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That’s well-reasoned advice from makdap.
@Aramis Cool said:
The entire building is being scaffolded for structural repairs. As a result a retail space has closed …However, Mr Cool (or his insurer) would have to quantify the loss in an action under common law.
To close a business, not permanently or temporarily relocate it, and to do so while the building is still being scaffolded, introduces a big element of doubt that the OC’s structural work is the actual cause of the business closure and the landlord’s loss of rent.
Landlords knowingly take on the risk that their premises will be unoccupied between tenants. In the current business environment, retail shops are standing empty for many months (at least in my suburb).
How will Mr Cool distinguish between the rent he didn’t get because eager shopkeepers just didn’t occupy his premises and the rent he didn’t get because eager shopkeepers didn’t occupy his premises because of the scaffolding and associated works?
I know JT always says that strata is different, but I think there are two somewhat analogous situations that you should consider before you push a wheelbarrow full of banknotes into a lawyer’s office.
Note – Concrete cancer isn’t covered by the typical strata defined event insurance, and given the length of time it takes to develop, probably not by home warranty (defects) insurance either. So, there’s no insurer to claim against for relocation expenses.
1) What if you were living in your unit? Would you temporarily relocate or would you just put up with the inconvenience and noise for the duration? What if all residents had to move out? The OC would have to pay compensation to all owners. Basically, each owner would be paying their own relocation expenses, just funneled through the OC via a special levy. The only case you might have is if, as JT says, the inconvenience fell unequally upon owners.
2) What if you owned a torrens title house which you leased out but needed extensive repair? You’d probably do it between leases, losing rent money for the period. After having to organise and supervise the repairs yourself !
Why does everyone think that living in Strata is about always having someone else to blame or shove the cost onto?
As Forrest Gump said “Sh*t happens”.
As I say, sometimes even to tenants.
Your unit has not been declared uninhabitable, so if the tenants left before their lease expired, sue them.
If anyone has a moral right to compensation, it is probably the EC members who had to spend their valuable voluntary time to organise the rectification and will probably also supervise it to ensure all owners get value for money, while all the absentee landlords sit on their couches with their feet on the ottoman counting their rent money.
Judge Kangaroo (from the Kangaroo Court) decides in favour of JT.
If you are “entitled” to vote by virtue of being an Owner, but don’t attend the meeting nor send a proxy, your vote is not cast.
If you are “entitled” to vote by virtue of being an Owner, but you or your proxy abstains, your vote is not cast.
As the Act is worded in terms of “cast”, then I can’t see the alleged difference between 75% or more of UEs cast in favour = pass, and more than 25% of UEs cast against = fail.
All of the enticements suggested here have been tried in our block but failed.
Actually, our block (every block?) has shades of Dardanelle Towers.
Our resident “Old Guy” arrived at one AGM carrying a tray of whisky shots, which got the meeeting off to a good start.
In the middle of the discussion on the roof replacement, of which I have written previously, he says “Oh, wait a minute” and hobbles off upstairs to get something.
We idly chit-chatted while waiting patiently for whatever piece of important information he’d forgotten, and back he comes with a platter of freshly-cooked dim-sims.
We didn’t think that dim-sims would be a very durable roof covering, so we went with tiles.
Our block is a typical 1970’s block. You know, cream bricks and mission brown highlights.
One of the owners suggested we brighten up the foyer by painting it mauve or purple. I think he wanted to entice a few young pole-dancers up to his apartment.
The only “scary motion” which might work would be one that hits the hip-pocket nerve.
How about a motion to collect a special levy to commission a twice-life-size bronze statue of Saddam Hussein to be placed on the front lawn?
Maybe the Act should even make this a required motion like approving the Minutes and Financial Reports.
At least you would be able to tell just by driving by whether to buy into a block.
Duds,
I’m not sure from your question whether you’ve received the Notice of AGM or not.
If you haven’t, what Whale says is correct, you can write your own motions and send them to the secretary or SM to have included on the agenda.
If you have already received the Notice, that it’s too late for that.
You will have to content yourself with asking pertinent (or impertinent) questions on the financial reports at the AGM prior to the vote.
Financial Reports should include: Balance Sheet, Income & Expenditure, Non-Levy Income, Levy Position Report and (hopefully) Detailed Expenses (full transaction list).
Go through them thoroughly and ask questions about anything you don’t understand. You’re entitled to.
If one or more interested owners has done that, there’s probably no need for an auditor, unless you don’t get satisfactory answers. Auditors cost money, they usually only check a “sample” of transactions, and it’s not their job to check whether you got “value for money”.
I would prefer compulsory attendance and voting.
Voting of itself does not mean that Owners have heard the discussion and other Owners opinions.
But failing that, this is the scheme I submitted to the GAP Strata Review:
- $100 discount on the next levy payable for Owners who attend in person.
- No discount or surcharge for Owners who attend by nominee or proxy.
- $100 surcharge on the next levy payable for Owners who don’t attend in person, by nominee or by proxy.
This is good (IMHO) as it’s a one-time discount/surcharge on the next levy payable, instead of having to remember to apply a discount over the next 4 quarterly levies. Simple to administer.
Probably no need to take discount/surcharges into account in the budget.
A $200 difference between attending or not.
Damn, I knew I should have spelled it the American way! Jail.
I don’t think an on line electronic voting system would be good.
It would simply encourage even more Owners to skip the AGM.
Fewer Owners getting to meet their neighbours face-to-face, and actually talk to them.
Fewer absentee landlords taking their once-a-year look at the state of their property.
CTTT Goal?
We’re the 4th tier of government, aren’t we?
We should be allowed to set up our own justice system.
