Sign up with GoogleThe trustees are like the directors of a company. They cannot run the company representing the interests of the shareholders (the body corporate) if they don't know who they are. The managing agent is just an administrative person or company acting on instruction of the trustees.
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Popi act and how it can influence future Sectional title meetings
- Thread starter tawdry
- Start date
The trustees are like the directors of a company. They cannot run the company representing the interests of the shareholders (the body corporate) if they don't know who they are. The managing agent is just an administrative person or company acting on instruction of the trustees.
swakop_toe
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2013
- Messages
- 420
And this ^^^^
I am on the board of trustees of a HOA.
If your managing agent is any good, they MUST advise and guide you on the process to call a SGM. They do not protect the Board of Trustees, they are paid to act as intermediary and advisors to all the trustees/owners.
Hi
If the governing body has 3 members they can potentially secure 9 votes with 2 proxies a piece gathered from members I have no access to and to who they can tell any story they want to secure the proxies.. So my access to a maximum vote of 5 people which is all I have the ability to contact is fair?.
So If you were on trail and a witness testified against you but you were not alowed in the courtroom during the testimony not allowed to cross examine the witness after nor even told the witness identity you would be absolutely fine with whatever verdict the court dealt out????? That is essentially how this law is set up c'mon man how can you argue in favor of that?
When you call an SGM the notice for the SGM will be accompanied by an agenda (including the reason for calling the SGM) with an attached proxy form. If your fellow owners are too idiotic to read the agenda and blindly provide their proxies to the trustees you've got bigger problems than the trustees especially if you're calling for a vote of no confidence. Your analogy of a court trial is hardly an apt comparison as you're not prejudiced as long as the process is followed.
I am going to continue to disagree on this.If I do not have access to their information surely they don't have access to mine. So any query as to why the vote of no confidence could potentially only go towards the chairperson who can then spin it without counter.
Everyone keeps reducing this to my situation but I am trying to look at the bigger picture as a whole.How this could effect and harm anyone not in power from challenging those who are. Access to information is a big deal.I
just feel this law needs tweaking.
I still like my analogy of the court case.
I wonder if I would even be allowed to examine a proxy vote what if its filled out incorrect.For instance a trustee proxy must state specifically what the vote is been cast in favor of it can't be a catch all like a standard owner proxy.
You have multiple mechanisms which to challenge the status quo yet you are convinced that not being able to contact all owners is a disadvantage when the various mechanisms for doing so are prescribed, enforceable and not negotiable. If your reason for request of an SGM is valid and of substance then you should have no fear of it being spun by anyone.
All resolutions to be voted on are a matter of record requiring them to be minuted and documented and those present are there to ensure any voting is representative, fair and recorded adequately at the time. If you have an issue with a specific resolution you challenge the resolution itself not who voted in favour or against it.
Even though, as others have set out, there is a formal procedure for calling a special Meeting, I think you do have a point about its potentially being to your disadvantage that you do not know who the other owners are.
If you knew who they were, you could speak to them or mail them to campaign for your point of view, well in advance of the next meeting. And if they heard from you what you are trying to get changed, then they might a) be more inclined to attend the next meeting themselves, or b) be less inclined to grant a proxy to the very person who might be contentious.
It is, of course, also possible that they may disagree with you, and work to oppose what you are trying to achieve. And of course, someone will surely inform the person you wish to oppose that you (and perhaps other owners who agree with you) have become active. But at least you'd be having the conversations yourself, and learning how the other owners see things, and explaining what you think should be done to remedy the situation.
Therefore, in your position I would set about trying to find out who the other owners are. Here are suggestions to try:
If you knew who they were, you could speak to them or mail them to campaign for your point of view, well in advance of the next meeting. And if they heard from you what you are trying to get changed, then they might a) be more inclined to attend the next meeting themselves, or b) be less inclined to grant a proxy to the very person who might be contentious.
It is, of course, also possible that they may disagree with you, and work to oppose what you are trying to achieve. And of course, someone will surely inform the person you wish to oppose that you (and perhaps other owners who agree with you) have become active. But at least you'd be having the conversations yourself, and learning how the other owners see things, and explaining what you think should be done to remedy the situation.
Therefore, in your position I would set about trying to find out who the other owners are. Here are suggestions to try:
- The printed flyer is one option. Distribute it in person into each letter-box, and a second copy to each door, in person if someone will open for you, and otherwise try to post it under or tape it to the door.
- Read through a number of previous Minutes of meetings, and pick up the names (and the troublesome issues, if they were already recorded) from there. If you do not have those minutes, (perhaps because you are a new owner) then ask your management agent (or an owner you already know) to supply you with copies.
- Knock on each door and ask the residents whether they are tenants or owners. If tenants, ask how you could contact their landlords, or if they won't give you the info, then ask them to ask their landlord to contact you. (You'll have more success with this if you take care to explain that your wanting to speak to the owner is not to complain about that tenant.)
- Have a look at the cars, and see if anyone has a business info painted on the vehicle, that you can google/trace to be connected to the owner.
- If there are long-term cleaning and maintenance staff in the complex, ask them. They might well know who owns what, or know which owners are friends with which other owners, and sometimes even have contact details, especially if they at some point have worked directly for those owners, in addition to their jobs for the Body Corporate.
- Have a look in the municipal Valuation Roll.
- Enquire at the Deeds' Office.
- Subscribe to a property search service.
- Buy a property report on each unit.
- Find out if there is a Neighbourhood Watch organisation, or a Community Improvement group, perhaps beyond the owners in your complex. Someone somewhere will have a WhatsApp group or a Facebook group, and may know an owner or two from your complex.
