Posted by Rob Honeycombe on 22 June 2010
Keeping up with changes in legislation can be tough and for Brisbane property owners the penalties for non-compliance can be nasty. Somehow you’re supposed to absorb all the info and make changes, often without much notice. So here’s a heads-up on one of the latest.
The legislation won’t be passed until September but from December 1st it looks certain you’ll need a pool fence inspection if you want to sell or rent your property. A qualified inspector will need to check it and issue a compliance certificate, and you’ll need to do any works to bring it up to today’s laws. So for example those self-closing doors on the living room won’t be enough any more. Your certificate will need reissuing every 2 years and body corps will be required to have an annual inspection.
Our suggestion: get these underway well before December because you won’t be allowed to sign a lease or a sale contract without your certificate and the inspectors are going to be a tad busy. Watch the small print too – any body of water more than 300mm deep that’s kept full and usually used for swimming will be captured. Visit the website or talk to your property manager now.
Landlords might like to keep an eye on further changes in the wind. We expect you’ll be required to prepare a Sustainability Declaration from mid 2011 to show any prospective tenant if the home’s energy efficient etc. And in a controversial move the tenancy lobby groups are currently arguing for an end to giving tenants a “notice to leave without grounds”. So landlords may lose the ability to choose who lives in their property. If you’d like to have a say on this one why not send the Housing Minister an email? It’s Karen Struthers at communityservices@ministerial.qld.gov.au
Like to have a rant on these issues?! Make a comment.
Tags: pool fencing laws Queensland, Queensland tenancy legislation, Residential Tenancies Authority, Sustainability Declaration Queensland, tenancy agreement Queensland, tenant selection Brisbane, Tenants Union Queensland
Posted in Brisbane landlords, real estate marketing | No Comments »
Posted by admin on 8 March 2010
Bought a property in recent times? Here in the Smart State we must have one of the most complex, confusing and convoluted contract processes in the western world. Warning statements, disclosures by the dozen, many of them in BIG BOLD LETTERS. We’ve written here before about the failure of these so-called consumer protections.
Last Friday night we met with a couple who wanted to buy their first home. It’s 7pm at the home’s kitchen bench, another offer’s been received, the auction’s the next day, so no time to waste. And out we come with the 5 documents over 22 pages. Nervous do you think? Do they understand fully the details and implications? Is it a fair environment to put anyone in?
Surely consumer protection is firstly about informing people? How can they be fairly informed by 22 pages of reading on a Friday night? And this isn’t including the 2 page Sustainability Declaration the seller’s provided or the building and pest inspections they still need done. Or the title/council/body corp/main roads/EPA/flooding etc searches their solicitor will ask them to check.
One option being canvassed is the idea of a disclosure document, prepared and paid for by a seller before they put their property on the market. Kind of like a “roadworthy” you need before you can sell your car. It could include all the usual info and even a building and pest report, and be available to each and every buyer when they first enquire. If you don’t understand something, you can ask your lawyer/valuer/townplanner/banker/Uncle Jack before you decide to buy…
Then we can have simple contracts that everyone can follow.
What do you think of this idea? Got another solution to the masses of contract paperwork?We’d love to hear your comments.
Tags: Brisbane home buyers, building inspection Brisbane, consumer protection, contract of sale, selling a house Brisbane, selling an apartment Brisbane, Sustainability Declaration Queensland
Posted in Brisbane's sales market, real estate marketing, trends in Brisbane property | 2 Comments »
Posted by Rob Honeycombe on 4 February 2010
Some good news for home sellers today with the state government releasing a new and shrunken form of the controversial Sustainability Declaration. Those 31 questions are now just 20.
The Minister says he listened to all our concerns and has now produced a document that doesn’t need expert help to complete. “All of these are simple questions that can be answered through a basic household inspection by the homeowner,” he said.
We don’t quite agree. A quick once around our office and we weren’t 100% on what an “evaporative airconditioner” was, nor did we know how to check how many stars our kitchen sink taps would rate.
But they’ve got rid of heaps of nonsense questions that simply weren’t getting answered anyway. So yes, it’s an improvement and we do agree with helping educate home-owners on sustainable housing options. You have to start somewhere.
Now if you’ll excuse me I’ve got to go and bin a ream of copy paper, all those out of date Sustainability Declarations!