Trial by jury (of 12 owners) for By-Law breaches.
Subpoenas to attend AGMs.
Conscription to the green army for working bees.
And our own goals.
Totally agree, except 1 year before re-visit should be sufficient.
Predictions:
There’ll be dead plants hanging off the building’s exterior walls because they can’t afford to hire a cherry picker to remove the dead plants.
The black exterior walls will be stained with run-off, and projected to cost a fortune to re-paint all the louvre/slat arrangements.
There will have been umpteen complaints about noise from all the polished concrete, tiled and wooden floors.
And probably umpteen more water leaks.
The large-screen TV and other furnishings will have “disappeared” from the common property roof recreation area.
We should be told the electicity consumption for each apartment in this 8-star energy efficient building where there are thousands of lights, double ovens, triple sinks and more bathrooms than a chronic diahorrea sufferer could ever use.
I wonder what the levies will be?
Contendo ergo sum.
Sorry JT and Lannocks, but I totally disagree.
The overall amount of savings is far less important than who pays.
If you move into a new building with new carpet in the foyer and the carpet is expected to last 15 years, the rightful contributors to the cost of the eventual new carpet are those who walk on it during those 15 years.
Not the Owners who happen to be in residence at the 15-year mark, nor their heirs and successors.
Also, Mr Morton’s calculations could just as easily be applied to the purchase of a new car by a teenager. His spreadsheet would advise you to not to save up and then purchase it. His spreadsheet would look at the lost “opportunity cost” of paying tax on your savings, the inflation rate applicable to new cars, the cost of bus/train tickets to get to work in the meantime, and then advise you to get the car on hire purchase now.
Ain’t that what’s wrong with the economy?
The SM doesn’t usually copy the EC on the tax return, but all owners should see the tax agent’s fee and any tax paid in the annual accounts.
Whether you get interest depends on whether the SM holds your funds in their trust account or an individual trust account for your Strata Plan.
If it’s in their trust account, any interest is on-paid by law to … guess who … Fair Trading.
Our (large) SM used to do this until several years ago. The interest on-payment is actually at a “deemed” rate, so I guess when interest rates fell, and SMs were no longer making a “profit” (on top of management fees and undisclosed insurance commissions), maybe even making a loss, they changed all their clients to individual trust accounts. Or maybe they just decided that was the fair thing to do after all those years.
When the SP earns interest, it has to submit a tax return.
Our tax return cost $165. At the RBA cash rate of 2.75%, if your SP’s accumulated funds are over $8,571 then it’s better to have an individual trust account. [165/0.0275/0.7]
If your SP’s accumulated funds are not over $8,571 then you should probably review your 10-year Sinking Fund Plan.
You should probably also instruct your SM to open an individual trust account.
If they don’t want to, then get a new SM.
My understanding is that the 1974 changes to the Act, for new stratas, made balconies Common Property and moved the dividing line between Lot and Common Property from the middle of common walls to the inner surface. Therefore doors leading onto balconies were Common Property for new strata plans, but remained part of the Lot for existing Stratas.
My understanding is also that the reason it wasn’t changed for existing stratas was the constitutional issue as per “The Castle” – that for existing stratas it would be “acquiring (Lot) property without just compensation” if done by a law change.
Which makes me wonder how the NSW Strata Review intends to bring pre-1974 schemes into line with post-1974 schemes. I don’t think the constitution has changed. Perhaps if existing schemes passed a unanimous resolution?
I also think that your building would look a lot nicer if all windows and balcony doors were of the same style, so it’s a matter of convincing everyone that this plan is good for them.
Balcony-owners would get “just compensation” if the OC acquired their balcony, in the form of a free new door and future maintenance by the OC, but still have exclusive use.
Non-balcony-owners probably have more windows than balcony-owners and they would get the benefit of the project going ahead and the building still having a consistent appearance, which increases their property value.
But if you get one curmudgeon balcony-owner who doesn’t want to pay for their own balcony door, or one non-balcony-owner who doesn’t want to pay for balcony doors which are not Common Property, then yoiu might be up sh*t creek.
It bewilders me why Schemes which do not want pets without prior written approval do not simply strike out (via an amendment) Clause (2) of By-Law 16.
They’ve decided on Clause (1).
Why make a rod for their own back by leaving Clause (2) there?
Instead they should write a new Clause (2) which says that the CTTT is responsible for sending an officer around to remove any pet which does not comply with the conditions they set when ruling the OC’s decision was unreasonable.
ICW,
In my opinion, you have the right to access, but not necessarily the right to a remote control.
You need to find out what the scheme’s policy is on remote controls. Is it “one remote per garage”? If so, you will have to borrow your flatmate’s.
As there are visitor spaces, you need to find out the procedure for admitting visitors and letting them out. Perhaps you are supposed to go down to the gate and let them in and out (with your flatmate’s remote).
Or you could ask them to reconsider given that you only have a bike, and you would prefer to keep it in the garage, rather than bring it in through the main entry and take it up and down in their nice passenger lift.
Patricia & Lisa,
I don’t know about the types or thickness of underlay required.
Given that the upstairs owner was duped, she should be receptive to the information you’ve discovered.
She should lodge a complaint with the CTTT, the Consumer Claims division, not the Strata division or Tenancy division.
She should ask for an order for either (whichever she prefers):
1) Pull up the hardwood floor, replace underlay with compliant underlay, re-lay hardwood floor, all for free.
2) Pull up the hardwood floor, take it away, refund the money. Then she could lay carpet (with proper underlay).
I would recommend (2), as the By-Law about noise is subjective but takes precedence over numerical standards.
I don’t know about fines which might be imposed in addition.