The big news this week is … innkeepers will no longer be responsible for their guests horses and saddlery.
Seriously, some government reforms and removals of outdated laws have taken the pressure off innkeepers … phew … with the excision of that particular law.
However, the really big news is that under a red tape reforms package announced this week, tenants will be able to roll their rental bonds over from one tenancy to the next.
That way they won’t get stuck between the financial rock and a hard place when they are fixing up one tenancy before they’ve got the bond back from the previous one.
“The new rental bond rollover system is a big win for tenants throughout NSW and we’re expecting to see it potentially benefit up to 300,000 new tenancies annually,” Mr Kean said.
“Having to fork out thousands of dollars for a new bond while waiting for the other to be released causes significant financial stress for families.
“With these changes, renting families will only have to lodge one bond, which can be transferred from one rental property to another.”
Hmmm. Tha’s all very well but I can hear the Tenants Union saying something along the lines of “if you really want to reduce the stress on families, how about getting rid of no-grounds terminations that allow landlords to end leases when, for instance, they can see an opportunity to make more by jacking up the rent between tenancies.”
We don’t get too many tenants on Flat Chat, which is a shame. But we do have lots of owners with, it seems, an endless variety of curious questions.
For instance, what do you do about a wealthy owner who drags you off to NCAT every time he doesn’t get his way, and hires fancy lawyers to bamboozle the Tribunal Members (which, to be fair, isn’t that hard)? That’s HERE.
The body corporate decided to install speedbumps on a driveway – which is good. But they installed the wrong kind in the wrong place and now nobody will talk to the resident who is losing sleep (literally) thanks to the thumping and crunching of cars. Talk about speed bumps in democracy! That’s HERE.
What happens to the strata committee when a strata manager is appointed by NCAT. Does the committee still have a role? That’s HERE.
This strata scheme once had 30 security cameras feeding images into every home. Then it was reduced to nine and finally, when a new owner joined the strata committee, to one, covering the entry intercom. But can the committee even do that without a by-law? That’s HERE.
A new air-con installation will need to cut through common property at some point. So, does that mean you need a special resolution by-law (contrary to what the strata Act says)? That’s HERE.
There’s something new in the Flat Chat Forum every day – so don’t forget to drop in again.