Tags: selling a house Brisbane, selling an apartment Brisbane, Sustainability Declaration Queensland
Posted in Brisbane's sales market, real estate marketing | No Comments »
Posted by admin on 1 January 2010
It’s been a colossal rush-job but Queensland’s new Sustainability Declaration comes into force today, with all sellers of residential property now required to complete the document.
You can see from the amount of commentary on our previous blog posts the level of opposition this has created.
What you have to love is the way government can make the simplest thing so damn complicated. After plenty of stick about been hard for home-owners to complete the form the department has now released a guide to help.
All 8 pages of it!
Tags: selling a house Brisbane, selling an apartment Brisbane, Sustainability Declaration Queensland
Posted in real estate marketing | No Comments »
Posted by admin on 25 November 2009
We know that from January 1st every seller of a property in Queensland will have to fill in a 2 page Sustainability checklist.
We attended a Department information session today and one thing’s become very clear: this is a Government rush job of mammoth proportions!
On 3 fairly significant issues the Department couldn’t provide an answer – they still haven’t fully digested their own legislation. For example, they couldn’t tell the meeting if you need to mention the body corp pool when you sell your apartment. House yes, apartment “we’ll have to get back to you”.
A building inspector spoke up to advise that his insurers can’t yet confirm if they’ll cover him for completing a Sus Dec. So his industry is not going to be an easy solution for completing the form, at least in the short term.
The Department did make one thing very clear though: if a seller is unsure about an item then they can leave it blank. When asked if that meant all boxes blank could still be a valid form the answer was yes.
There is to be no penalty relating to the form other than for failing to complete one prior to offering the property for sale. And even then we understand it will be up to local governments to enforce….
The Department say the form is to help buyers compare homes and weigh up their sustainability features. It’s an “education and marketing tool”.
And we agree with the sentiment behind that.
What a shame the government didn’t spend the time educating the marketplace and industry before rushing this in. The risk now is the Declaration will become a low-value sheet of process, most of them largely incomplete, and it will lose its real value.
Love to hear your comments.
Tags: Brisbane real estate agents, real estate advertising, selling a house Brisbane, selling an apartment Brisbane, Sustainability Declaration Queensland
Posted in Brisbane's sales market, real estate marketing | 4 Comments »
Posted by Rob Honeycombe on 19 November 2009
Putting your place up for sale is about to get harder and will probably cost you more money, thanks to a new state government requirement.
In an “innovative and nation-leading sustainable housing policy” our Minister for Infrastructure and Planning has introduced a mandatory Sustainability Declaration. From January 1st 2010 every seller of a residential dwelling in Queensland will have to fill in a 2 page checklist.
But don’t worry, the Minister says it’s “simple” and “user-friendly”…. Have a look at the draft Sustainability Declaration for yourself.
I had a go at doing one for my house and completed just 13 of 31 questions. I didn’t know if my shower heads were WELS 3 or WELS 4 rated. And I didn’t know what the “R-value” of my ceiling insulation would be either….
To be fair we agree there needs to be a bigger focus on energy use in existing housing. But these questions are going to take sellers some time and create another hurdle to selling.
You won’t be able to advertise your place for sale until you have a Sus Dec and your agents must display it at open homes and advertise to prospective buyers that it’s available. It looks like the penalty for not doing this will be $2000 for you and $10,000 for your agent…. so if you’re thinking of selling after Christmas you might need to read up on this.
We’re guessing that most sellers will pay a building inspector to complete the form, especially in Brisbane’s inner city where many homes are rented and their investor-owners barely know the property.
Will this create a new value and ‘point of difference’ for homes with extra features and bring a higher focus to sustainability? Maybe. But given the time/cost impost on sellers, and the very small percentage that will be fully completed, we’re not sure it’s a worthwhile change at all.
The government is not even going to collect the data. That might have been useful – they could target their campaigns/incentives at getting home owners to upgrade the items that really make a difference.
We’d be interested to hear your comments…
Tags: Brisbane real estate agents, real estate advertising, selling a house Brisbane, selling an apartment Brisbane, Sustainability Declaration Queensland
Posted in Brisbane's sales market, property taxes and rates etc, real estate marketing | 3 Comments »
Keeping up with changes in legislation can be tough and for Brisbane property owners the penalties for non-compliance can be nasty. Somehow you’re supposed to absorb all the info and make changes, often without much notice. So here’s a heads-up on one of the latest.