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The "like" was for all the effort you have gone to in this reply.
You did miss one option? at least in this case. I could write a blanket email and insist the managing agents send it to all those involved(owners).However there could be no way for me to be sure that they ever did as instructed.
On a broader scale I just think this is going to allow those in power in all areas not just this narrow example to easier avoid blame and or retain power. Journalists are going to find it harder and harder to get to any truth.I think its a nightmare law without some serious amendments but maybe I'm not understanding it correctly.
Back to my narrow case here. Just to be clear of what information I actually asked for it wasn't even contact details it was just the names and units that were owned in the scheme.
The managing agents are already breaking there own popi stance. The AGM minutes contain the name and unit of the proxies received so giving a proxy in essence now means giving away some privacy(name and unit owned). In future you would have to have such vague wording as
"the person who owns a unit within this complex gives proxy to this other person who owns this other unit in this complex blah blah blah". You would have to obtain consent to give out more information than this or explain somewhere on the proxy form that by giving out this proxy you agree to such personal details to be made common knowledge.
It would be increasingly hard to spot shady dealing for instance in my case a couple years ago at an AGM the chairpersons daughter was credited as been the owner of a unit later at the same meeting suddenly the chairperson is credited as been the owner of that unit.At the next years meeting the chairperson is still the owner of this unit but now her daughter is the owner of one of the other chairpersons units(has 3) it like they playing a game of hot potato with the units .
Either the person typing out the minutes is an incompetant boob or its just outright fraud?
I can now ask at the upcoming AGM for an explanation. However if the persons identities were withheld I would never see the connection.
Maybe I'm sounding nuts?
If the chairperson has four or five or six units in effect it doesn't matter if the daughter is the owner of the one unit or not - the combined participation quota vote outcome is technically the SAME. As many have pointed out it is NOT ONE unit ONE vote nor ONE person ONE vote . It's technically each vote has a weight based on the participation quota in the scheme. Read the related sectional title acts and the POPI act- you have a skewed understanding of both. Furthermore, it's not a violation of POPI to have personal details contained in an organisations minutes or related documentation but who and how it's made available/protected and for what purpose it is shared which is important iro the act.
I think you missed my point here Quo. How can she own a unit that her mother owns?they could co own it ?Transferring a unit to someone else would be expensive so seems unlikely that they would be doing that. I don't think her daughter owns anything .How do i get to see the title deed for the units when Popi would prevent that?
As for that one unit 1 vote
There is this guy who is a trustee(never present) who gives 2 proxies every year 1 for each of his units so that is then wrong?How does giving 2 proxies differ from 1 proxy that has the weight of 2 units in what sort of situation would that make a difference.
Thx
1. The Deeds Registry Act is separate to POPI thus the information at the deeds office is publicly available and is not subject to POPI.
2. I'm saying it technically doesn't make a difference since it's supposed to be according to participation quota. ie. If there are 10 units of 5x 500sqm and 5x 100sqm then owning 3 of the 500sqm means your voting power is 1500sqm or 50% of the voting power (3000sqm total) thus splitting it as 2x 25%, 3x 16.66% or 1x 16.66% and 1x 33.33% doesn't make a difference.
No you are not, read the Act, it makes provision for these details to be made available to any BC member (for the correct purposes of course). POPI has nothing to do with it, unless you use the info obtained to send them spam. Managing agent needs to comply with the request, some do not want to and quote POPI out of context, others want to frustrate you by stating that they do not provide electronic copies and "...will make it available for viewing on site...". If you encounter any of these, lodge a complaint with CSOS, who will order the managing agent to make electronic copy available.
So if everyone had the same sized units in a block of 20 and 1 person owned 11 with 9 individuals owning the rest those 9 people will have no say in how the property is run in terms of voting power?
Kosmik
Honorary Master
- Joined
- Sep 21, 2007
- Messages
- 25,659
Majority vote yes, some votes require 2/3 though but it boils down to owner quotient.
Welcome to sectional title living. The 1 person is also paying 11x more than each of the 9 other people and has 11x more exposure should there be a special levy if things aren't run properly. It also depends though on the type of resolution. eg. Special resolutions require 75%.
Two options as I see it
1) Follow the process and request special meeting and instruct managing agent to send notices to owners.
2) Look up owners details on Deeds registry, if your in CPT you can do it online. Contact them directly.
Non residing owners generally want the easy way out and cant be asked to get involved in additional drama. They want to rent their unit out, collect rent and make sure the sectional title is running and being maintained.
1) Follow the process and request special meeting and instruct managing agent to send notices to owners.
2) Look up owners details on Deeds registry, if your in CPT you can do it online. Contact them directly.
Non residing owners generally want the easy way out and cant be asked to get involved in additional drama. They want to rent their unit out, collect rent and make sure the sectional title is running and being maintained.
Thank you I shall do so If we do not succeed at the upcoming AGM meeting.Owners have tried the SGM route before but non residings just blindly give there proxy. or maybe we will just all retreat back into our shells and stick our head in the sands and wait for the glorious release of death.
Sorry went to a deep dark place for a moment.
Yea but this woman has only 3 units of 20 unfortunately her daughter has another and she appoints her tenant to the trustees who can then further hold 2 more proxies using the weight of her role as "caretaker".Half of the other units are rented out .And of the 8 residing residents 4 have the combined IQ of the only natural number not to be positive .
Sorry for double post was meant to be an edit.
hellfire
Honorary Master
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2007
- Messages
- 11,625
You can get owner information from the deeds office. Obviously this would cost money, but not excessive considering you want to stage a coup.
Then once you have names, you can start tracking down contact details.