Clear dimensioned plans on websites and flyers

Amen.

 

@Burramys just out of curiosity, are you a legal practitioner or a law student? A legal practitioner specialised in consumer law or a law student studying ACL this term?

 

I was thinking law student as well

 

There are certain provisions that must be met in consumer transactions. Property involves major dollars, and it is best to have a process that provides fairness for all involved. This is why documents are provided by the vendor. I'm hoping to identify a way of having accurate plans in a low-cost, quick and simple manner. A few ways have been suggested. I don't know if they will work, and it's up to governments to find the best answer. Many sales have plans. Making the plans mandatory and accurate is not a big jump. There will be costs, but after perhaps 10 years these will drop as the existing records are used. I got plans for one IP prepared by an architect for $50, with the next quote $150.

I have no formal education in law. However, I worked in that area for over 15 years, and picked up a bit. Now I'm rather involved in consumer advocacy. Over many decades I've taken on and beaten major corporations, as in ASX top 50. Government agencies have also been quite unhappy. Private entities as well, including a lawyer ... but I can't detail that.

 

If you get a floor plan with dimensions of a property prepared by the vendor will you actually believe that that's correct? It's the same as believing the fences on the property reflect accurately the boundary. The Contract may say where the boundaries are but every lawyer will advise you to go and measure the block your self. You would be surprised how often fences are out.
At the end of the day its up to the purchaser to get it measured to satisfy them selves. Caveat emptor.

 

@Burramys you really need to relax yes it is annoying but going any further than that is really how much time do you want to waste trying to correct it.

Yes you see funny things like this...

Sold Price for 6 Powley Parade Watsonia Vic 3087 - 1333m2 approx in Oct 2014

and

6 Powley Parade Watsonia Vic 3087 - House for Sale #123313358 - realestate.com.au - 1261m2 2 years later.

I know global warming is an issue but boy it hurt this property!

However it is buyer beware, if the original purchaser did a quick search (which is free) the numbers wouldn't stack up.



This would scream to me that something isn't right and you would need to get a licenced surveyor to survey the land.

 

I guess that looking at the bigger picture, underquoting by REAs in Melbourne is a much bigger issue.

 

As you mention, property involves major dollars so if a buyer is really concerned about the dimensions of the property they should get their own floor plan done (internal) or survey (external boundaries). Why do buyers need to be spoon fed everything? For existing properties it really doesn't matter if a wall is 3m or 3.3m...if you're standing in the room you can see how big it is and if you're happy with that, buy it and if not, don't.

Do you want sellers to provide you with recent comparable sales, a rental appraisal and their favourite colour as well?

 

Nope. Just a plan that's not misleading.

 

If they really are misleading, I have not seen it, I have seen inaccuracies on floor plans, maybe some of you should try doing your own, sometimes the software cannot do what you want, or you already spent hours on it.

Registered plans will have accurate dimensions, but even then you need to do your own checks.

Floor plans do not need to be accurate, a plan means little, you need to inspect yourself.

If agents are purposely misleading or being deceptive, then use existing law to rectify this.

 

Someone said this... "trust no one".

 

This is true. The house I am renovating now came with DA approved plans but as soon as I saw them I could see the extension was not built in accordance with the approved plans. But then the agent never claimed that, so all good. It was still good to have the DA plans because they have some value to me.

 

I actually like seeing the underquoting, I like seeing how ridiculously low the prices are being quoted but feel sorry (in someway) for people thinking they are going to get a property for 20% below what it should normally achieve.

With having no underquoting all the agents do is have contact agent and then say we are seeing interest in the mid to high 400s when the property is likely to go for 550k. However now there is no record and interest is only interest not offers.

In the realm where everyone has so much to gain and lose, no one tells the truth. I have told agents in the past lies so how are they meant to tell the vendor the truth when what I told them was a lie?

Same with vendors they wont tell the REA the truth about their price as they want as much as possible so again how can the REA tell the truth of what price the vendors are willing to accept if that is a dream figure price.

like @larrylarry wrote 'Trust no one'.

 

@Big Will I sold a property Melbourne late last year, so I know how it works You should try coming to Perth. The list price is the actual price!

 

I heard the list price is the ceiling price there at the moment!

I asked one of my friends about how much would he pay for a house in Brisbane and it was $500,000 (IIRC) and he said he would pay 600,000 for it. I was like what wow, he didn't understand the quoted price is usually the vendors starting position and you negotiate lower than that. All really depends on the market which Perth isn't crash hot... It is crashing somewhat.

 

True @Big Will but it has always been like that in Perth. Even at the peak of the boom if a place was listed for $750k you could buy it for $750k.

 

I always check block dimensions on allhomes.com.au. It's a quick no-fuss way to get reasonable data for most properties in Australia.

E.g.

 

AFAIK there's no basis for providing prospective purchasers with a floorplan other than for marketing purposes ie it doesn't form part of the contract which is the documentation that you are reliant and bound.

B&P, plans, DA conditions, handshakes, flyover video presentations etc are not generally referenced in the contract for sale.

Who pays for it? The vendor ie you when you come to sell & then you complain about how much you got ripped by the agents & conveyancers.

Here's a novel idea - put all of the marketing, contract preparation, documentation costs onto the purchaser. That way the vendor only pays the 1-10% commission to the agent.

 

In Perth it's pretty rare to get a floor plan. In the last couple of years some people have started including them but I would say at least around 80% still don't have floor plans.
When you are trying to buy without floor plans you are grateful for even a 2yo drawing on a napkin depicting the layout of the home.

 

In the next few weeks I hope to measure the rooms properly prior to settlement, but for now, an interesting observation. The garage is cited as 6.1 X 3.0 metres. The REA flier has a picture of a car in the garage. The car has four doors and a small boot. The car is 3.7 metres long, possible. At the widest point, excluding the mirrors, the car is ... 1.5 metres wide. Cosy. My desk is wider than this! The car probably doesn't have a 22" screen and a printer.

A garage width of 3.0 metres is fine, seems to be a standard of some sort. The garage shows a car with a lot of room, misleading. The car picture is deceptive.

Note the pattern. Room dimension shown bigger than they are, car picture smaller than most four door cars.