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@cate said:
why is it that people who buy strata properties and respect the bylaws are called bullies when they tell people about the bylaws in a complex and try to enforce them for the benefit of all residents.in our complex 7 out of 13 vistors bays are being permantly used by selfish owners for there extra cars and trucks yet i am called a bully .if you read your morgage contract you signed it states that you will obey the by laws in a strata situation .its about time more honest and decent people stood up to these people that do not give a shitI totally agree and their is something you can do about it (owner or tenant). Pick the worst offender (prefeaably on the EC) and start proceeding against them at CTTT (concillation and adjudication) as the cost is reasonable (about $150).
If it gets as far as adjudication you can also name the other offenders and if you have an understanding adjudicator each one of the offenders could be looking at a fine of up to $5,500 plus costs. Take plenty of date stamped photos to support your claim.
Problem is most people want the probelm solved but don’t want to get involved and that is what most of these offenders rely on.
The OC or EC have ZERO power to grant residents use of the visitor parking bays.
@considerate band fair said:
Hi All, what if.. alterations where already made to CP without consent and the property is sold.Cheers CBF
The sale of the property would not afect the fact that the seizure of the CP was illegal but now the onus for the cost of restoreing the CP passes to the OC instead of the offending owner who made the change).
To restore the CP to it’s origional state just requires a ordinary motion to be passed by the OC or EC (but OC pays).
If the new owner wants to resolve the situation by being granted Exclusive Use of the area he would need to get a bylaw passed granting him EU (75% in favour) and to pay an ammount to compensate the OC for looseing that CP.
My belief is the amount should be the market value of the land involved
@Stumped said:
f) Plus our building insurance is void due to a non-compliant use:
Surely you inform the Insurance company that x units are rented short term and please advise the strata of the increase in premium.
Then divide the extra ammonst the x units and tell them to pay or stop using short term rentals.
In QLD we already have the situation where SM, caretakers, Building managers cannot be on the committee or control proxies but the SM still presides over the AGM (with no voting powers) and manages the spending (budget approved at AGM and non budget items voted when they occur by EC or OC) throughout the year and it works.
Cappy in fact this spending is illegal as far as I can see if a motion approving this spending was not passed by the OC.
80D Legal action to be approved by general meeting
(1) An owners corporation or executive committee of an owners corporation must not seek legal advice or the provision of any other legal services, or initiate legal action, for which any payment may be required unless a resolution is passed at a general meeting of the owners corporation approving the seeking of the advice or services or the taking of that action.So unless a motion was passed authorizeing this spending the OC have no liability to pay. The EC do not have the power to initiate this spending
BUT The SM and whoever authorized this on the EC are liable for the costs incurred.
For a sale I would expect you would not only require unanimous vote but unanimous agreement from those who did not vote as well. The common property belongs to everyone and so every owner needs to agree to the sale.
If you have already spent $20,000 and the sale has not completed yet your costs are going to be higher than this. Also if you have spent $20,000 on advise why haven’t they told you what sort of approval is needed.
Seems to me you should cut your losses and abandon the sale because the buyer is never going to pay $15,000 plus costs $20,000 +.
The buyer should have agreed to pay these costs before any spending was done not the EC.
@Petard said:
The text of the scheme is very specific about the carspaces – they are for guests of residents. I have to respect that condition. So if I had a special or peculiar situation, I would need to seek permission from the executive to use one or both of those spaces for either one of our vehicles for a specific length of time.Yes but what does the Development Approval of the scheme say about the guest parking. If it specifies them as visitor parking then the EC or OC could not legally give you permission to park their at all.
Most councils require the developer to set aside a certain no of parking bays for visitors ONLY and the Strata cannot overide this.
That is the legal situation but if all residents agree to bend the rule the council aren’t going to intervene.
Section 65A of the act allows you to transfer common property to an owner using an exclusive use bylaw which only requires a 75% vote for approval. This would be a permenant transfer to the lot and it could only be resinded with that lots owners written approval.
I would expect the owner to pay all costs AND a payment to the Strata (admin fund say) to cover the value of the land transferred. This is one situation where the required bylaw should be written by a qualified Strata lawyer.
Not sure of the advantages of a lease / over a straight forward Exclusive use bylaw. The actual sale option seems to me to be a non starter as it would be too expensive and complicated, whereas the exclusive use and lease are designed for effectively this purpose.
