$2m special levy between 24 units

This looks very suspicious. Three committee members sell out just before  a special levy of on average $80,000 per unit is required.

First, you need to get legal advice from a specialised strata lawyer.  Our sponsors Bannermans and Sachs Gerace  (ads on the Forum page) are both excellent.

Then you need to find out what has triggered this requirement for an upgrade. There is no requirement to upgrade balconies to current standards unless something else in the block has needed planning approval.  (See comments below)

Also, there must be cheaper alternatives available. Many schemes simply raise the effective height of the balcony by adding a toughened glass screen  to the top of the existing structure.  That would not require tiling or the $2 million of work.

You need to collect enough signatures to call another meeting to discuss this (25 per cent of owners) and agree on another plan. The owners corp (all owners) can overturn its previous decisions at a subsequent general meeting.

Notwithstanding cheaper alternatives, you should be looking at a strata loan to spread the financial pain over several years.

Also, subject to legal advice, you probably need to start action at Fair Trading to get interim orders to stop this process before it goes too far.

And you might want to try to find out how much the recent committee members who sold out knew about this, and whether or not they told prospective purchasers.

There’s a lot to do but the first thing would be to contact all the other owners and tell them they are betr options available, and call a specialised strata lawyer as soon as possible.

Alternatively, you could approach another of our sponsors, Strata Answers, who will provide expert advice (at a modest cost).

• This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by .

chesswood wrote:

How could a strata loan help you?

Because you pay it off over a longer period, obviously, on a reducing balance over a 10-year period. Some people simply can’t lay their hands on a lazy $80-100k in one hit.  The problem is that the law doesn’t allow the strata owners to choose – it’s either all special levy or all loan. That’s what really sucks.  People who can afford it should be allowed to pay their share up front, the others could pay off a smaller loan – if the law allowed it.

Or do you think people should be forced to sell their homes if they can’t afford a special levy?

It is hard to imagine that the Committee would have put forward a motion for a Special Levy costing each unit owner approx $80,000 and expected owners to pay up within a couple of months….Any owners corporation trying to raise that sort of money would have to seriously consider taking out a loan for at least part of it  – repayable, as Jimmy notes above, over the next 10 years by today’s owners who will get the benefit of the new balconies.

Secondly when $’s have to be raised on this scale the owners are usually given at least 6 months notice and then maybe a couple of instalments to pay it in. Of course some owners may still just not have the capacity to pay unless they can draw down on their mortgages etc. and the OC could well expect some owners to default under such an ill considered plan, meaning more argument and more legal costs and the money not being there when needed.

So the first thing to do is to check the facts…

What does the AGM Motion actually say in the Minutes of Meeting?

Were owners sent copies of the Engineer’s report / scope / recommendations with the Notice of Meeting ?

If not, you need to ask  the strata manager for a copy and if they won’t give it to you, arrange to go round to their office and find it.

I hope this helps

John Hutchinson

Paddy37 wrote:

Re Jimmy-T writing that the current BCA requirements on balustrades does not apply unless . . . . . .
Surely this has been overturned by the Doherty case decided by the Appeals Panel in September, 2021?

You’re right, although the NCAT Appeals Board decisions are not “settled law” and can be overturned by a higher court (as in the Coopper pets case).

Nevertheless, judging by this article and this one, Tribunals are more likely than not to insist on common property being brought up to scratch.

NB: To avoid confusion, I have corrected this in my earlier post.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by .