Tenants using visitor car spaces

xpose – I assume that by your use of the term “strata” you mean your Plan’s Strata Manager, who works for you and the other Owners of Lots in your Plan!

As Strata Managers take their instructions from the Executive Committee it seems to me that your Strata Manager is either doing things autonomously (?) or there’s someone else on your Committee from whom they’re taking those instructions (?).

You and your Committee need to get that under control in the first instance!

With regard to the visitors’ parking spaces, the differences on the Plans between what’s been provided by the Strata Manager and what you’ve obtained from Council  may be because the Strata Manager’s been making amendments to match the unauthorised changes that they’ve made on the ground.

I’d be inclined to accept Council’s version, but I’d recommend you contact NSW Land & Property Information (L&PI), formally the Land Titles Office, and purchase a copy of the Registered Strata Plan for verification.

Whilst your Owners Corporation could, by a specially resolution at a General Meeting, alter its Common Property by sub-dividing a visitors’ carspace, a physical change of that type should have been noted on the Registered Strata Plan; so check that.

As for the use of the visitors’ carspaces, depending upon the date that your Strata Plan was Registered, you’ll  be bound by one of two Model By-Laws of relevance and contained in Schedules to the NSW Strata Schemes Management Act (1996) or the Regulation (2010), both of which typically state:

An owner or occupier of a lot must not park or stand any motor or other vehicle on common property except with the written approval of the owners corporation.

So if owners and occupiers (tenants) of a lot cannot park on the common property, of which visitors’ carspaces are part, then it stands to reason that the habitual use of one of those by a tenant is a breach of By-Laws and of Council’s Development Approval which requires an O/C to keep all designated visitors’ carspaces available for that purpose.

Dave B’s post #2 sets out how your O/C can manage this, and your Strata Manager will be aware of how the issue of a formal Notice to Comply (with a By-Law) can be authorised; generally following a resolution of the E/C or under delegated authority to the Strata Manager under their Agreement with the O/C – check which applies.

Non-compliance leads to the imposing of a $550 fine by the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal (NCAT), and again your Strata Manager will know how to escalate the matter to that level once they’ve been instructed by your E/C to do so.

Now for the obstructing of access to your property. There’s another Model By-Law stating:

An owner or occupier of a lot must not obstruct lawful use of common property by any person.

So as you need to use the Common Property (divided carspace) to access your property, and you cannot, then what the Strata Manager has done with or without instruction from their Client (the E/C on behalf of the O/C) has resulted in a breach of that By-Law by whoever then parks there.

What can be done?

1) Have the Notice to Comply issued to the habitual parker.

2) Once you and/or the E/C has ascertained the correct layout of the Common Property as shown on the Registered Strata Plan, then instruct your Plan’s Strata Manager to ensure that all physical characteristics on-the-ground mirrors that.

There are a few other “complications” that I’ve omitted, such as whether your O/C needed to formally adopt the Model By-Laws or if it was automatically covered by them by its Registration date, but the scenarios that I’ve given are those most likely applicable and your L&PI inquiries will clarify and resolve them.