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Topic
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Im looking at installing roll a doors on my garages.Currently there are the original tilt a doors
The garages are internal and as such not visible from the street
For the purposes of security and also ease of personal access I have made a request to replace the existing doors.I would maintain the colour and profile of the existing doors and I would of course bear the cost
The response from the OC has been no
Where do I stand on this ?
Any thoughts
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Replies
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Firstly, establish whether the garages are common property or on your title. It might not matter in the end but the question will come up. Grab a copy of your title and see if the garage is on it, or not. If it’s yours, you have a better case. If it’s not, perhaps give up now….
Your next step might be mediation:
The threat of having to actually stick up for their point of view might make them cave.
Do you know if anyone else has a problem with the existing doors? If you can get some other owners on board it might help your case. Think of the increase in value if you had modern garage door technology!
If it were me, I’d play up the “ease of access” (borrow a walking stick for the day of mediation!). I’m imagining that old pull up doors might be heavy and frankly I can’t imagine anyone wanting that over a modern, possibly remote controlled garage door. You could throw in the safety aspect too – much safer to sit in your car and open the door remotely than to have to get out to lift it, leaving your car exposed to thieves or yourself open to personal attack.
Good luck.
Assuming the garage doors face the common driveway then they are common property and the responsibility of the Strata (even the opening mechanism and motor).
So not only would you need permission you would also require a bylaw transferring responsibility of the ongoing maintenance to your lot approved by a special resolution (75% in favor).
Kiwipaul is correct but I would qualify one thing. The “Who’s Responsible” publication put out by the Institute of Strata Title Management provides that if the opening mechanism was installed after registration by the owner the opener is Owner responsibility. I copy from clause 15 page 8:
Garage Doors: If they were there on the registration of the strata plan, then they are the responsibility of the owners corporation (The OFT takes the view that garage controller is classified as the lock and door closer for the garage door albeit it being electric. Therefore as with the main lock and door closer to a unit’s entrance door being OC responsibility, so is the controller). However, if they were installed after by the owner, then they are the owner’s responsibility.
littlevoice, on ‘where do I stand’? my view is the OC is correct (technically anyway).
@kiwipaul said:
Assuming the garage doors face the common driveway then they are common property and the responsibility of the Strata (even the opening mechanism and motor).Unless your strata plan document says something like “garage doors within each lot form part of the lot and are not common property”.
I’d just like to point out that the garage doors are internal and, with that in mind, I don’t see why we are assuming they are common property. If the garages are individual lots, then, unless indicated otherwise, I would think the doors may be lots too. I’m not saying one thing or the other – just that it’s not a clear-cut as some respondents seem to think. Little Voice needs to find out whether they are lot property or common property.
The opinions offered in these Forum posts and replies are not intended to be taken as legal advice. Readers with serious issues should consult experienced strata lawyers.
little voice – I don’t know in what forum the Owners Corporation (O/C) has said “no” to your request, but that decision may only be made at a General Meeting and not by your Executive Committee, which I suspect may have been the forum in question (?).
By all means check your Title Plan, but I agree with the others here who’ve suggested that the existing garage doors would almost certainly be common property, and therefore any request by you to replace those would need to be decided by the O/C as a whole, where ≥75% of those Owners in attendance at the General Meeting would need to vote in favour of your proposal in order for consent to be granted.
So submit a formal Motion to your Secretary (or to your Strata Manager if that role has been delegated to them) outlining what it is that you propose and why, advise that you are prepared to meet the cost supplying and installing of the roller-doors, and that you’ll maintain them thereafter, and perhaps lobby other Owners between now and that Meeting so that you can achieve that 75% majority vote.
If your proposal is consented, then strictly speaking your O/C should draft and register a Special By-Law (SBL) to formalise your maintenance, repair, and replacement responsibilities for the roller-doors, and if it’s likely that other Owners will in future make future requests of that same type (as yours), then the O/C should cover the costs of that SBL.
If you don’t receive consent, then polish your walking stick and apply for mediation of your proposal, and depending upon how that goes you can at your discretion apply to for the matter to be adjudicated upon by the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
A lot of rigmarole for what should be a simple procedure I agree, but that’s how it is in NSW I’m afraid, where there’s no differentiation between minor changes to the Common Property such as yours, and major ones such as when Owners propose to significantly renovate their entire Lots.
There is a clause in the standard by-laws that allows an owner to install “…a safety device to protect a lot against intruders or to improve safety within a lot”, seemingly without OC permission. Devices which prevent entry of animals or offer protection to children are also exempt.
Mightn’t a roller door come within this definition?
@Boronia said:
“…a safety device to protect a lot against intruders or to improve safety within a lot”Sounds like lawyer-speak for “a lock”.
As the garages have tilt-a-doors now, I think it would be a bit of a stretch to rely on this particular by-law to replace the whole door with something different.
Could it be that the EC or OC (in which ever forum said no) is saying that it sees no compelling reason to change from standard functional tilt doors that look pleasingly uniform across all the garages?
I would think that a key to addressing the issue would be to know who said no and why.
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