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I purchased a few units and thus have a 66% unit holding of the small block. I’d like to know what that means with regards to strata. What does this let me do without having to vote on it? What can’t I do? Anything I should read in strata regulations?
Thanks
Benji
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This may disappoint you but in terms of complying with Strata Law, including with not being able to “do” certain things at your block without a consenting “vote” by your Owners Corporation, you derive absolutely NO advantage from owing 66% of the total lots in your Plan.
Your only advantage is that when votes are taken on matters included on the Agenda of General Meetings in accordance with Strata Law, if all Owners are present either personally or by proxy then you can exercise 66% of the possible votes and may thereby control what matters pass and which fail.
Be careful with exercising your controlling votes though, as any other Owners who believe that your votes at a General Meeting have been used in a way that unfairly disadvantages them can seek Orders in the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal to have such decisions overturned.
THIS publication by the NSW Office of Fair Trading gives an excellent overview of how NSW Strata Law operates.
Yes, “do” was probably the wrong word to use, and I misinterpreted your intent to some degree; sorry.
You probably contribute at least 60% of your Plan’s levies and that certainly enables, and maybe entitles you, to responsibly influence how the entirety of those funds is spent.
Using your example of maintenance funds expenditures, you can certainly put an appropriately worded Motion on the Agenda of your Annual General Meeting that directs that expenditure towards those activities that you regard as a priority, and use your majority vote to pass that Motion.
My only advice is that you use your majority vote responsibly, and that ideally, you engage with the other Owners, because as I said before, any of those Owners who regard what you do as self-serving (e.g. just benefiting you/your lots) and/or as disadvantaging them can make things difficult; even if their concerns are groundless.
As a very cynical exercise, you can set the size of the EC at your AGM and then decide who is and isn’t on it.
You can also demand that every contentious decision at a general meeting be decided by a poll vote (based on unit entitlements).
But be prepared to be the most hated person in the building if you throw your weight around in this way.
But you can’t alter common property without the support of another 10 percent of owners (giving you 75 percent) and you must have a properly constituted AGM every year at which certain items must be on the agenda.
But as far as running the EC is concerned, it depends how unpopular you are prepared to make yourself. It’s one person, one vote on the EC – unit entitlements don’t count – and you would have to hold a general meeting to overturn any decisions that you didn’t like.
As Whale says, use your power responsibly because there are ways too many poor decisions could come back to bite you on the bum. Not least among them is that another owner could successfully apply for the statutory appointment of a strata manager at which point you would find you had exactly the same power as other owners – ZERO.
The opinions offered in these Forum posts and replies are not intended to be taken as legal advice. Readers with serious issues should consult experienced strata lawyers.
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