We would like any advice in regards to a situation we are now faced with our PPOR that we have recently purchased.
We have purchased a ground floor unit in NSW that has a floating deck next to our balcony. The contract for sale from the agent clearly states that the floating deck is included in this sale. So, we were led to believe that approvals with the Body Corporate (since its on common property) and the Council have already been dealt with through the previous owners.
We have recently been notified by a letter from the Body Corporate to remove this floating deck as it is in breach of the by-law as it is an obstruction to common property.
Prior to purchasing, we had the property lawyer survey the contract and another professional searched the Strata minutes for any unresolved disputes and nothing was found (nothing has ever been raised in the Strata minutes). The deck was put in a year and a half ago and we have recently learned that the other owners only became aware of this deck recently.
We believe that demolishing this floating deck will also compromise our privacy as people then would have access to the garden area directly in front of our kitchen and bathroom windows. Can we legally enforce any boundaries to protect our privacy?
We feel that we have been misled and we have now paid too much for out unit as we believe this deck with a garden outlook is a vital feature of our unit.
Has anyone had any similar experience to us? Does anybody have any specific advice as to where to go with this. We will be contacting our property lawyer.
Any advice would be helpful!
has there been a special resolution granting exclusive use to your unit? Can you make the appropriate approach to body corporate?
We don't want to go down the 'exclusive use' because apparently the previous owner of our place have aggressively tried in the past and built this floating deck without any approvals, which has really annoyed all the others of the building even more.
We are going to try for an exemption of this by-law but not exactly sure how the procedure works. Can we vote on keeping the deck? Can we approach all the other owners via mail or phone call to bargain our case that we weren't aware that this deck was built without following the correct procedures? Apparently we need a 75% vote on our side to keep the deck.
What should we do if we lose the votes?
if it is on common property, then it will always be at risk unless you have exclusive use ie it does not pose any risk to BC or other owners, you can’t insure it unless it is ‘yours’ & BC don’t want the risk.
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