Hi team, one of our tenants in some units has a water leak in the car park which is causing for rust stained water to drip into his boat. The issue has been reported to body corp back in November and have followed up in writing each week since then. The standard response is that they are working on it. The tenant is now parking the boat on the street and has had his motor stolen now. For which he is trying to hold me liable. At what point can I step in and fix the issue and can body corp be held liable?
I'm assuming you are the owner of the unit, the stolen boat belongs to your tenant? It would seem you've done all you can to sort out the issue. Where he parks his boat is not your issue (I would assume). Could he not have put a tarpaulin over the boat rather than park it on the street? Where do his own actions come into play here? Does he take ownership of the decision to choose to park the boat on the street rather than throw a tarp over it and keep it in a more secure place?
He was parking in the common (visitor) parks but was told to remove the boat by the body corp. Work that out. He could have covered the boat, I’ll concede to that. His position is that his lease with me is for 2 parks and that he has the right to use them. For me, that’s a fair point. Where I am at now, is what I can do to force the body corp to act, or, take the repairs into my own hands. We pay a fair sum to body corp and in this instance, I feel quite rorted.
The body Corp sound particularly difficult - they won’t fix the issue so the park allocated to your unit can be used and also won’t let the tenant use the visitor park. I really think that they need to temporarily allocate the visitor park to your tenant. As for the motor, not your fault it got stolen.
Thanks for everyone's comments. Are there any laws or relaxations that allow me to make good the issue myself. It would cost around $500 to fix.
Depending on which State your unit is in, there are more likely to be laws/penalties to stop you from undertaking common are repairs as you have no authority.
If someone steals their boat how are you liable? The legal principal of causation is involved. A unbroken chain must exist and they have no necessity to park on the street and the choice is a issue. You are not responsible for the acts or inactions of the strata. The tenant issue is not uour issue. It is their problem Do you reimburse their train fares if the train to work doesnt arrive on time?
