A young family’s dilemma: Is a house really better for raising kids than an apartment?
21 May 2021 As more young couples are deciding to raise their kids in apartments, we ask the age old question of whether having a quarter acre block house is really necessary to raise children. .. It’s the mindset that’s the most important element, believes Phillipa Dobbin, director of the apartment owners peak body, the Owners Corporation Network. “Being closer to amenities and transport hubs, having shared facilities and a [...]
NSW Building Commissioner says engineers behind Sydney towers with ‘structural issues’ must be ‘accountable’
14 May 2021 The NSW Building Commissioner says he will refer the principal engineers involved in a large Sydney residential development where "structural issues" were found to the industry's peak body. Karen Stiles, Executive Officer, Owners Corporation Network was interviewed. ABC News > View recording here > Read article here
Mascot owners’ best hope is for $40m firesale
5 May 2021 Apartment owners in Sydney’s Mascot Towers will vote this month on a $40 million proposal to sell their troubled apartment tower as a redevelopment site, with many resigned to losing up to 80 per cent on their property as the most realistic way to end their two-year nightmare. Apartment advocacy group Owners Corporation Network says a review of NSW strata laws under way should reduce the scope [...]
Dodgy Home Builders – Seven News
25 April 2021 As if they weren't expensive enough, new Sydney home prices are being pushed up by sky rocketing insurance claims that are gouging taxpayers for more than $700 million. Claims have surged for defective work by dodgy builders - some who've since disappeared. OCN's Executive Officer, Karen Stiles, was interviewed for this news article. Seven News > View recording here
High-rise owners to get government advice about safe replacement cladding
19 April 2021 Owners of high-rise buildings in Sydney will finally receive advice from the NSW government as early as Monday about what products they should use to replace flammable cladding found on their towers. The long-awaited findings from a report by the state’s cladding product safety panel are set to be released, helping to end years of uncertainty in NSW about whether replacement products are safe or too risky. [...]
Bungled holiday let rules put on hold
15 April 2021 When NSW Planning tried to finish its planning instrument, it was the start of a whole new set of problems. There’s an old saying in politics that if you’ve upset everyone, then you must be doing something right. Or perhaps you just screwed up spectacularly. Late last week when the NSW government finally released the second part of its new regulations on short-term holiday letting, there was [...]
New rules for Airbnb-style letting in NSW delayed by three months
13 APRIL 2021 The NSW government has decided to delay the introduction of new rules for Airbnb-style letting across the state by three months after an outcry from councils and online rental company Stayz. The short-term letting rules were due to come into force on July 30, but the government has decided within the past 24 hours to delay their introduction to November 1. But the non-profit Owners Corporation Network, [...]
RE ‘experts’ on better service exclude customers
30 MARCH 2021 If there was any doubt which side of the great strata divide Fair Trading is on – between those who make money from Real Estate and those who live in it – it was clarified last week in an announcement from Better Regulation, trumpeting the creation of a Real Estate Expert panel. “The NSW Government has established a panel of real estate professionals to be a voice [...]
Developer of Sydney’s ‘worst’ tower ordered to fix faults
15 MARCH 2021 The developer of a 16-storey apartment tower in western Sydney, which has been singled out by NSW Building Commissioner David Chandler as one of the worst he has inspected, has been handed orders forcing it to fix serious defects. The tower at 93 Auburn Road in Auburn has joined a growing list of apartment buildings to have been slapped with orders in recent weeks as the commissioner steps [...]
Latest NCAT decision on by-laws affecting the keeping of animals
9 MARCH 2021 - OCN Statement On 1 March 2021, NCAT senior member R C Titterton OAM handed down a decision in the matter of McGregor v The Owners – Strata Plan Nº 74896. The building in which Mr McGregor and his partner live is part of a complex in Camperdown where each of the individual stratas is required to comply with the by-laws of the Community Management Statement [...]
Sydney building commissioner raises standards, builds confidence in apartment industry
24 FEBRUARY 2021 The new building commissioner appointed to raise standards in NSW’s construction industry – and his willingness to use his unprecedented legal powers to do so – is having a major impact on the standard of projects around the state. Six months on from being given the right to enter and inspect construction sites, issue rectification and stop-work orders, and prevent settlement on sub-standard properties, industry watchers say [...]
Developers forced to fix defects after commissioner wields new powers
18 FEBRUARY 2021 Developers have been slapped with orders to fix serious defects in apartment buildings and townhouses, as the NSW Building Commissioner signals he will not hesitate using his strongest powers to stamp out shoddy work in the construction industry. Almost six months after his powers came into force, commissioner David Chandler has issued prohibition orders in the past week to developers of four buildings in Sydney and Forster, [...]
NSW to Start Removing Flammable Cladding This Year
15 FEBRUARY 2021 Construction on the first projects to start under a three-year program to remove combustible cladding from 225 high-risk apartment complexes in NSW will kick off around the middle of the year, the government in that state says. In an announcement last week, NSW Minister for Better Regulation Kevin Anderson unveiled details of the state’s cladding rectification scheme which was announced in last October’s budget. Labelled Project Remediate, [...]
