With close to 50 per cent of all properties in the Greater Victoria area being strata, many owners should be concerned with the recent enacted Strata Property Act changes regarding depreciation reporting. The less-than-five-unit exemption from the new law needs to be reconsidered.
Obviously the new rules are great for insurance companies and mortgage lenders, since now strata will be paying for the information these companies need to make their decisions. Similarly, the real estate brokers benefit from these documents. Another large benefit will fall to the professional engineers and other experts who, under the law, must be hired, at considerable expense to prepare the documents.
Is it reasonable to have 25 owners pay from $10,000 to $20,000 for a document that may help an owner sell his unit? Not only that, but it will raise the monthly strata fees and almost force those smaller strata into hiring a property manager at another $20 to $30 per unit per month?
Strata may exempt themselves by having a 75 per cent vote at a general meeting each year. However, the threat is that if a strata does not have these documents, it is hiding something and owners who want to sell will suffer due to difficulties getting mortgages for buyers and complexes will be facing larger insurance premiums.
The concept of depreciation reporting is a sound practice. However, is it necessary to have it forced in this manner on smaller stratas at such a huge cost?
Fred McLeod
Victoria
