All property owners who share common property on a plot of land are members of a body corporate. Owners join the body corporate as members. The body corporate will continue to exist as long as there are multiple property owners on the subdivided land. Members will be brought in and deleted when owners come and leave.
The establishment of a representative nominated committee under the direction of an elected chairperson is necessary for managing the body corporate. In Australia, there are laws governing how the committee is established, what it is intended to do, what its duties are, and other details. In essence, they are in charge of overseeing the daily operations of the shared property.
Owners must pay levies to support these operations. In collaboration with all members present at the Annual General Meeting (AGM), the body’s corporate committee sets the rate of these levies by prescribing a monetary amount per unit held in the common property. The levy varies according to the amount of property owned by an owner. Also, strata management Collingwood often delegates their body corporate duties to a qualified stratum manager if they are time-constrained.
The committee will keep an eye on the strata manager’s activities to make sure that the body corporate is receiving good value for the management fees paid. The body corporate needs money to effectively administer the common spaces and keep up with building maintenance. These are funded by the levies that different owners must pay. Levies are typically paid every three months. When more work is needed, either ordinary levies will be slightly raised to meet the expense or a special one-time levy will be needed to pay for it.
It is a legal need to elect a committee to administer the building daily and generally take care of the location since things can go very wrong if the body corporate is not handled properly. The committee is typically composed of a Chairman, Secretary, Treasurer, and several Ordinary members and non-voting members, and it is chosen (by nomination and election) at each Annual General Meeting.
There must be three voting members or more. A useful analogy is to consider this committee to be similar to a company’s board of directors. They are elected, have extensive authority, and should be given the freedom to do their jobs and make sure your building is secure and in excellent condition as long as they follow the rules. Similar to a board of directors, a committee that is dysfunctional or inactive in its duties would inevitably cause issues for the body corporate.
Typically, it is up to the committee members to organise their affairs in a way that ensures the smooth operation of the body corporate. When problems emerge, some committees will hold extraordinary meetings in addition to their regularly scheduled meetings, while others may choose to only call meetings under exceptional circumstances.
The number of meetings the committee must hold is not required by law, but only sessions that are formally called and for which minutes are presented will be recognised by the Act. But every norm has an exception, and if necessary, a committee can decide by “postal poll.” This indicates that the committee may perform a postal vote, which is often organised by the committee secretary or a strata manager. If a dispute cannot be resolved before the Annual General Meeting, there could be an Extraordinary General Meeting called.
