Sydney Graffiti Sampler

For all those graffiti fans here's some examples of what you'll see on the streets of Sydney (my home town).


Enjoy!

Francesco ...

A Strata Owners Charter

In the last few days a few people have raised the idea of a charter or code of conduct for strata owners and residents to address some of the more difficult challenges of strata living.


For instance the blog livinginstrata.com.au posted about the top 5 responsibilities of owning strata property suggesting that strata owners need to be good strata citizens.  And, the NSW Minister for Fair Trading, The Hon. Anthony Roberts, said at a luncheon hosted by SCA NSW on 20 June 2012 about the latest plans for strata law reforms that not every problem can be solved by laws and that even though it may be based on goodwill asking strata owners to behave to a higher standard was a worthwhile exercise.


It's a nice idea and it may even work.  After all catholicism has successfully promoted 10 commandments for a long time.


But, if there was a Strata Owners Charter what would it focus on and say?   Would it focus on compromise, common interests, personal respectfulness, financial responsibility and/or neighbourliness?  Or, maybe, something else entirely?


What do you think?  I fear that a Strata Owners Charter could be like the camel designed by a committee and not that useful to anyone.


Francesco ...




  

No Thanks; I'll Use my Own Water

Almost everyone gets their water from the same place ... usually the public water utility.  It's been that way forever and there aren't many options.  


Until now!

A new real estate development by Frasers at Sydney Central changes things a bit by setting up the first private water supply services contract in Sydney with the Water Factory Company.  You can read more about it in this SMH article.

I like the choice things bring to property developers and strata owners.  It also follows the pattern we've seen with telecommunications and electricity supply in the last 10 years and the way other utility and other services might be supplied to strata owners in the future.

What will be interesting is how the suppliers, regulators and consumers balance the recovery of infrastructure costs by the contract supplier, competitive supply charges, contestability for supply and consumer choice about supplier.  The correct answer should be based on value but it might end up being based on political expediency.


Either way you can expect more privately supplied water, electricity and other services in strata buildings from now on.


Francesco ... 

Minimalist Urban Graffiti

I haven't blogged about graffiti for a while so sorry to its fans.  It's back!


This time from the English artist Mobstr who might be the thinking persons street artist due to his pithy minimalist work throughout the UK.  Rather than amuse with vibrant colour and imagery, he bemuses us with the message and placement.


Enjoy!  And, thanks Laughing Squid.

Francesco ...

Value Strata Spending

Strata owners continuously pay money to their strata corporations as quarterly or monthly strata levies.


In Australia that ranges from a low of about $1,000 per year to more than $10,000 for upmarket apartments.  The average is somewhere around $3,000 per year per owner (my guesstimate since there's no available data).  Which means they're paying 0.8% of the value of their property (assuming an average strata property value of $375,000) every year.


So, it's no surprise that strata owners are always interested in keeping strata levies low and resist increases.  You can't blame them.


But it occurs to me that trying to stop levies rising is only one side of the levy equation and that managing strata expenditure better can achieve equal or better results. 


SSKB (one of the leading Queensland strata managers) published this pie chart of what strata corporations spend money on (source http://stratablogger.com.au/2012/06/levies-spent/) and it reveals many areas where significant amounts are spent by strata corporations year after year.  


I'm not suggesting that strata corporations can spend less (although in isolated cases that's distinctly possible), but that they can get better value for what they already spend and, therefore, save money in the medium and long term.


This is especially so in relation to capital works, repairs, maintenance and utilities which each represent 10% or more of strata corporation expenditure and involve specialist knowledge and expertise.  There are many good and bad examples of strata corporations spending more than is necessary and/or getting inferior outcomes on all these issues due to poor information, poor decision making and poor implementation.


Ultimately, its about getting value for the strata dollars being spent.


I predict that Strata Value Spending will become the key feature of good strata management and operation when everyone finally realises that compliance with existing laws is not good enough anymore and not what strata owners care about.


So, think about how you can give strata owners Strata Value Spending to get ahead of the strata curve and be part of its future.

Francesco ...

100,000 Strata Blog Page Views

I'm pleased (and a little surprised) to announce that yesterday, the 100,000th person looked at my blog since it began in 2010.


That's a lot of people.  


Enough to fill more than 50,000 apartments or over 6,500 average Australian strata buildings.  It's twenty times the total number of Australian strata managers and people working in strata businesses.  And, it's more than the total number of lawyers in Australia.


So, I guess that a lot of people are interested in strata title issues and that my simple blog provides them with useful (and hopefully interesting) information.


So, thanks for visiting the blog.  Please keep doing so and tell your friends and colleagues.


Francesco ...

NSW Fixes the Strata Termination Dilemma

Last year I asked the question Do We Need a Strata Terminator ? arguing that maybe the debate about reducing the level of owner approval to end strata corporations would be overcome if we had a strata terminator who could simply make the decision unilaterally.


Well, that's exactly what the NSW Government is about to do.


It's creating a quango called Urbangrowth NSW that will have powers to compulsorily buy private property to include in large development sites.  In the context of strata that means the power to take over the building and effectively terminate it (with to without strata owner approval).  


It effectively ends the strata debate on forcing owner agreement to terminate strata corporations for redevelopment purposes and simultaneously avoids the problem of deciding owner compensation when that happens by substituting a fair market value formula when owners can't agree.

And if you don't think that possible, the Planning Minister, Brad Hazzard, said the new body would be ''Landcom on steroids''.

You can read more about the announcement in this Sydney Morning Herald article and the Australian Financial Review article.



