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 ...