[Faraway girl]

Well everyone, the plot thickens at our Strata complex in a small coastal area. The latest is that the developer has now advised everyone that I don’t know what I am talking about by advising him ( as per the Ministers Office statement) that the Act prevents him from charging for unmetered water on top of our levy. He is already charging the two newest owners 1/5 of the water account.   The most recent event is that one of the newest owners ( 4 out of 14 apartments have now been sold) got stuck in the lift and had to ring her daughter to come and get her out. When she emailed the developer to report this he then emailed all owners and said that the two earliest owners ( us and our upstairs neighbour) had prevented him from having the lift serviced as when he wanted to put the annual levy up 20% we would not agree. He has now banned use of the lift and does not have any lights on in the common areas so we have all had to run out and buy torches so we can use the ( very dark) stairs at night. He is still insisting that he will have the AGM ratify his decision to charge the two earliest owners 1/3 of the water account so it will be back dated. 

Now he says he will be implementing a special levy so he can have the lift fixed. He has not ever identified a revenue budget and we do not have a budget at all except a draft that he sent us which said we had to pay over $3000 pa levy as well as water, lift maintenance, electricity , insurance and any other costs not included in budget ( he had no idea what they were). No estimate of these expenses and no revenue ( levies) as he is not charging himself for his 10 units even though they are 73% of lot entitlements. 

We may now go to mediation and failing that will need seek the appointment of a Strata Manager as whatever we do he just over rides us and tells the other owners that we do not know anything. 

[Faraway girl]

Will certainly keep everyone informed . We will likely end up at the Tribunal as this developer has never accepted when he is in the wrong. He is having a conflict with the Council regarding another development in town and with a  neighbour of  a different property. He never gives up. I’ll update you all as it happens. 

[Faraway girl]

Thank you Jimmy for following this up for us. Having Minister Dominello’s office respond provides us with the ability to show our initial owner/developer that he can’t keep moving costs onto us at will.

we were almost ready to give up and accept that he had such control over the 4 owners in the 14 Unit Strata Scheme so you have made our Christmas a very happy one.

best wishes Jimmy for a lovely Christmas and many thanks once again

[Faraway girl]

Further troubles with our developer who still owns 10 of the 14 units in our NSW Apartment block.  Now that 4 apartments have been sold he is in the process of transferring one of his currently owned Apartment to his wife so that they will be able to have 4 votes ( 1/3 of his own + 1 for her) and will then just need one of the new owners to vote with him to have a majority vote.  He has advised us that at the AGM which he intends to hold before Christmas he will ensure that a vote is taken to ratify his decision to backdate the water bills so that from the time the first person bought into this Strata Scheme, water bills were to be divided equally amongst the number of owners in the Scheme. This means our neighbour would be liable for half the water account for the quarter she moved in ( shared with him), and we and she would be liable for one third each of the next 5 quarterly bills from from the time we moved in ( shared with him). 

He has now changed the contracts of sale for the two newest owners ( they are different to the first two contracts of sale) so that new owners buying in  will pay for 270kl per year. 

My questions are these:

1. Can the AGM or any meeting for that matter, vote to backdate costs by a different division than the lot entitlements of owners?

2. Can some owners be charged a fee based on one system and others be charged by a different system?

3. Are we correct in stating that we pay our $2400 contribution in quarterly instalments so should not be being billed for other costs of the Strata Scheme. 

[Faraway girl]

Many thanks once again Jimmy. I will contact a Strata Law Firm asap however we are located in a small coastal town at least 6.5 hours from Sydney so I hope we do not need to attend at the Law Office.

your information is always appreciated and I take your point that you are giving a personal opinion not legal advice. 

Thank you so much for your prompt reply. 

[Faraway girl]

PS I forgot to mention that we are in NSW

[Faraway girl]

im back again with more issues with our original owner who owns 12 apartments in our 14 apartment block in NSW. Since we advised him to read the SSMA he has now developed some minutes which he has sent us on 26/6/16 supposedly from a ” meeting” held on 9 May 2016. These minutes claim that we objected to the payment of water accounts and ” demanded that xyz pay the account”  the meeting was not a properly convened meeting of the OC but was a discussion held with him in his apartment on that date to discuss his demand that we pay 1/3 of the very large water account. The minutes bear no resemblance to our discussion and he has sent them as a true and correct copy. 

We paid 7% of the last water account and he has now sent a further large account demanding we pay the balance to 1/3 of the last water account plus 1/3 of the current account . He has not given us a copy of the most recent water account.

as well the original owner is now claiming we agreed to pay a levy of $600 per quarter which is quite true plus 7% of insurance , also true. However after that he send us a demand that the levy is now $725 per quarter.

It is certainly not our preference to have a Strata Manager appointed by the adjudicator but it seems that we have no other choice. 

Can you help please 

[Faraway girl]

One thing that gives me the gripes is when the caretaker removes all the rubbish bins to the road for pickup at least 18 hours before the truck is to arrive. This means I have to take the last bag of my garbage out to the road in the darkness .  

[Faraway girl]

Just want to say many thanks and how much I appreciate your help. It is all working out now and we have heard no more for the past two weeks which is most unusual. Your replies (2) solved our problem Jimmie , thanks so much. 

[Faraway girl]

Many thanks Jimmie. We will immediately follow your advice. He is a difficult one to deal with. The next issue will now be the contributions as he has told us it is going from $600 per quarter to $ 725 per quarter with no evidence of the reason why. His ” budget” which we asked him to provide was a joke , no income, a set sum of $26000 for the caretaker, no information on caretaker work hours , requirements etc even though this caretaker does all the private cleaning for the developer’s units as well as his off site properties, no workers  comp insurance, no super, no leave cover etc and a number of open ended costs ( just the name with no estimate) that the levy does not cover such as water use, electricity for common property, lift maintenance , insurance and a few other things that he said we would also have to pay 14% of ( two units @ 7% each) . 

Oh for two more units to sell. I don’t think this guy knows about the SSMA so we will also advise him that he needs to act urgently and get a copy. 

Thanks for your help.

[Author]

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