What’s Behind the High Number of Strata Bankruptcies?
OCN Executive Director2023-08-31T13:34:11+10:0031 AUGUST 2023 OCN talks to Sarah MacDonald about the high incidence of bankruptcy applications by owners corporations for unpaid levies. Listen:>
Strata debts sending more Aussie homeowners bankrupt
Chloe Lear2023-09-04T22:21:24+10:0029 AUGUST 2023 The Business | ABC News A growing number of homeowners are being sent bankrupt because of debts owed to body corporates over the upkeep of building complexes. Consumer groups say it often starts as a small amount but quickly escalates once fees and charges are added, landing some Australians in court. Strata companies are facing calls to offer hardship arrangements. Watch the full video:> HERE
Collapsed developer Toplace ordered to fix another defective Sydney building
OCN Executive Director2023-09-04T22:21:18+10:0029 AUGUST 2023 The Business | ABC News Collapsed developer Toplace has been ordered to fix yet another defective Sydney building. Uncontrolled cracking has been found in the Kellyville apartment complex. It was the third Toplace development slapped with a rectification order in one week. Watch the full video:> HERE
Apartment owners face strata fee increases of 20 per cent as costs soar
OCN Executive Director2023-07-19T10:50:04+10:0019 JULY 2023 Strata levies paid by apartment owners are up by 15 to 20 per cent on average over the past year as the costs of insurance, utilities and repairs and maintenance outstrip even the rapid rise in general inflation. Apartment owners are facing an increase in strata fees on top of rises in mortgage repayments. Without any official source of strata levies, the evidence for rising levies is anecdotal, [...]
NSW Government is Under Pressure to Better Protect Home Owners
OCN Executive Director2023-07-19T15:32:16+10:0012 JULY 2023 OCN talks to Ruby Cornish, ABC News, after apartment developer Toplace goes into voluntary administration, leaving apartment owners in financial ruin. Watch ABC News:> HERE
How strata schemes are letting down Sydney’s apartment owners
OCN Executive Director2024-01-11T12:28:45+11:009 JULY 2023 When Eloise O’Connell joined the strata committee for her apartment in Liverpool, their first task was to raise the fees to prevent insolvency. “Whether your building can be well run is just by the sheer luck of the combination of people who put their hands forward,” O’Connell said. Head of the peak body for residential strata owners the Owners Corporation Network Karen Stiles said the strata management industry [...]
Sydney Apartment Investors Fear Debt Trap As Levies Skyrocket
OCN Executive Director2022-02-08T15:07:11+11:00Investors from retirees to single mothers on low incomes fear losing their properties after their strata levies jumped from under $2000 per quarter to more than $10,000 for building repairs they had no say in approving. Bright and Duggan told the Herald it was appointed to do work that the owners’ corporation had “failed to undertake over many years with the highest priority of ensuring the building can be safely occupied”. Executive director [...]
Mascot owners’ best hope is for $40m firesale
Sonya Acton2021-05-14T15:59:01+10:005 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 for [...]
Stink of politicians and property developers hard to wash away
Sonya Acton2020-10-22T15:16:54+11:0021 OCTOBER 2020 We had no idea how far the disease had spread until the autopsy was carried out. We’d known something was wrong because there was no mistaking that pungent smell of rot and decay. But when we peered into those dark cavities after the first incision was made and the fragile skin had been peeled back, the full horror of it all became clear. By then, the culprit was long [...]