@just get on with it said:
The Strata Managing Agency Agreement will determine who the SM is obliged to take instructions from. This will usually be the chairperson and/or secretary.
I agree the SMA determines this BUT whoever passes on the instructions they must have been approved by a properly organized vote of the EC or OC. The Sec cannot make arbitrary decisions (unless he has been approved to by an approved motion) themselves.
@Louie said:
Our Strata Managers (Sydney) told us at our AGM that one of our residents who fixes cars is covered by our insurance.If this guy is running a business and repairing cars for payment then unless your policy covers the strata for business use the whole policy could be invalid.
Say one of the cars he is working on catches fire which spreads to the building the strata insurance would be well within it’s rights to refuse the claim if they didn’t know about the business unless you had paid a premium based on running a car repair business.
I assume he is doing these repairs on common property which must be covered in oil stains which Strata is responsible for. This guy is exploiting your situation to his own advantage.
Jimmy I think we are all in agreement that it is a Strata Building insurance claim and the only difference is who pays the excess.
If it was common property I would agree that in NSW it is Strata reasponsibility to cover the excess but it is not common property the fixture belongs to the lot and so it is the owners problem to pick up the excess.
This is one of the confuseing things about strata insurance it cover both lot property and common property. If the item was damaged by a non insurable claim would you expect the Strata to pick up the bill for the total repair of a clearly lot item.
Whether the damage was caused by strata negligence or origional builder negligence opens up a whole new bag of worms which I am not even going to try and argue for or against.
problem is this is a grey area.
It’s def not a contents insurance claim because it’s a fixture and so if it’s an insurance claim it would be on the strata building insurance. As the Strata insurance has an excess ($250 maybe) this would be payable by the yourself (as the item is not common property).
You may have a claim against the Strata for negligence but that is a bit thin and unless they accept this you will have a uphill battle.
I belive the Strata insurance should pay for the repair to the fan / light except for the excess which is your cost.
Yes you are correct about the lack of details.
6 Notice of executive committee meetings
(1) An executive committee of a large strata scheme must give notice of its intention to hold a meeting at least 72 hours before the time fixed for the meeting:
(a) by giving written notice (which may be done by electronic means) to each owner and executive committee member, and
(b) if the owners corporation is required by the by-laws to maintain a notice board, by displaying the notice on the notice board.
(2) An executive committee of a strata scheme that is not a large strata scheme must give notice of its intention to hold a meeting at least 72 hours before the time fixed for the meeting:
(a) by displaying the notice on the notice board, or
(b) if the owners corporation is not required by the by-laws to maintain a notice board, by giving written notice (which may be done by electronic means) to each owner and executive committee member.
(3) The notice must specify when and where the meeting is to be held and contain a detailed agenda for the meeting.AND
15 Minute of certain resolutions to be included in executive committee’s minutes
The executive committee must cause to be included in its minutes a minute of all resolutions passed in accordance with this Schedule.If their is no details of the resoloution on the agenda you should inform the SM that the meeting was not leagal and so any decisions weren’t legal and so the Sec has no power to execute any decisions untill properly convenened motion is presented and approved.
So tell the SM not to approve any spending untill a properly organised meeting is held and that any futher spending that occurs without complying with the above you will take action at CTTT to have the money recovered from the individual who suposedly authorized it (the office bearers insurance will not cover them for intensional misuse of funds).
Just like a GM you cannot add motions at the actual meeting they have to be on the agenda sent around to all owners.
Granting exclusive use to a lot should not just involve passing the relevant motion it should include a financial contribution to the Strata from the lot owner who benefits as depending on the amount of land involved will increase the value of that lot significantly. Remember this transfer is permanent and cannot be reversed without the lot owner (and subsequent lot owner) agreement.
You need to work out the value of the land / sq m and then multiple that by the land being transferred. Take for example an extra parking space transferred from common property you could expect approx $10,000 depending on where the land is.
If it is common property then it is Strata reasponsibility to maintain which would be the best soloution in this case
BUT
If the stairs were installed by current resident then they are reasponsibile.
If they were installed by a previous owner and no bylaw registered the reasponsibility falls back on the strata once ownership changes.
If a motion was passed authorizeing the origional stairs to be installed by the owner at their cost but no bylaw registered then I would suspect that that the Strata would have to accept reasponsibility.