Amid all the discussions on this website about strata law, regulations and by-laws, we spend a lot of time talking about the way things ought to be and the difference with how they really are.

David Bannerman

Every so often it helps to cut through all the wishful thinking and speculation to get some definitive answers and so we were delighted to be asked by David Bannerman of Bannermans Lawyers to participate in his monthly webinar.

In fact, it’s worth pointing out that this was actually his show, not ours, but judging by the intro, I seem to have inadvertently hijacked the online event.

But that’s all window-dressing. In this, the first half of a discussion in which David - one of Flat Chat's strata law sponsors - answers your questions, we got into issues like water-proofing, how design practitioners are delayingwork and inflating the costs, the whole pet by-laws issue, sacking managers and EV charging.

At this point I have to say there are parts where David’s audio is less than perfect – the perils of using Zoom to record these events – and if you are really struggling with it, the transcript (below) will get the job done.

Next week, we’ll run the second part of what turned out to be a very interesting chat with some truly curly questions from you, our readers.

TRANSCRIPT IN FULL

Jimmy  00:00

Just over a week ago, I hosted a webinar online. We called it 'Lawyer in the Hot Seat,' and one of our sponsors, strata lawyer David Bannerman, came along to answer your questions, which had been sent in advance on a Zoom webinar. The webinar lasted an hour; we've cut it into two parts, that we are presenting this week and next. The sound quality isn't up to our usual standards, because we recorded it on Zoom. I'm Jimmy Thomson, I write the Flat Chat column for the Australian Financial Review, and this is a special Flat Chat Wrap.

[MUSIC]

Jimmy

We've got a lot of questions to get through. David Bannerman is the fastest lawyer in the east, so we'll probably get through quite a lot. I'm seeing lots of chat coming up and I hope somebody else is looking at them, because I am a bear of little brain, and I can only do so much at one time. Are you ready, David?

David Bannerman  01:11

Thanks Jimmy, for joining us. For those of you who don't know, Jimmy (most of you should), but he's a well-known commentator in the strata space and was recently in the AFR, talking about Strata Hub, and is often in the frontline of lots of owner inquiries, regarding strata stuff. We thought it'd be good to see what sort of questions he's frequently encountering and seeing what we can do to help the strata community get a better footing on their position.

Jimmy  01:40

All right, thank you for that. David. I'm going to kick off with a question that comes pretty much straight off the Flat Chat forum and it is; if an external hosepipe on say, a washing machine, bursts and floods the unit downstairs, passing through common property, who is responsible for the repairs; the upstairs owner, or their insurance (if they have it), strata insurance, or the downstairs owners' insurance (if they have it)?

David Bannerman  02:10

It's a good question and it happens a lot, where there's a few rights that follow. One is, the person who might have suffered the damage below, could have an 'action in nuisance' against the person above, for allowing the water to escape from their property and cause the damage below. Now, it wouldn't normally be a failing in the common property, because concrete is porous, so it's supposed to allow water through, so there's probably no problem with the common property in that circumstance. As to insurance though, a strata insurance will typically cover burst pipes, and claims can be processed through that. Alternatively, a claim could be processed through the lot owner's insurance, in the event that it covered that sort of event. The payment of the excess and the increase in the premium that...