This article discusses strata private lot maintenance responsibility and clarifies that strata cannot use levy funds for repairs to private property.
Question: Our strata is organising the repainting of fascias and gutters on our units. The units are all on private property. Can strata request the area be prepared by owners in readiness for painting?
Our strata is organising to repaint gutters and wood trims/fascias for our brick units. The units are all on ‘private’ property, not common property.
Can Strata demand owners carry out maintenance on these areas prior to painting? This maintenance is all on the privately owned units on private property. The items demanded to be ‘maintained’ do not endanger neighbours or common property.
Answer: The Strata Company may only expend levy contributions paid by lot owners for the management of common property – not private property.
The Strata Company has a general duty to control and manage the common property for the benefit of all of the owners of lots, and must keep in good and serviceable repair, properly maintain and, if necessary, renew and replace the common property.
In addition, the Strata Company must establish a fund for administrative expenses that is sufficient in the opinion of the Strata Company for the control and management of the common property, for the payment of any premiums of insurance and the discharge of any other obligation of the Strata Company.
Therefore, the Strata Company may only expend levy contributions paid by lot owners for the management of common property – not private property.
The building or structure within the lot for a survey-strata plan is the responsibility of the lot owner to maintain. The boundaries of the lot for a strata plan are in the form of a notation on the plan (but not in all instances). Your Strata Manager should be able to provide you with the definitive boundaries of part lot ownership and responsibility to maintain from the plan and the bylaws of the scheme.
It can be a challenge for the Council of the Strata Company to fulfil their obligations under the Strata Titles Act when all lot owners don’t share the responsibility of maintaining all of the structures, and by doing so, maintain a uniform quality and appearance of the scheme.
For example, you may have a single tier row of adjoining buildings, and each of them has 3AB boundaries, being the external surfaces. The lot owner at the bottom of the row of buildings adequately maintains his roof and gutters, but the remainder do not. This has resulted in water ingress into the lot at the bottom – of which the Strata Company insurance policy is required to pay for the internal resultant water damage.
The owner of a lot must ‘maintain and repair the lot, and keep it in a state of good condition, reasonable wear and tear’. If the lot owner fails to do so, the Council of the Strata Company may breach the lot owner for failing to comply with the scheme bylaws. Or, the State Administrative Tribunal may make a determination that the lot owner must take certain action to maintain their lot.
The Council of the Strata Company should not be expending scheme funds to engage specialist contractors to assess anything other than common property.
And so, where the Strata Company has limited jurisdiction over lot owners private property within the parcel, it is paramount to build a rapport between all owners so they may collaborate and achieve positive outcomes for the benefit of all. If a strong rapport does exist between all owners, an agreement could be reached by all owners to collectively arrange the work and contribute their portion of the costs through a single entity. However, the strata company could not force such an agreement for maintenance to individual lots, and certainly can’t expend funds for the completion of the works in the first instance.
This post appears in Strata News #618.
ESM Strata
E: info@esmstrata.com.au
P: 08 9362 1166
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