Communication Channel with Owner

1. A Tenant is not paying the 'management agency' a fee for service, the Tenant is paying rent to the Lessor. What the Lessor pays the PM is nothing to do with the Tenant.

2. The Lessor is kept informed by the PM frequently this is why routine inspections are carried out every 3 months with photographic reports.

 

Unsure why the term 'power' is thrown around so much. Apart from the free market economy deciding who the market favours at a point in time (supply & demand and which side you're on), the Legislation never changes, it's an open book freely available on line and all stake holders - Lessor/Agent and Tenant - have ready access available to it and ready access available to the RTA & QCAT in Qld for example, there is no 'shift' in power' so far as rights go etc.

If anything the more these reforms go on the more they get unbalanced in the Tenants favour. Consider already, the Lessor must give the Tenant 2 months notice to leave but the Tenant must only give the Lessor 2 weeks notice. Now they're trying to remove the Lessor's ability altogether to choose not to do business with a Tenant anymore when a mutually agreed fixed-term contract ends and the Tenant can choose to continue doing business for as long as they want, again how is that supposed to be balanced?

 

Regarding point 2, I agree that In theory thats what should happen, and no doubt the good PMs do that. Browsing these forums coincides with my own observations that good PMs are not necessarily the norm however.

Regarding point 1, Its somewhat splitting hairs but as far as I am concerned I pay $x to a PM to reside in a property and I expect a standard of service.
What subsequently happens to that rent money is nothing to do with me, hence I consider myself a customer of the PM. What the PM keeps or distributes to the lessor is of no interest to me.

 

This is where the misunderstanding is by a lot of Tenants in my opinion, it's not the same as a person being a customer at a restaurant. The Agent is an Agent for the Lessor and the Tenant is not paying the Agent for a service to be provided, they are paying rent to the Lessor and the Agent is simply the straw man in their place just the same as if the Tenant was dealing direct with the Lessor. There is definitely a consumer relationship between the Tenant and the Lessor and that is outlined in the Tenancy Agreement (eg. the obligations of who must do what and so on etc).

 

Using the 'consumer and restaurant' metaphor, the above is like saying a patron at a venue has given the right to stay past the businesses closing time

 

There are many reasons owners hire a property manager. The first would be that they don't have the time, knowledge or expertise to handle all of their rental property needs themselves and hiring someone else who does is more efficient for them in terms of both cost and time management. Second, an objective third party can keep things running smoothly without personal bias by stepping in if there's ever any conflict between owner and tenant because they know what it takes legalistically while also understanding how this impacts financially on each side. Therefore, 1 to 1 communication between owner and tenant is avoided.

But during Covid for example, it was great being able to help tenants in urgent situations through personal communication. I think we can allow tenants to contact us in some situations.

 

You actually pay your rent into a trust account for the owner. Your not paying the PM at all. It’s almost like saying because you paid your money into an ANZ bank account, the ANZ bank now works for you.

 

None of which negates my entitlement to a standard of service however.

 

And there you have it Entitlments.
What you are entitled to is laid out in the Act and your lease contract nothing more.
As stated before the property manager doesn't work for you, you have no contract with them. There is no way you can twist this to make it so. In fact if I was to get a whiff my PM was "working" for the Tenant against my best interest there will be a new PM immediately.
If my tenant was to ring me direct I will just refer them back to the property manager, that I am paying and have a contract with. If I wanted to take calls from the tenant I would self manage. Yes even things like Covid changes.
Typically a tenant direct calling will be to try and skirt around issues.

 

Typically a tenant calling (or CC'ing an owner in on an email) is due to a non responsive PM. In that regard, yes I am entitled to a standard of service.

The attitude of 'you are entitled to no more than what the act provides' is exaclty why the act gets ammened seemingly in favor of tenants, which is then of course met with cries from some landlords of 'oh how unfair we are treated'.
NSW legislation now requires landlord contact details to be provided as if to prove my point.

You shouldn't be so concerned about a PM working for a tenant against you, you should be wanting a PM working for the pair of you. Each can reduce themselves to the minum requried under the act, but is that in anyones best interest?

 

Sounds like what you really want is a Tenant Agent! I will be your tenant agent and my fee is 7.5% +gst of the weekly rent you pay and I will be your advocate in the fight against unruly landlords and evil property managers.

Nb. An Agent cannot/should not represent both parties, just like a lawyer doesn’t represent both parties

 

Haha thanks for the offer, Ill self manage for now.
Fortunately there's a plethora of rental listings in my area so I can afford to be picky on property/pricing at the moment.

To be fair I've never met an evil PM... just completely useless/absent ones. Everynow and then a very good one comes along but they are certainly not they norm.

 

Just coining the usual jargon slewed on the various tenancy advocate group pages

 

When you have had PM cost because they allowed a tenant to damage your place, get behind in rent by more than possible to recover, you may understand.
(I was young and niave let a bad PM put their mates in and screw me over).
I acknowledged every request the tenant put forward to make it easier for them and still got screwed.

Now I hold my PM to account to ensure the terms of the lease are adhered to as per the Act.
In return I do what is required of me as the LL as per the lease and Act.

Your absolute insistence the PM works for theTenant is a total crock. The tenant has no legal or financial agreement with the PM. The Tenant cannot instruct the PM to do anything.
The PM is their point of contact.

 

Never made an absolute insistence the PM works soley for the tenant.

The PM is thier point of contact..... except when the PM is uncontactable, and that no doubt the reason NSW now requires the landlords contact details to be provided to tenants.
It's obviously ruffled a few landlords who may have failed to question why this change was deemed necessary in the first place.

 

Does the amended act require nsw owners to respond to the tenant contact?

 

Nope. I.assume its so that when a tenant has an issue such as water ingress into a newly renovated property that after a couple of weeks and a dozen/calls emails to a PM that doesnt responded the tenant can reach out to the owner who might be somewhat interested in preventing the problem getting worse (my most recent experience).

Some LLs still remain staunch advocates of no contact from a tenant however. I guess one can only try.

 

Sounds like emergency repairs were needed, did the Tenant read their lease and follow their obligations in their agreement to make arrangements when they couldn't get a response or action out of the Lessor/Agent? (Qld example):

 

Nope. I dont consider the water tightness of a building to be an emergency. For the longevity of recent renovations however it might have warranted attention.
If I owned the property I would have wanted to know about it, and I would have wanted a please explain from the PM as to why I hadn't been notified sooner.

At the end of the day its not onerous to ignore a CC'd email it if such matters dont interest you.