#55423
TrulEConcerned
Flatchatter
Chat-starter

    Cosmo wrote

     

    Unless enough owners are willing to demand better the agent can do all those things even if they aren’t aren’t authorised or legal.  Everything maybe above board or it may be as  dodgy as hell.  My view is that this, like most issues regarding common property, is one that must be transparent to all owners.

    TrulE’s comment: in this case I don’t blame the agent. From what I have seen, he doesn’t wipe his nose without a pre-approval from the Sec/Tsr, who is the only active member on the SC. The other member, an elderly woman is on the SC in  name only. I 100% agree with you on the matter of transparency. This strata is a small one of 5 lots where I found the SC to be allergic to the notion of “transparency”. Contrast this to when I was Tsr of a 65 unit block where transparency was one of our guiding principles in action not in theory.

    I have experienced such issues often.  The only way to properly address this issue is to get enough other owners on side.  Approach them point out how much the owners are paying and how little they really know about what value they are getting for that money.  Put a resolution either at the AGM or otherwise.

    TrulE’s comment: And here is my problem. A strata of 5. Two elderly owners who are not as sharp as they were and are IMHO, intimidated by a loud Sec/Tsr. One of which is the Chair and the other one blindly follows the Sec. So Mr Secretary has 3 of the 5 votes without even trying. The fifth owner is not so involved and when she is, she sees 3 votes in Mr Secretary’s corner and 1 vote in my corner and like all folk who are too lazy to look too deeply into an issue, she votes with the 3.

    When I raised the issue of being denied a seat on the SC which was a problem for Mr Secretary who demanded he be elected Sec and Tsr, the fifth owner had nothing to say. Mr Secretary secured 4 votes. Not only did he rail against me being on the SC, but he railed against changing the SC from 2 members, which it has been for some years, with him (Sec/Tsr) and the Chair glued to their seats like barnacles on the hull of a ferry.

    In short: the strata is dysfunctional; opaque;  decisions made in secret; decisions are not communicated to OC until the AGM and even then not always; and when questions are asked (by me), I am threatened with an invoice for the “work” the agent allegedly will spend looking to answer me.