimised the levies holiday.
To do so would probably require an application to NCAT under a Section 87 (below) to vary the contributions that had been agreed at the last AGM. I would imagine an application by an owners corp with a clear majority of owners supporting it would be regarded sympathetically (although you never can tell).
But there are rules about borrowing from the maintenance fund to boost the admin fund, basically that it has to be paid back within three months (although creative accounting can find ways around that). See Section 76 (2) below.
Also, individual owners could apply to the committee for some leeway in paying their levies in cases of extreme hardship, for instance, allowing them to pay their quarterly levies in arrears without penalty interest being applied. That comes under Section 85 (3) and (5) of the Act.
What it really comes down to is whether there is spare cash lying around that could be used in the short-term. If there isn’t then the question is moot unless all your suplliers and contractors are prepared to go without pay too.
76 Use of administrative fund or capital works fund for purposes of other fund
(2) The owners corporation must, not later than 3 months after the transfer or use, determine the amount to be levied as a contribution to the fund from which the transfer or use was made to reimburse the amounts paid from the fund. Section 81 (3) and (5) apply to a contribution determined under this subsection.87 Orders varying contributions or payment methods
(1) The Tribunal may, on application, make either or both of the following orders if the Tribunal considers that any amount levied or proposed to be levied by way of contributions is inadequate or excessive or that the manner of payment of contributions is unreasonable:
(a) an order for payment of contributions of a different amount,
(b) an order for payment of contributions in a different manner.
(2) An application for an order may be made by the lessor of a leasehold strata scheme, an owners corporation, an owner or a mortgagee in possession.If you want to be alerted when anyone replies to your posts or responds to this topic, please register and login, then you will be able to subscribe to the topic. The opinions offered in these Forum posts and replies are not intended to be taken as legal advice. Readers with serious issues should consult experienced strata lawyers. NB: Longer threads may spill over to additional pages - look for the numbers on the bottom right, under the last post.
My understanding is that special levies do not require a special resolution, meaning that a simple majority can pass them. Unless there is a serious imbalance in the Unit Entitlements, 5-3 is a majority in this case.
Given that the correct procedures have been followed, and assuming the levies aren’t for some frivolous reason, I wouldn’t think your minority group had much chance at NCAT.
Even if there had been some technical issue (like not sending out agendas) the Tribunal probably wouldn’t change the ruling because the missing three votes would not have made a difference to the outcome.
But then NCAT is a strange beast that sometimes makes odd rulings, so who knows?
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It’s only the strata manager’s job if the owners corp via the committee makes it so. In the majority of cases, the committee mambers may feel that they lack the skills and/or experience to do that properly themselves and delegate the job to the SM.
In any case, whatever is negotiated has to be approved by the committee or the owners corp as a whole so there is plenty of scope for a committee member to undertake this themselves, knowing that they don’t have the authority to sign off on a deal anyway.
But in short, it’s up to the committee to decide who does the negotiating and that job would often fall to the SM as they have the skills and experience (or should have).
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It’s an Office of State revenue issue, not ATO. Maybe you should send them this story from 2017 about someone being fined for first-home buyers grant fraud, and ask them if they really want to pursue the case.
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The recipient needs to show bank statements that have previous payments made by you, then missing payments. In any case, your bank records should show the bank accounts that were paid into. Those are the accounts that he needs to produce.
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There is no standard fee (except for the charge for viewing strata scheme documents). There isn’t even a standard charge for strata management services. But it might be in your contract. If it isn’t, your only protection is the knowledge that you won’t renew if you are being overcharged. Challenge it and see what happens.
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That’s quite a saga. As to your questions:
Why won’t NCAT accept my bank statements as proof of payment?
I have no idea. You would have to ask them. But it sounds like they have refuse to make a ruling (because there has been no hearing) not that they refused to acknowledge the payment. Two differnt things. I would be asking that the owner shows the bank staements from that account for the dates that your statement shows the payments were made (and from an account that shows other payments from you).
Can NCAT actually order me to enter into a formal investigation with the banking ombudsman?
I wouldn’t think so. They are more likely to ask the owner to do as I suggested above.
Is there anywhere I can get proper legal advice from someone that actually knows this area of the law?
Try Redfern Legal Centre, who specialise in residential tenancies. Or either of our sponsors, Sachs Gerace Lawyers or StrataAnswers.
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It’s interesting that if the Building Commissioner’s plan to introduce a “Duty of Care” to strata owners’ corporations comes to fruition, they won’t be able to choose not to pay for common property repairs. To the barricades!
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As in most states, a by-law can only be created or altered in WA by a special resolution at a properly notified and convened general meeting.
To achieve a special resolution in WA strata schemes, it has to be agreed on at a general meeting by no fewer than 50 percent of the owners numerically who must also represent a total of no less than 50 per cent of the unit entitlements.
Furthermore, it must not be opposed by more than 25 per cent of owners and/or owners holding 25 percent of unit entitlements.
However, owners have 28 days from the meeting to gather enough dissenting votes and send a letter to that effect to overturn the by-law.
If your committee did not hold a general meeting for all owners, then the by-law is invalid. If they did hold a properly constituted general meeting, then the above conditions apply.
Frankly, unless you have 50 percent of owners turning up at meetings in person or by proxy, I can’t see how by-laws ever get passed. And I defiinitely can’t see how they would ever be altered if they were legitimate in the first place.
You’ll find the letter of the law HERE. Good luck.
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This does raise the question of the overcrowded flats that overseas students are conned into living in.
Are the overseas students even here? Are the con-artist landlords scrabbling to pay their rent (they don’t own the flats, of course).
And is cramming all those Korean and Chinese students (if they do turn up) into six, eight or 12 to a room, not just the conditions under which any virus would thrive and spread.
Protect our health – shut down the one-flat hostels.
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So what exactly is the problem, here? That they didn’t take a vote? Or that they’ve now taken a vote and supported you? Or something else?
Here’s the thing, in all likelihood the wall is common property and you can’t do work on common property or change the outward appearance of your lot without strata permission, probably in the form of a by-law. I know that seems heavy-handed, but it’s the law so you are going to be on the losing side if you fight it.
See if you can find a compromise – maybe paint the pipe the same colour as the wall – and everyone can go back into their boxes.
However, the chairman was a bit sneaky in not including you in the email corresponcence so you could always put a motion up for the next committee meeting that that chair be vacated and a new member be elected as chairperson.
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