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Thank you Sir Humphrey, for your reply, much appreciated – just in past few days the committee members have received more email(s) from this owner saying the below:-

“I can’t understand how the back steps are considered to be part of the courtyard when they originally formed part of the main building in the original building design. Without the steps the building would have been considered unfinished and quite clearly the original workmanship was substandard with insufficient footings. the steps were obviously not constructed correctly when the building was first built and i believe should not be the responsibility of the owner in this instance”

“I still cannot quite understand how the rear steps can be considered separate to the building because as per my previous comments, if the steps were not part of the original building then the property would have been considered incomplete.

I appreciate that the properties were constructed several years ago but the defect is the result of shoddy workmanship when first constructed and were this known at the time, would have been rejected.”

Seven other townhouses have these stairs in back courtyards at varying amount of steps & none have this issue.  We are thinking he believes, this is a boundary wall and yes its an outside wall of the t’house on the strata plan it shows no stairs at the back. (albeit the architects drawings do)  i can see this heading to a legal opinion as these emails from the owner are now five, in a very short period of time.  will ask the Strata Manager (again) to send the relevant Strata Act to this owner.  short of asking this owner to visualise that the back courtyard is another ‘room’ and everything in it is owner responsibility.  

[taps]

Morning, 

thank you Lady Penelope – i couldn’t find anything in the legislation either.  (we are in NSW – Sydney)

we are in very early process of having these locks counted in our property and in touch with a window lock company,  we require winders that are keyed at $75.00 each some property’s have them and some don’t –

when i asked him the question about annual checks and i quote what he said….

‘we provide digital certificates for each unit in a PDF format.  Annual inspections will be required at a flat rate of $60.00 per unit….

this response from the contractors is a bit annoying especially as there is no requirement by law to have them checked 

goodness this is disappointing from our point of view we haven’t engaged them yet and this company is effectively lying….

Kind regards
L

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Hi

I have a question – once the locks are put on by the Strata Plan and then the compliance certificate is issued, which govt body is in receipt of this certification and (IN NSW) does this compliance certificate have to updated every year?  which would obviously be a cost to the Strata.  (ie: like the fire alarms / sprinklers) some buildings.  

thank you 

[taps]

Good evening,

Our strata is all townhouses in NSW built in 1971 – therefore pre-1974.  All townhouses are two levels (bedrooms and main bathroom on second level) one of our owners is doing up their townhouse and as such as sent an email to the Strata Mgr saying they are wanting to put timber flooring on the bedroom level.  None of the other townhouses have timber or lino or hard flooring on this level.  while some of the townhouses have original timber flooring on the lounge / dining / kitchen level (ground level) and one or two have uncarpeted stairs.  the townhouse in question is offset and not on the same slab. 

With the new laws that have come in to play in November 2016 Whale’s paragraph above says that the decision to put timber flooring could now not be made by the EC and should go to a General meeting.   Has this law come into play? 

we are a bit reticent to give the go ahead as to the noise factor. 

and being pre 1974 the LPI states:-

• Any floor or wall separating the same parts of a strata lot are not common property the repair and maintenance is the responsibility of the respective lot owner.
• Any staircase within a lot connecting different levels of the same lot is the responsibility of the respective lot owner.

this owner had problems with the shower leaking into the second bedroom we believe it was the ‘tray’ in the shower not pipes in the wall… and our strata manager sent someone to fix and the strata paid for repairs to the shower floor, bedroom wall and whatever, the committee members were both away at the time and were not consulted.  we believe that being pre-1974 that rules above from LPI also apply to the floor of the main bathroom – and strata should not have paid for the repairs. 

we now have had another incident over Christmas of the same problem leaking shower into the second bedroom causing same damage. the owner has paid for the repairs – however, I believe the bills for repairs will be coming to strata to pay.  is this correct? 

it is our belief that all walls internal to the lot and the second floor including bathroom floors and showers are part of the lot and not strata responsibility.  are we correct?

regards

taps

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thank you Whale and PeterC – your comments and help is very much appreciated 🙂 

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Thank you PeterC.

i should have added that the wiring in the ceiling only services that townhouse. I looked at LPI for pre-1974 as we are 1971 building and the wording is somewhat confusing but it says something along the lines of 

if the wiring only services that lot then it’s the owners responsibility – and i have something in my head from years ago that this is still the case for this lot. Albeit this wiring is in the ceiling / roof cavity.   

I do see your point PeterC that if it was ‘code’ then and doesn’t need upgrading – but i think that the building inspector who did the report was being cautious and when it comes to what is standard now to what was there is always changes.  

If anyone has some input or can point me in the right direction for the rules?  much appreciated.  

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our strata is full of apathetic owners – who complain amongst themselves in their little groups then become aggressive at meetings (if they bother to turn-up). Last AGM 3 ppl out of 20 came.  we run fairly tight strata and because of the apathy there are only 2 committee members.  

recently one of outspoken long time residing owners came to my door complaining (at 8pm at night) – the issue was strata manager and owner related nothing to do with EC.

my parting line to this other owner in a very pleasant voice was:-

‘i am not your staff’ – ‘please do not come to my home and treat me as your staff you do not employ me and as such i deserve respect as an owner just as i respected you up till this point’

‘the OC employs the strata manager and pays them with strata fees every 3 months please remember that – as to your issue please speak to the Strata Mgr’  

[taps]

thank you everyone – it’s been most enlightening.

we did get incorrect advice from our Strata Mgr which is/was disappointing.

the owner has abused a committee member verbally and the SM + the owner has accused the EC in writing of, if the situation with the tap was one of the committee members the tap would be rectified – which is rubbish. 

the owner has been contacted to say the tap will be replaced provided the owner takes the responsibility of maintenance / problems or whatever in the future.  

all other courtyard taps are connected from within the property lots and not to common property infrastructure – thank goodness. 

if the previous EC which was run ‘in house’ (no strata mgr) and a dictator who ran the committee had not allowed this in the first place this wouldn’t have been an issue. 

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Morning,

thank you everyone – we as a committee have a decision to make now.  

the works to the common property tap have been done and the ‘extension’ has been removed – the owner was aware the plumber was coming and the SM requested the owner pay a nominal amount for the extension but flatly refused stating nothing wrong with their tap.  the owner has been aggressive wanting ‘their’ tap reinstated and is threatening legal action. 

do we put the tap back? (even though it’s illegal and request that the owner pays if anything goes wrong with said tap by way of a letter from the owner)

do we investigate how much it would cost for the OC to pay for a tap to this courtyard correctly installed within their lot? there is no way the owner would pay.  which would mean we are correcting a past Exec Comm mistake in allowing for the tap in the first place.  

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Hi whale – thank you for responding quickly.  

the common property tap and pipe to the ground had to be replaced it didn’t comply very old pipes and as the branch through the wall to the owners lot was attached above the stop valve for both taps.  (it’s about a metre of copper pipe and two taps which is why it was hundreds – the tap to the Lot would have been brass and about 30cm of copper pipe.

you are right – heaven knows who gave permission to 1) put a hole in the common wall into the lot from this tap 2) allow this lot to have the tap from the common supply when they could have had a pipe from under their floor pipes and up to form a tap as others in the complex do.   

we don’t have separately metered water to each lot.  

so Fair trading site is not right in saying

Lot airspace may include balconies and courtyards. Everything within the airspace must be maintained at the owner’s cost.

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