do tenants have a right to access visitor parking?

ICW,

In my opinion, you have the right to access, but not necessarily the right to a remote control.

You need to find out what the scheme’s policy is on remote controls. Is it “one remote per garage”? If so, you will have to borrow your flatmate’s.

As there are visitor spaces, you need to find out the procedure for admitting visitors and letting them out. Perhaps you are supposed to go down to the gate and let them in and out (with your flatmate’s remote).

Or you could ask them to reconsider given that you only have a bike, and you would prefer to keep it in the garage, rather than bring it in through the main entry and take it up and down in their nice passenger lift.

ICW’s rights are governed by her lease/tenancy agreement.  For a start, I am assuming that ICW is a party to the lease with the landlord.  If the lease is only with her housemate, then different considerations apply.

The lease would include the right to use the garage, in that the apartment has been rented out with the garage included.  If ICW can’t access the garage because he/she doesn’t have a remote control, then he/she needs to demand that a remote control be provided by the landlord so they can have access to the garage.

This is presuming that the lease doesn’t provide that the tenants have the right to use the garage and they will be provided with one remote control for that purpose.

A few years ago I helped a friend of mine who had a similar problem and drafted a letter for her to the letting agent setting out that without being given means of access to the garage, the landlord was in breach of the lease.  The key in that case was provided very quickly.

The same consideration applies to the gate.  If your lease gives you certain rights or implies them, then not being provided with the code for the gate is a breach of the lease, in that you are not able to do something you are paying for under the tenancy agreement.

In the case of the visitors’ parking spaces, that depends on a number of factors including whether it is set out or implied in the lease, and whether the apartment that you occupy comes with the right to use those spaces.  If it does, then it would be reasonable to say that you do have the right to use a space because those rights go with the apartment.  The same would apply if you rented an apartment in a building that had a gym, and you needed a key to get into the gym – the landlord should supply that key.

Your avenue is with the landlord and their agent (not the strata), because that is who you have the agreement with.  You need to assert the rights in that agreement and if they don’t provide them, tell them that they are in breach of the terms of the contract.

A condition of your Tenancy Agreement requires the Landlord to give each Tenant a copy of the entry key and any other opening device / information (e.g. an access code) “for the premises and any common property that they’re entitled to access”.

Note that the wording is ” give” not charge for, other than for a security deposit that must be refunded when you hand back the keys/devices, that it’s “entitled to access” not just “reasonable access”, and that the provision applies to each Tenant named on the Agreement (Lease).

So if you genuinely need another remote, then you should ask your Property Manager to include your housemate on the Agreement (unless that’s been done already), and then ask him/her to approach your Landlord about arranging that additional remote with his Strata Manager / Owners Corporation as the Agreement and the NSW Residential Tenancies Act (RTA) requires.

BTW the provisions of Sect 70 (2) the RTA apply as they’re superior (at law) to any Special By-Law that the Owners Corporation of your Building may have concerning security access or similar matters.

Now that you’re almost “IN”, I just hope that you do as you stated in your first post, by legitimately accessing the visitor carspaces only for your short term visitors, and by using the gate to get your bicycle in and out of the garage; if you don’t, then RTA or not, the Owners Corporation can (and should) come down on you like the proverbial ton of bricks.