FLAT CHAT WRAP

This week’s podcast is about the bushfires.  For a change, apartments are not portrayed in the media as the worst possible way to live in Australia.That’s not to say unit blocks are immune from danger and disruption; as the original article points out, you still have to protect them from fire and floating embers.And can you imagine what would happen if the flames nudged up to a block clad in flammable composite?  We’d have our own Grenfell Tower right here.Thankfully, the reality for most apartment dwellers in country and seaside areas is a lot less dramatic.  Our country town apartment blocks tend to be a lot smaller, however, that brings its own problems.It they’re not high enough to legally require fire sprinklers, you can reasonably assume they don’t have them.  And it was internal sprinklers that arguably saved residents in our two major cladding fires – in the Lacrosse and Neo200 blocks in Melbourne – from suffering tragic consequences.So rural residents are just as keen to keep their smaller blocks free from flames. Meanwhile, they are suffering some of the less obvious effects of the devastating blazes, even when they are far from their front doors.Power outages mean their lifts have to be shut down and their mobile phones are not the lifelines they once were.  Phone lines are also likely to be cut, as are main roads. Plug in radios are useless lumps of plastic while a desperate search for the right sized cells for the old battery powerd transistor radio.  This week Narooma saw 500 metre queues for petrol ... when the pumps could operate.Shops have been running out of essentials, tourists have been trapped, others have turned back and chosen other areas for the holidays.  And toiurist present another issue for apartment residents.  Do your neighbours even know where the evacuation centre is if things take a turn for the worst.But on top of all that, there is the fear that this worst bushfire catastrophe in living memory could flare up again and wreak its havoc in their town.We also point people to a friend’s Facebook page where she’s raising money for Wires, to help all the injured animalsOn a slightly lighter note, JimmyT and Sue discuss the issue of what to do about stray cats … and how they evoke strong emotions in otherwise placid people.All of which leads to Jimmy’s “insult to injury” memory of what happened after a tom cat crawled into his recently robbed car.But as problems go, stray cats and car break-ins are pretty far down the list of our priorities right now.Lessons are being leaned from these bushfires – we can only hope there’s something left that will allow us to put them into practice.

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

Privacy, consumer protections and how to engineer radical change in your apartment block are the main topics for discussion in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap podcast.A heated discussion in the Forum has spilled over into the pod, with JimmyT trying to establish where or not it’s true that the law forbids strata managers from revealing owners’ email addresses in the strata roll (in NSW).Certainly, that’s what the strata managers say but neither strata law nor privacy laws seem to back that up.So why would the SCA – the strata managers’ professional body – advise its members not to pass email addresses to owners who are otherwise entitled to view all strata records?One sophisticated piece of strata management software – Rockend – even has a button you can click to hide email addresses from prying eyes.Could it be that this is one line of communication that strata managers and other strata professionals want to stay closed.Consider this, if you live in a block of 100 units and you want to run a campaign to get yourself voted on to your strata committee, that’s a lot of letters to print, envelopes to stuff and stamps to buy. One email, 100 addresses, total cost, zip.If your campaign is to get the committee or strata manager sacked, how much of an advantage is it that they have access to email addresses and you don’t!?!So, are you entitled to see other owners’ email addresses?  You’ll have to listen to the pod.Also in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap we look at the fateful day four years ago when Jimmy told then Fair Trading Minister Victor Dominello about a story Sue Williams was writing about “sunset clawbacks”.It was a loophole in the law whereby developers would deliberately delay the completion of off-the-plan apartments, invoke the sunset clause to return the purchasers’ deposits, then put the units on the market again to take advantage of soaring property values.On Sunday, new laws came in that should put paid to those dodgy dealings for good, and provide much-needed protection for off-the-plan purchasers.And finally, Jimmy previews his column in this weekend’s financial review in which he explains how a softly-softly approach to moving the bullies and buffoons from your strata committee can work much more effectively than direct confrontation.