NSW Stops Short of Paying for Cladding Rectification
18 NOVEMBER 2020 Owners of buildings with flammable cladding in NSW will still need to pay tens of thousands of dollars per apartment to rectify their complexes after the NSW Government refused to Victoria’s lead in paying for flammable cladding to be rectified. Whilst the preference would be for the government to pay for the cost of remediation, Karen Stiles, Executive Officer for OCN welcomed both the announcement of the [...]
NSW building reforms to put strata managers under microscope
NOVEMBER 2020 The conspiracy of silence that surrounds apartment buildings and possible defects would be ended in the next round of landmark building reforms. In the wake of the Grenfell, Mascot and Opal tower disasters, Better Regulation Minister Kevin Anderson is proposing law changes forcing strata schemes to hand over basic maintenance information about their building. OCN executive Karen Stiles said the strata portal would only be the second in [...]
Pets in Strata
13 OCTOBER 2020 Listen to a radio segment recording from ABC Radio Sydney including an interview with Karen Stiles, Executive Officer of OCN, discussing pets in strata. ABC Radio Sydney, Breakfast with Robbie Buck & Wendy Harmer.
Peak Body warns of unintended consequences of pet ban reversal
13 OCTOBER 2020 A legal challenge to overturn a ban on keeping pets in apartments in NSW will have unintended consequences, strata owner advocates warn. The NSW Court of Appeal ruled blanket bans on pets in apartments were unlawful. Owners Corporation Network executive officer Karen Stiles warned the ruling would have far-reaching implications. “Strata is one of the fastest growing forms of housing. “Australians don’t seem to understand that along [...]
Pets Now Allowed in Sydney Apartments
13 OCTOBER 2020 This little doggie in the window’s big court win means pets are now allowed in Sydney apartments. Jo Cooper has won a four-and-a-half-year legal battle to keep her miniature schnauzer Angus in her Darlinghurst Horizon unit block. The pair overcame the building’s blanket pet ban after a unanimous ruling in the NSW Court of Appeal. The Court overturned blanket bans on pets being allowed in any apartment [...]
FlatChat Podcast: Olympics, Emails, Wheel Clamps
29 SEPTEMBER 2020 Karen Stiles, Executive Officer of the Owners Corporation Network, joins Flat Chat Wrap Podcast 93 – Olympics, Emails, Wheel Clamps They discuss the push to keep apartment owners’ email addresses secret, and demands for a return of wheel clamping for rogue parkers. Karen talks to Jimmy Thomson from 12 mins 30 secs into recording. > Listen Here
‘In limbo land’: Apartment owners in bind over flammable cladding fix
17 SEPTEMBER 2020 A drawn out saga over replacing flammable cladding has soured relations between owners of a southern Sydney apartment building and imposed a large financial burden on them. Yet almost 18 months after their local council ordered cladding to be removed, some owners of the Quattro Apartments at Gymea fear the material they plan to use to replace it won't comply in future because the state government is [...]
FlatChat Podcast: Crackdown on dud developers hits home
15 SEPTEMBER 2020 Karen Stiles, Executive Officer of the Owners Corporation Network, joins Jimmy Thomson on Flat Chat Wrap Podcast 91 'First there is the redoubtable Karen Stiles who is the Executive Officer at the Owners Corporation Network (OCN) and, as such, has a seat at the table for some of the most critical discussions being made about NSW strata in decades. Karen has come on to the podcast to [...]
‘Nail in the coffin of democracy’: It’s D-day for Sydney’s prize dog fight
13 SEPTEMBER 2020 It's the dog fight that has captivated Sydney - or at least a small part of it - and this month it will command the attention of the state's peak lawmaking bodies: the Parliament and the Supreme Court. For five years, musician Jo Cooper has battled the strata committee of her apartment block, the Horizon, which stands tall among the terraces of inner-city Darlinghurst. Her quest: to [...]
NSW puts first four developers on notice
2 SEPTEMBER 2020 NSW building commissioner David Chandler has put a first group of four developers on notice under sweeping new powers, telling them his office will audit their apartment projects to make sure they conform with the approved plans and will not allow them to settle if they do not comply. The first audits, to be followed by another six next month, follow passing of new laws in June [...]
Sydney pet owners get shock win in the battle against apartment pet bans
26 AUGUST 2020 It could soon be near-impossible for any apartment building to vote to keep pets out after a last-minute amendment to an unrelated bill scored a shock win in the NSW Legislative Council just before 10pm on Tuesday night. The move by the Animal Justice Party (AJP) means that, if the bill is passed by the Lower House in September, no strata scheme will be allowed to have [...]
‘Signatures for sale’ days are over, warns Sydney’s new building commissioner
24 AUGUST 2020 A week before his new powers come into force, NSW Building Commissioner David Chandler has issued a blunt warning to certifiers of buildings that the days of a small group of them choosing to act as "signatures for sale" are over. Mr Chandler will have the power from September 1 to enter and inspect building sites, prevent the issuing of occupation certificates, call for documents and order [...]
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