› Flat Chat Strata Forum › Hard floors and tough decisions › Spalling causes damage to wooden flooring with under heating – who pays? › Current Page
Floyd – the NSW Strata Schemes Management Act (SCMA) is not that specific, but as a matter of principle the Owners Corporation (O/C) is responsible for the maintenance and repair of its common property, and owners are responsible for that activity within their lots.
However in the circumstances that you describe, there are a couple of complications (at least) including whether or not the lot owner concerned sought the prior consent of the Executive Committee (E/C) to replace the “as constructed” floor coverings with a wooden floor, and if so, whether the O/C then resolved to put a special by-law in place to among other things state who is responsible for the ongoing maintenance and repair of that type of flooring, and to what extent the current degree of water damage to the owner’s flooring arose from their reluctance to “work with” the O/C to address the spalling problem.
On the assumption that you’re in NSW, that there was no prior consent, and that there’s no applicable by-law or special by-law in place, then the usual interpretation of the SCMA is that the O/C must do whatever is necessary to repair the spalling (common property), and the convention is that it must also rectify any damage that’s consequentially and unavoidably caused to the lot owner’s property.
If as your post suggests the lot owner’s prevarication has worsened the damage to their flooring, then to both adopt a consistent approach (to that taken with other owners) and to limit expense to the O/C consequential to its necessary repairs, its E/C should in my opinion resolve to require the lot owner to at their cost provide clear access for the O/C’s contractors to attend to the spalling repairs on its common property by removing all necessary section/s of their wooden flooring.
The O/C could leave the subsequent replacement of those sections of wooden flooring to the lot owner’s discretion, although others may suggest that if the entirety of that flooring was originally installed without the prior written consent of the E/C, then the lot owner could be required to restore the floor covering to the type that existed at the time of the building’s completion, but in my opinion that would be excessive given that other owners have, presumably with the E/C’s knowledge, installed similar flooring.
- As an aside, problems arising from owners’ installation of wooden or laminated flooring post completion of buildings are such that this Forum has a topic dedicated to discussing those, and the upcoming NSW Legislation will specifically remove such works from Executive Committees’ delegations, and instead require approval only by the O/C at a General Meeting.