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

Privacy, consumer protections and how to engineer radical change in your apartment block are the main topics for discussion in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap podcast.A heated discussion in the Forum has spilled over into the pod, with JimmyT trying to establish where or not it’s true that the law forbids strata managers from revealing owners’ email addresses in the strata roll (in NSW).Certainly, that’s what the strata managers say but neither strata law nor privacy laws seem to back that up.So why would the SCA – the strata managers’ professional body – advise its members not to pass email addresses to owners who are otherwise entitled to view all strata records?One sophisticated piece of strata management software – Rockend – even has a button you can click to hide email addresses from prying eyes.Could it be that this is one line of communication that strata managers and other strata professionals want to stay closed.Consider this, if you live in a block of 100 units and you want to run a campaign to get yourself voted on to your strata committee, that’s a lot of letters to print, envelopes to stuff and stamps to buy. One email, 100 addresses, total cost, zip.If your campaign is to get the committee or strata manager sacked, how much of an advantage is it that they have access to email addresses and you don’t!?!So, are you entitled to see other owners’ email addresses?  You’ll have to listen to the pod.Also in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap we look at the fateful day four years ago when Jimmy told then Fair Trading Minister Victor Dominello about a story Sue Williams was writing about “sunset clawbacks”.It was a loophole in the law whereby developers would deliberately delay the completion of off-the-plan apartments, invoke the sunset clause to return the purchasers’ deposits, then put the units on the market again to take advantage of soaring property values.On Sunday, new laws came in that should put paid to those dodgy dealings for good, and provide much-needed protection for off-the-plan purchasers.And finally, Jimmy previews his column in this weekend’s financial review in which he explains how a softly-softly approach to moving the bullies and buffoons from your strata committee can work much more effectively than direct confrontation.https://episodes.castos.com/flatchatpod/Flat-Chat-51-Privacy.mp3 If you want to get new episodes of the Flat Chat Wrap and as soon as they are posted, just subscribe (it’s completely free!), click on this link for iPHONE and IPAD and this one for Youtube. You can also subscribe on  Castbox or here on Spotify.  And  if you like the podcasts, please share with a friend, (especially in strata) and leave us a rating – it helps people to find us.

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

Amazingly, this is our 50th Flat Chat wrap which means we have been doing this for almost a year.And yet, the same topics come up, time after time, albeit with the occasional (welcome) twist.For instance, co-presenter Sue Williams has had enough of Airbnb – or, at least, stories about them.  She has a point but when you are dealing with a super-aggressive interloper in the property market, you have to keep tabs on them.What have they done now?  Well, they have launched their campaign against “red tape” that they say will make it harder for ordinary working families to be able to afford seaside holidays?What red tape are they talking about?We can only assume it’s the regulations that will make it easier for holiday let guests to escape from fires and easier for the authorities to work out who’s running holiday rentals. Are they such bad things?Meanwhile, yet another major inner-city apartment block has had its "no-pets" by-law overturned  and looks to be heading for an appeal.Sue reckons this has gone beyond the right of owners corporations to establish by-laws banning animals and is now about whether or not strata schemes can make their own rules for living as they wish.Also this week we talk about the worst neighbours we’ve ever had  and who the perfect neighbour might be.  And we touch on the latest popular names for pets.That’s all in the latest Flat Chat Wrap

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

Amazingly, this is our 50th Flat Chat Wrap which means we have been doing this - the podcast thing - for almost a year.And yet, the same topics come up, time after time, albeit with the occasional (welcome) twist.For instance, co-presenter Sue Williams has had enough of Airbnb – or, at least, stories about them.  She has a point but when you are dealing with a super-aggressive interloper in the property market, you have to keep tabs on them.What have they done now?  Well, they have launched their campaign against “red tape” that they say will make it harder for ordinary working families to be able to afford seaside holidays?What red tape are they talking about?We can only assume it’s the regulations that will make it easier for holiday let guests to escape from fires and easier for the authorities to work out who’s running holiday rentals. Are they such bad things?Meanwhile, yet another major inner-city apartment block has had its "no-pets" by-law overturned  and looks to be heading for an appeal.Sue reckons this has gone beyond the right of owners corporations to establish by-laws banning animals and is now about whether or not strata schemes can make their own rules for living as they wish.Also this week we talk about the worst neighbours we’ve ever had  and who the perfect neighbour might be.  And we touch on the latest popular names for pets.That’s all in the latest Flat Chat Wrap.  By the way, the podcast may have been going for a year but the website has been going for … what 15 years?That must be why the podcast has such a unique perspective.https://episodes.castos.com/flatchatpod/Flat-Chat-50-Airbnb.mp3If you want to subscribe to the Flat Chat Wrap and get new episodes as soon as they are posted (it’s completely free!), click on this link for iPHONE and IPAD and this one for Youtube. You can also subscribe on  Castbox or here on Spotify.  And  if you like the podcasts, please share with a friend, (especially in strata) and leave us a rating – it helps people to find us.

