Flatchat has been in touch with the Office of fair Trading this week, following up some of the suggestions made and questions asked by readers late last year in our New Laws contest. The first cab off the rank was illegal parking and what to do about it, given that the law seems to favour [...]

Having only this past week been involved in an arm-wrestle with the Office of Fair Trading’s Education and Information department over the content of a new book I’m writing (out soon from Fairfax), I am indebted to the strata managers Linders Property Group for keeping me up to date on changes to the law through [...]

As an avid TV watcher and recent convert to digital free-to-air, I can understand the frustrations of a number of big apartment buildings who’ve contacted me about their eagerness to switch their owners on to Foxtel Digital – but who’ve baulked at the massive expense of being able to do so. The buildings have all [...]

Pets are becoming a much more acceptable part of apartment life but how can you let them in without turning the building into a menagerie? Q: We live in a strata block where the original by-law did not allow pets. Despite this, both owner occupiers and tenants have brought in cats, and more recently a [...]

I think it was Winston Churchill who said democracy was the worst system of government … apart from all the others. In strata land, democracy has an anachronistic twist – reminiscent of the days when only landowners could vote – with those who own the most or largest apartments having the biggest say in the [...]

Apartment buildings are becoming more pet-friendly but some owners are concerned that it’s getting out of hand with no controls over pets. The Office of Fair Trading’s model by-laws say you can’t have pets unless they’re permitted by the executive Committee but adds that permission can’t be withheld unreasonably. Many readers have asked for a [...]