Do I need OC approval to install a toilet that affects NO common property?

Can you explain how it is that both a water supply and sewerage line are in the air space of your garage, and how the sewerage line services only your Lot?

In a way preempting your response, if you mean that both pipes are attached to the inside face of a wall, and that’s common / perimeter wall, and your sewerage line is integral with one that services the other two (2) Lots, then I’d agree with your Strata Manager.

However if the wall with the pipes attached is an internal / dividing wall within your Lot, and the sewerage line serving your Lot has a gully-trap at the point where it meets the one that services the other two (2) Lots, then I’d agree with NSW Land & Property Information.

Consider also that under either scenario, if the toilet pan is fixed to the floor of your garage, then technically it’s being attached to the common property and your Owners Corporation could require you to seek its consent to do that, although that would be a bit finickity in my opinion.

Either way, you’d need to use the services of a Licensed Plumber & Drainer and provide their License and Liability Insurance details to your Owners Corporation.

db – thanks for clarifying that, and as what you’ve described falls within the scenario that I outlined in the 3rd para. of my post (#2) and as the toilet pan is on a false floor that I assume won’t be attached to the concrete floor of your garage, all you should need to do is give your Owners Corporation 14 days written notice of your proposal in accordance with Sect 116 of the NSW Strata Schemes Management Act (1996).

I say “should” because your Owners Corporation (O/C) could claim that as the sewerage line services your Lot and the other two, that it’s integral and therefore common property; unless of course there’s a physical point of connection such as a gully where your line joins the one that services the other Lots – but that’s a moot point that I doubt your O/C could sustain.

You’ll note that the preamble to Sect 116 differentiates between the structure of a Lot and its services, and that Clause 4 only refers the the former. However in my opinion, that Clause is intended to apply to both the structure and the services, that’s how I’ve always applied it and it appears from your discussions with Fair Trading and NSW L&PI that they are making the same interpretation.

So I’d go ahead and give your O/C that 14 days notice, but you’ll need to include an overview of your proposal, including hours-of-work to avoid your works causing a nuisance to the neighbours, and your tradespersons’ details as I advised before, particularity as they, their vehicles, and equipment will presumably need to be on the common property at some stage.

db – firstly, whilst the Executive Committee (E/C) can meet to discuss the Owners Corporation’s (O/C) consent or otherwise to your renovations, the decision one way or the other and to create and register a Special By-Law must be made by way of a Special Resolution at a General Meeting of the O/C as a whole.

Secondly in order to pass, a Special Resolution requires a YES vote by ≥75% of those owners in attendance (both personally and by proxy) at the General Meeting, with that percentage being determined from a calculation based on the the units of entitlement (UOE) attached to each owner’s Lot and the aggregate UOE for the Plan.

So in your Plan of 3 Lots with say each having 30 UOE, on a vote to create and Register a Special By-Law where the other owners voted YES and you vote NO, that would be 60 UOE / aggregate 90 UOE, being 67% in favour, and that Motion would fail. Similarly, any vote to grant consent to your renovations would also fail if the votes, as you’d expect, were cast as above.

Lastly, if the UOE for each of the 3 Lots in your Plan is disproportionate and your NO vote cannot cause the Special Resolution (SBL) to fail, then any condition of a resultant SBL that requires you to maintain any components of your renovation that, despite your advice, the O/C insists are Common Property would be unenforceable unless you provide your written agreement to that condition in advance of the SBL being Registered, and I doubt that would happen.

So let the E/C have its Meeting with you in attendance, ask to address the Meeting, calmly reiterate your point of view including the advice that you’ve obtained from Fair Trading, L&PI, and elsewhere (i.e. here), and advise that on the basis of that (advice) you will be voting against any General Meeting Motion to create a SBL, that you will not be meeting any costs of the O/C, and that you won’t be agreeing to any Condition of a SBL that involves you maintaining Common Property.

Here is the relevant extract from Sect 65A of the NSW Strata Schemes Management Act; my emphases in BOLD:

Owners Corporation may make or authorise changes to common property

 (1) For the purpose of improving or enhancing the common property, an owners corporation or an owner of a lot may take any of the following action, but only if a special resolution has first been passed at a general meeting of the owners corporation that specifically authorises the taking of the particular action proposed:

(a) add to the common property,

(b) alter the common property,

(c) erect a new structure on the common property.

(2) A special resolution that authorises action to be taken under subsection (1) in relation to the common property by an owner of a lot may specify whether the ongoing maintenance of the common property once the action has been taken is the responsibility of the owners corporation or the owner.

(3) If a special resolution under this section does not specify who has the ongoing maintenance of the common property concerned, the owners corporation has the responsibility for the ongoing maintenance.

(4) A special resolution under this section that allows an owner of a lot to take action in relation to certain common property and provides that the ongoing maintenance of that common property after the action is taken is the responsibility of the owner has no effect unless:

(a) the owners corporation obtains the written consent of the owner to the making of a by-law to provide for the maintenance of the common property by the owner, and…

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@db said:
One of the issues with that is, apart from wasting my time to deal with them, is that they are incurring unnecessary costs… Is there any way that I can stop these unnecessary and meaningless meetings from occurring…

The numbers means that you have to go with it as they can approve the expense retrospectively. 

or can I make the other two owners (who request these pointless EC and later OC meetings) pay the costs out of their own pockets (ie additional strata fees)?

There are very few instances in which the share of levies can be adjusted from what is calculated by unit entitlements and this isn’t one of them

Can the other two OC members go alone to create and register the SBL regarding my renovation, and then somehow get the strata manger to pass the bill to me? I suspect the answer is no (because of 65A(1) – I will fail the special resolution, and 65A(4)(a) – I will never consent to the SBL), but just double checking.

Correct on both counts.