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

This week’s podcast features JimmyT and Sue Williams examining the half-million dollar turnaround in a strata defamation case, a discussion about who’s the boss in a strata scheme – the committee or the strata manager – and a chat about how we can get a bit too relaxed when we’re planning our holidays from our “lock up and leave” apartment.The first item refers to the recent Court of Appeals decision in the case of the Manly apartment block chair who earlier this year won $120,000 in damages after alleging he’d been defamed by a tenant in an internal email war.However, the Appeals Court decided there was no defamation – due to qualified privilege attached to internal discussions in a corporation – and even if there had been, the payout was excessive.So the $120,000 hit was rescinded and all costs were awarded against the chair.  With those costs estimated at $400,000, that’s a half-million reversal for the chair.All of that led to a discussion about what you should and shouldn’t say, especially online.  Basically, all legal considerations aside, a little civility and respect goes a long way … and keeps you out of trouble.Then we look at the curious case of the misrepresented minutes, in which one Flatchatter received the minutes of their AGM from the strata manager, only to find they didn’t properly reflect the content of the meeting or the decisions made.Does the committee now need to wait until the next AGM to fix them?  We say no.  The secretary takes precedence over the strata manager and he or she can issue a more accurate set of minutes and instruct the strata manager to distribute those.Was there jiggery-pokery involved? “Never ascribe to malice anything that could just as easily be explained by stupidity” is our motto at Flat Chat.And finally, we look at how “lock up and leave” living can make you a bit lazy when it comes to packing and preparing for your holidays.More sunglasses than underpants?  Some miscalculation there, we think.  And we also take a moment to promote our sister travel website Mildrover.com  where you’ll find a lot of travel features, some bargain holiday deals – and even advice on how to pack.

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

This week’s Flat Chat Wrap podcast features JimmyT and Sue Williams examining the half-million dollar turnaround in a strata defamation case, a discussion about who’s the boss in a strata scheme – the committee or the strata manager – and a chat about how we can get a bit too relaxed when we’re planning our holidays from our “lock up and leave” apartments.The first item refers to the recent Court of Apeals decision in the case of the Manly apartment block chair who won $120,000 in damages after alleging he’s been defamed by a tenant in an internal email war.However, the Appeals Court decided there was no defamation – due to qualified privilege attached to internal discussions in a corporation – and even if there had been the payout was excessive.So the $120,000 hit was rescinded and all costs were awarded against the chair.  With those costs estimated at $400,000, that’s a half-million reversal for the chair.All of that led to a discussion about what you should and shouldn’t say, especially online.  Basically, all legal considerations aside, a little civility and respect goes a long way … and keeps you out of trouble.Then we look at the curious case of the misrepresented minutes, in which one Flatchatter received the minutes of their AGM from the strata manager, only to find they didn’t properly reflect the content of the meeting or the decisions made.Does the committee now need to wait until the next AGM to fix them?  We say no.  The secretary takes precedence over the strata manager and he or she can issue a more accurate set of minutes and instruct the strata manager to distribute those.Was there jiggery-pokery involved? “Never ascribe to malice anything that could just as easily be explained by stupidity” is our motto at Flat Chat.And finally, we look at how “lock up and leave” living can make you a bit lazy when it comes to packing and preparing for your holidays.More sunglasses than underpants?  Some miscalculation there, we think.  And we also take a moment to promote our sister travel website Mildrover.com  where you’ll find a lot of travel features, some bargain holiday deals – and even advice on how to pack.https://episodes.castos.com/flatchatpod/Flat-Chat-49-Defamation-decision.mp3If you want to subscribe to the Flat Chat Wrap and get new episodes as soon as they are posted (it’s completely free!), click on this link for iPHONE and IPAD and this one for Youtube. You can also subscribe on  Castbox or here on Spotify.  And  if you like the podcasts, please share with a friend, (especially in strata) and leave us a rating – it helps people to find us. 

