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Hi Struggler
You’re right. The bylaw is about the resident’s conduct (ie – parking a car) and it doesn’t matter who owns the car.
As you can imagine many people drive cars that are not registered to or owned by them – such as partners, parents, friends or employers cars.
Francesco Andreone
Sadly, there's no easy way here.
You can't change strata unit entitlements in NSW other than by getting a CTTT order under section 183. And, that kind of application can only be made on limited grounds and needs a detailed (means expensive) valuation of all lots in the strata building to support it too.
Having said that, if you've got a good valuation and you can show the developer didn't rely on a valuation when the unit entitlements were set, you might also be able to get a costs order against the developer and repayment of any overpaid levies for the last 6 years.
So if it's worth doing, there's some upsides.
Francesco Andreone
Jimmy
The Griffith University Conference Forum about management rights in strata and community title building is getting a lot of action and worth a look (and comment) by anyone interested in the topic.
So, I encourage all Flatchat followers to go to HERE.
Francesco Andreone
Fortunately since most monkeys don't own apartments (and if they did couldn't sign the nomination) not many of their uncles are getting onto strata committees.
But, there are many committee members who either do nothing to assist the running of the strata corporation or (worse still) actually cause harm to the building and owners' interests.
There's not easy answer … since it's only through education to increase owner knowledge, understanding and appreciation of what it means to be in a strata scheme that things will improve. And, since being on a committee is largely a volunteer role with very few volunteers out there, anyone who wants to be on a strata committee will usually get on.
Some interesting developments and stories around the world include –
- Florida where committee members must now be certified to have basic knowledge of thier strata corporations by doing an approved course.
- The very rare cases where committee members have been sued for negligent and poor decisions.
- Queensland where there is a code of conduct for committee members.
- Suggestions that there should be professional committee members who act like independent directors in public companies – with good knowledge of strata operations and no self interest.
- And the bizzare case in the USA where an owner's dog was actually elected chairperson of the community association through owner apathy.
So, maybe it's the fault of the system, owner apathy and committee laziness?
After all if you pay peanuts, you always get monkeys.
Francesco Andreone …
Jimmy
You must be making the assumption that the CTTT provides justice to strata stakeholders … rather than simply a mechanism by which disputes are moved from start to fininsh in the most time effective way.
Unfortunately, the CTTT and the strata dispute systems suffers the following problems.
1. Strata disputes are inherently complex because the rules are very detailed, each strata building is unique, each dispute is peculiar to the parties involved, small things can make a big difference and very few people really understand the details.
2. The OFT and CTTT dispute resolution system is inherently compromised by trying to determine complex disputes quickly, cheaply and by formalised processes.
3. Encouraging (or forcing) parties to be unrepresented by not allowing costs orders in most cases leaves participants at a serious disadvantage to each other and the Tribunal members.
4. Tribunal members are both overly legalistic and personal in their handling of strata disputes. Making them both Solomon and Judge Roy Bean (the hanging judge).
5. Since appeals from the CTTT have gone to the District Court which does not publish its judgements (rather than the NSW Supreme Court) CTTT decisions are not subject to oublic scrutiny.
6. The lack of understanding of legal processes, strata laws and evidentiary burdens means that none of the people involved in strata disputes often have anything like the material they need to establish their cases.
7. A bureaucratic mentality that values processing disputes as much (of more) than solving them.
Unfortunately, in my experience, having the CTTT resolve strata disputes left everyone unhappy.
Your example is just one of many situations where the right outcome could easily have been achieved but, instead, nothing is resolved and the people involved are less sure about what to do next time they have a problem.
These days, you need to know how to work the CTTT system as well as the usual facts, law and techniques to win strata disputes.
Francesco Andreone …