Flat Chat Wrap #46 – cracking down on by-law breachers and bad builders
JimmyT thinks of changing the name of this week’s episode to Hard Chat (but won’t because he’s scared of Tom Gleason) as he’s going in hard on two very different…
defects
Building expert: defects plan is deeply flawed
The NSW government’s plans to construct our apartment buildings better in the future, released last week, were met with a universal outpouring of … well … whatever the opposite of…
Flat Chat Wrap #37 – Defects loans, Airbnb rules and sex in the spa
It’s a real mixed bag in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap podcast – finance, Airbnb and sneaky sex. Sue Williams and I start our dissection of the week’s strata news…
Flat Chat Wrap #32 – Time we had a star rating for the best and worst developers and builders
We have a friend called Royce who wouldn’t buy so much as a toothbrush without checking online to see if it was the best design (at the best price) for…
Flat Chat Wrap #31 – Tip of the defects iceberg and why it’s such a massive problem
In this week’s episode of the Flat Chat Wrap we look at the revelation that the Opal and Mascot towers “disasters” are just the tip of a very large apartment…
Flat Chat Wrap #29 – the great Mascot Tower giveaway … and what it means about cladding
Confronted by images of residents of Mascot Tower evacuating the building, the NSW government has moved relatively swiftlly to plug the accommodation gap with a loan to the Owners Corporation…
Flat Chat Wrap #28 – Residents out on the street as another Faulty Tower crumbles
Residents of the 130-plus apartments in the Mascot Tower apartment block in Sydney’s South were evacuated over the weekend when cracks in walls and supporting beams suddenly widened. JimmyT and…
Ticking clocks and closing windows – time to deal with defects
Towards the end of last century, around about the time state governments started allowing apartment block developers to appoint their preferred certifiers, launching the self-certification scandal, HIH Insurance collapsed. HIH…
Flat Chat Wrap #12 – The ups and downs of apartment living with Sydney MP Alex Greenwich
Talking apartments, Airbnb, pets, the Opal, defects, cladding and all things apartment related with Sydney MP Alex Greenwich
Flat Chat Wrap #10 – Talking Opal on ABC radio & and the horrors of a dirty defects battle
Talking about Opal Tower residents being forced to move back on ABC radio. Plus part 2 of our podcast on an off-the-plan strata disaster: lies, spies and lawyers as the…
Flat Chat Wrap #8 – The crumbling Opal Tower and the whole defects disaster
JimmyT and Sue Williams ask the questions everyone else is avoiding, and provide the answers people need to hear, about the Opal Tower in Sydney and the whole defects disaster…
New apartments: How to select your defects detectives
Between flammable panel-clad high-rises, and crumbling apartment blocks, surveyors and certifiers have had a rough trot in the media in recent months. But if you are in a brand new…
PODCAST: Defect loans, Airbnb rules and sneaky sex in the spa
It’s a real mixed bag in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap podcast – finance, Airbnb and sneaky sex. Sue Williams and I start our dissection of the week’s strata news…
OCN blasts ‘hands-off’ regulations after Four Corners TV report
Australia’s main apartment owners’ organisation claims unit residents have been left in the lurch by developers and builders thanks to “hands off” government regulations that allowed the construction of sub-standard…
Why low-cost defects loans are not enough
Despite the first rumblings of discontent among some commentators, NSW seems likely to offer strata owners interest-free loans to rectify defects in apartment buildings. And so they should. In fact,…
The real deal for strata owners on James Valentine
I was listening to the ABC News Radio last Friday and an item came on about strata defects, flammable cladding and the state ministers meeting in Sydney. The news reader…
Time we had a Tripadvisor for unit block builders?
With defects on the minds of everyone in the apartment world, there’s a whole lot of finger pointing going on. Developers are saying engineers should be certified, strata owners say…
Forensic research – your best hope for not buying a high-rise lemon
With state planning ministers meeting this month, informed in part by a behind-closed-doors meeting of development “stakeholders” in NSW last week, you can be sure that building defects in their…