Townhouses on the rise as unit slide continues
Strata buyers are drifting away from apartments and towards townhouses in the post-Covid era, as people seek more space in which to work from home, and less close contact with…
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Forum: Seeking speaking permission & rising damp
There’s a genuine “Catch-22” hidden in one of our questions this week. How can you ask to speak at a strata committee meeting when you aren’t allowed to speak? The…
Podcast: Pets (again!) with James Valentine
Every so often – about once a month – I get invited on to James Valentine’s Afternoons on ABC 702. Last week the topic was pets in apartments – partly…
Top dogs – the very best pooches for apartments
Last week, on James Valentine’s afternoon show on ABC radio, I said we had an article on this website telling people what the best dogs for apartments are. I kind…
New app to handle heavy lifting in levy calculation
Imagine taking an online tool like a mortgage calculator – one of those apps on a lot of banks’ websites that tell you that you can’t afford to buy the…
Survey deadline extended to define ‘unreasonable’
The search for the definition of “unreasonable” has prompted NSW Fair Trading, aka the department of Better Regulation, to extend the deadline for public responses to its review of strata…
Pet-friendly housing helps everyone, says report
A new report backed by six Australian universities has concluded that having pets is good for both tenants and landlords. However, even though more than 60 per cent of Australian…
Reverse cycle air-con can be sustainable, after all
Last week, I asked how air-conditioning could be considered a “sustainable” renovation (as promoted by Fair Trading in their somewhat premature notes on minor renovations). Well, blow me down with…
Forum: Ctte member gets paid for ‘strata training’
In these days when conspiracy theories can almost lead to the overthrow of the “greatest democracy in the world” we have to be careful not to fuel the fires of…
Covid crushes city rents but boosts availability
“Sydney and Melbourne’s inner-city apartment glut shows no sign of easing with the clear prospect of high rental vacancies persisting into the foreseeable future,” says Dr Andrew Wilson, Chief Economist…
Podcast: New pet laws and defining ‘reasonable’
In this week’s podcast we give the NSW Parliament’s deliberations on it’s new strata pet laws a kick along. As reported here, the Lower House has taken a good six…
Tax and planning boost for build-to-rent blocks
The NSW government is getting behind build-to-rent housing in a big way, announcing major changes to tax and planning policies to encourage developers to build apartment blocks that will be…
Loving our pets to death with flowers and chocs
Has your fur baby been looking under the weather since Valentines Day? Maybe you’ve been sharing the love a little too much. We have to be careful we don’t love…
Strata ‘green renos’ and cladding plans move on
They were overshadowed and somewhat stymied by the pet amendment, but now that has been settled the NSW Government can push ahead with new strata laws that will make it…
Revised pet law offers clarity and compromise
The vexed question of pets in apartments and unfair by-laws took a new twist this week when Alex Greenwich, Sydney’s member of the NSW Parliament saw his proposal for a…
Forum: Something shady in manager’s offer of help
There’s a sad and slightly creepy story from Tasmania this week – and it’s all about how some people haven’t quite got to grips with the concept of strata even…
Podcast: Bad landlords and skinny buildings
The Flat Chat wrap this week is taken up with three main topics. The first is a petition to parliament to create a blacklist of bad landlords … launched by…
Fair Trading fluffs again – is air-con sustainable?
Our revelation last week that NSW Fair Trading has no idea what double glazing is, even though they specify it in their renovations regulations as being a permitted “minor renovation”,…