Episode 12: Kate Yeowart - Knowing The Different Types of Property Titles

Kate Yeowart from Strata Equity Management comes on the show today to talk to us about the different titles property can have, how an owner's corporation is involved and knowing what you need to be responsible for.

Owning a property doesn’t necessarily mean that you have the right to do what you want with it. Sometimes you need to get Owner’s Corporation agreement to change anything externally, sometimes it’s just not allowed based on the title. Knowing what type of title you are buying before you buy can make it all a lot easier to accept what is possible and what isn’t. Today we want to know how to decipher what title is what, and we have REIV member, and the director of strata equity management in to tell us all about it.

Intro:

A respected leader in the Strata Management industry, Kate Yeowart is the director of Strata Equity Management. Kate has worked in all facets of real estate, has been a law clerk and been in credit management, so she knows all the different sides of strata management. Kate holds a degree in political science, which she puts good use in her business. A credit to the industry, welcome Kate.

Grant: Kate, why did you choose strata management over all other sectors in real estate?

1. What are the types of titles you could expect on an apartment or unit block?
A) Can you describe the differences between them?
B) Where would you find out what type of title the property has?
2. What would be considered the best title to have?
3. Would I have to pay stamp duty on a company share title?
4. Which suburbs would you expect to see a company share title?
5. What about a house that might be on a battle-axe block – that is, a shared driveway between the neighbouring properties? What would we need to consider when buying a house with a battle-axe block?
6. What should we be looking out for with subdivided blocks?
7. Sarah from Prahran is buying her first home and is looking at an apartment close to where she is renting. She saw an Owner’s Corporation fee on the Section 32. What does an Owner’s Corporation do for that fee?
a. What do they also do with that fee?
b. How much of that fee goes to paying for someone to run the owner’s corporation?
8. Who is responsible for insurance excess in an owner’s corporation?