The cynical side of me thinks that this also assists developers (and not strata owners) since it means that they don't have to pay a premium to resistant strata owners to amalgamate development sites.


Francesco ...

Strata Truth is Stranger than Fiction

Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction (even in strata).

Imagine a group of criminals organising real estate agents, dummy owners, contractors, managers, lawyers, security staff and more to take control of strata corporations, raise money from owners, sign large contracts, run sham legal cases and sell out before too many people notice - and along the way make millions of dollars.

Sounds unlikely.  Well, it happened in Las Vegas over the last few years.  


The 14 people who recently pleaded guilty revealed how between 2003 and 2009 they undertook a large scale strata fraud operation doing things like -

• bribing managers and security staff to rig strata corporation elections
• vote swapping on ballots for important decisions
• appointing disbarred lawyers as strata managers
• suing strata corporations for defamation when accused of corrupt behaviour
• instructing 'friendly' lawyers to act for the strata corporations and settle cases in their favour
• appointing 'related' construction companies to do major works at inflated prices
• taking defect settlement payment money for themselves

Eventually an FBI investigation led to multiple charges.  And, after the scheme was revealed and charges laid one of the key players, lawyer Nancy Quorn, was found dead in her bathtub.


Read more about this amazing strata tales in this article from the Las Vegas Review-Journal.


Francesco ...

No Fault Strata Owner Apathy

If you're reading this you're a minority of the people in Strataland - those who are interested in knowing more, doing better and participating in their strata ownership, work and business.  So, congratulations!

But what about the silent strata minority?

We always hear complaints about strata owner apathy. It's endemic and we can't understand why so many owners take so little interest. For a long time that led us to simply feel confused and dissappointed. But, nowadays sentiments are changing and people are starting to get angry at apathetic owners, blame them for strata problems and feel that they deserve the (bad) outcomes that low engagement often causes. 

That's a shame and we need to resist the natural temptations to further alienate non participating strata owners.

In this short article by Matthew Peake of Thiinkstrata called Don't Confuse Lack of Participation with a Lack of Caring, he defends missing strata owners; arguing that not participating doesn't mean they don't care.  I'm sure he's right.  


In fact, I'd argue that we should reverse our focus on this issue to find out why strata owners don't participate and look at what we do and don't do that causes this. 


After all, the current situation is the result of what we've done in the past and maybe we should be doing something different? Like some of these ideas.

• Offering more options for strata owner participation rather than traditional (and boring) meetings
• Providing more (and more interesting) information for strata owners
• More visibly connecting strata owners' actions (or omissions) to their strata outcomes (good and bad)
• Demonstrating options and outcomes for strata owners by comparisons and with benchmarks

I know that none of these things are guaranteed, that they'll take time and effort and that many initiatives will criticised.  But so what?  If we don't do it, who will?  And, if more strata owners don't participate things will only get worse.

Francesco ...

Strata on TV

These days there's a wide variety of TV programs covering every imaginable topic (some good and some not so good).  But not strata title and I wonder why?

Sure there's a bit of news and news commentary like this interview of the SCA NSW president on Ten Breakfast and Michael Teys' regular appearances on Property Success with Margaret Lomas and Your Money Your Call which are great since they help expose strata title issues to the public and disseminate information.  But, it's not the same as strata entering popular culture via TV drama, comedy or reality shows.  

And, why shouldn't strata be the basis of more entertaining TV?  It's just as interesting as the happening on the Jersey Shore or in the Kardashian households (and possibly more entertaining).  There are a few obtuse examples of TV strata - Number 96 in the 1970s was about the happenings in small Sydney apartment block, there's been a few Frasier episodes about his dealings with his strata corporation (like Three Days of the Condo) and The Block started with renovating 4 apartments.  

I think there's plenty of interesting angles for TV strata involving the property aspects, renovations, investment issues, personal dramas, local politics, small (and big) business and more than a few characters and personalities that could sustain a few dozen episodes.  Or, what about a show called Strata Apprentice where strata owners, residents, managers and others compete in a series of challenges to see who is the best strata player?  Or, even Celebrity Strata Apprentice where past celebrities are placed in one strata building and play out a series of challenging strata scenarios?  It could catch on (or not).

Then again, maybe we don't really want Snooki, Mikey and the Situation in our strata buildings.

Francesco ...

Report Card on NSW Strata

After 22 weeks of consultation and review, we now have the report on the GAP consultation about NSW strata issues. 

The consultation statistics are something like this -

•                13,558 people visited the Open Forum site 19,138 times 

•                they viewed 62,348 total pages

•                averaging of 3.3 pages and 4.01 minute per visit

•                there were 1,230 comments and submissions 

•                they totalled 445,702 words

and it resulted in over 600 suggestions for changes


There's a lot of interesting material in the report which, if nothing else, is another good measure of strata stakeholder sentiment.  But whether or not, 1,300 random opinions are enough to base major law reform on or not is altogether another issue too ... and, I suspect, that more thinking needs to be done. 


The main issues GAP identified were -

• The need for better strata corporation governance strata managers and committees
• Finding more and better ways to deal with strata resident behavior that detrimentally affects living amenity
• Simplify (and improving) dispute resolution processes
• Facilitating the end of strata corporations for urban renewal purposes
• Simplifying strata laws and processes

Whilst these general suggestions are uncontroversial, they are also pretty basic, lack detail and do not consider how policy objectives affect them.  But Amongst these recommendations there are many specific ideas from participants that everyone in strata should read and critically consider.  The NSW Government is now developing a discussion paper on strata and community title laws for release in mid 2012.   

Over the next few months I'll pick a few of my favorites to highlight in this blog.


Francesco ...