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

We cover a lot of ground in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap, starting with the surprising news that new apartments are getting bigger while houses are getting smaller.  Is it all about downsizing and empty nesters?Or did we never really need all that space to begin with?  You’ll never guess where the largest new apartments are … and Jimmy wonders what a rumpus room  really is.Also in the podcast, we hop into Building Commissioner David Chandler about apartment purchasers and “buyer beware”.  Sue (Williams) is furious and Jimmy calls it “victim blaming”.It seems the government has just parked the whole problem of defects, and cladding for that matter, passing the buck to the people at the bottom who have no choice but to cop it sweet and pay for other people’s mistakes.At least the future looks brighter for apartment quality … until the government’s mates water down the legislation to cut down on “red tape”.And finally, we look at what’s going on with Airbnb.  They have taken a few hits in the past week or two but Sue reckons the one that will hurt most is the announcement that the Tax Office is planning to target holiday let tax cheats – short-term letting hosts who haven’t declared their additional earnings or have claimed too much against tax for the costs of running their ‘business’.We reckon the threat of the tax man is more of a worry to STHL hosts  than all the by-laws, tribunals and three-strikes codes of conduct combined.And finally, we have new theme music and stings.  It’s a bit rockier and stronger, because we plan to be a lot tougher on slack politicians, dodgy developers and bad neighbours for the next year or two.  Let us know what you thinkIf you want to subscribe to the Flat Chat Wrap and get new episodes as soon as they are posted (it’s completely free!), click on this link for iPHONE and IPAD and this one for Youtube. You can also subscribe on  Castbox or here on Spotify.  And  if you like the podcasts, please share with a friend, (especially in strata) and leave us a rating – it helps people to find us.

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

We cover a lot of ground in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap, starting with the surprising news that new apartments are getting bigger while houses are getting smaller.  Is it all about downsizing and empty nesters?Or did we never really need all that space to begin with?  You’ll never guess where the largest new apartments are … and Jimmy wonders what a rumpus room  really is.Also in the podcast, we hop into Building Commissioner David Chandler about apartment purchasers and “buyer beware”.  Sue (Williams) is furious and Jimmy calls it “victim blaming”.It seems the government has just parked the whole problem of defects, and cladding for that matter, passing the buck to the people at the bottom who have no choice but to cop it sweet and pay for other people’s mistakes.At least the future looks brighter for apartment quality … until the government’s mates water down the legislation to cut down on “red tape”.And finally, we look at what’s going on with Airbnb.  They have taken a few hits in the past week or two but Sue reckons the one that will hurt most is the announcement that the Tax Office is planning to target holiday let tax cheats – short-term letting hosts who haven’t declared their additional earnings or have claimed too much against tax for the costs of running their 'business'.We reckon the threat of the tax man is more of a worry to STHL hosts  than all the by-laws, tribunals and three-strikes codes of conduct combined.And finally, we have new theme music and stings.  It’s a bit rockier and stronger, because we plan to be a lot tougher on slack politicians, dodgy developers and bad neighbours from here on in.  Let us know what you thinkIf you want to subscribe to the Flat Chat Wrap and get new episodes as soon as they are posted (it’s completely free!), click on this link for iPHONE and IPAD and this one for Youtube. You can also subscribe on  Castbox or here on Spotify.  And  if you like the podcasts, please share with a friend, (especially in strata) and leave us a rating – it helps people to find us.

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.

This week, JimmyT and Sue Williams tackle subjects that range from the sinister to the sublimely ridiculous … with some practical advice for investors in between.Why won’t the government release the lists of the 444 buildings that have flammable cladding on them?Is it the risk of terrorism, as they say … or is it just potential vandalism … or the effect on property prices?Jimmy has his own conspiracy theory … and it sounds all too plausible.Then Sue explains why, when you are buying an investment, you should go for somewhere better than the place you live in.What!?!  How does that work?  Why should your tenants live in a better place than you do?And finally, they discuss the strangest raffle prize ever – a whole apartment block worth $6.4 million in sunny Queensland.At $10 a pop, it would have to be worth a shot … but then, as Jimmy explains, there could be a downside.That’s all on this week’s Flat Chat Wrap

____________________________________________________


Flat Chat is all about apartment living, especially in Australia.
Find us on Facebook  and Twitter and the Flat Chat website.
Send comments and questions to [email protected].
Register to ask and answer questions about apartment living anonymously on the website.
Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.