NSW: Can a co-owner nominate themselves for the strata committee?

Question: Can a co-owner self nominate for the Strata Committee?

Answer: Each lot can nominate one person as a candidate for the strata committee.

For context, section 31(1)(c) of the Strata Schemes Management Act states:

Persons who are eligible to be appointed or elected to strata committee

“The following persons are eligible for appointment or election to the strata committee of an owners corporation … an individual who is a co-owner of a lot or a company nominee of a corporation that is a co-owner of a lot in the strata scheme, if the person is nominated for election by an owner who is not a co-owner of the lot or by a co-owner of the lot who is not a candidate for election as a member.”

Subsections (4) and (5) then go on to state:

(4) Only one co-owner (including a company nominee of a co-owner) of the same lot may be a member of a strata committee at the same time, except as provided by subsection (5).

(5) A person who is an owner of more than one lot in the strata scheme may nominate one person for election as a member of the strata committee for each lot for which the person is an owner.

When all of this is put together, another way to explain it is that each lot can nominate one person as a candidate for the strata committee. For example if someone owns one lot, they can nominate one candidate for that lot. If someone owns two lots, they can nominate two candidates (one for each lot).

In other words, it is the lot that can nominate candidates not the people. For example, if there are three co-owners of one lot, they can’t nominate three people. They can only nominate one.

However, a co-owner of a lot could be nominated if:

1. The co-owners own more than one lot nominate them. For example, there three co-owners that own three lots – they can nominate one co-owner per lot, but if there are three co-owners who own two lots, they can only nominate two of the three co-owners.
2. The co-owners only own one lot and nominate one of the co-owners, and then the owner of another lot nominates the other co-owner.

This post appears in Strata News #542.

Tim Sara
Sara Strata
E: tim@sarastrata.com.au
P: 04 8500 7960