Growth By Region Revealed

Strata growth in Queensland – which region had the most growth?

It’s our favourite time of the year – announcing which strata region has grown the most over the past year.

And for the second year in a row the title goes to… The Sunshine Coast which recorded a 2.93% growth in schemes in the past year! Clearly the Sunny Coast is the place to be in Queensland right now – maybe it’s time to pack up and move?

Followed by Toowoomba which saw a 2.39% growth, Moreton Bay with 1.8%, Gold Coast and Brisbane with 1.29% and 1.17% respectively, and up north in Cairns with a 0.75% increase.

Read on for the latest facts and figures published by the Office of the Commissioner’s Office:

 Community titles sector and BCCM : Facts and figures

The community titles sector continued to grow over the last financial year, as shown by the data from Titles Queensland:

Consistent with previous years, more than half of all schemes were registered under the standard regulation module.  At the end of the 2020/21 financial year, the number of schemes registered under the various regulation modules stood at:

There were no significant changes in the relative size of new schemes over the financial year:

Did you know?

In June 2021, the State’s titles registry services transferred to the Queensland Future Fund, enabled by the Queensland Future Fund (Titles Registry) Act 2021. The titles registry is now Titles Queensland and is separate from the Department of Resources.  You can access titles registry activity data, including the above community titles schemes statistics, on the new Titles Queensland website.

 BCCM SERVICES

There has also been an increase in demand for many of our services in the last financial year.

In terms of our dispute services, clearance rates compare the number of dispute applications finalised to the number of applications lodged. This shows us the ability of our office to manage the inflow of dispute resolution applications. Clearance rates have generally remained at high levels over the previous four years, from 2016/17 to 2019/20   , averaging 99 per cent.  However the data for the last financial year shows that we experienced a 9.1 per cent increase in dispute applications.  While we also finalised a record number of applications – 1748 – an increase of 6.3 per cent from the previous year, our clearance rate fell slightly below our target, to 94 per cent.

The increase in applications received has translated to delays for some parties.  In 2020/21, 75 per cent of conciliation applications finalised were done so in under 14 weeks.  This was up from seven weeks in the previous year. Of the adjudication applications finalised in 2020/21, 75 per cent of those finalised by orders were finalised within 24 weeks, an increase from 19 weeks in the previous year. The percentage of adjudication applications that are more than six months old has also increased by 2.1 percentage points, to 8.6 per cent.  We are working hard to improve the efficiency of our services and to minimise any delays for parties in the year ahead. I am also pleased to confirm that we have continued to maintain high quality dispute services. In 2020/21, over 80 per cent of clients recommended the conciliation process in post-conciliation session surveys and most matters were either resolved in conciliation or did not proceed to adjudication. Of adjudicators’ orders in 2020/21, only 0.2 per cent were overturned or altered on appeal.

In terms of our information and community education services, the high level of demand experienced in 2019/20 continued into 2020/21.  We received more than 20,000 email and telephone enquiries over the last year, however more than 99 per cent of these received a response within service standards. This meant that almost all clients received a reply to their telephone enquiries within 24 hours and to their written enquiries within 14 days.

We receive telephone enquiries from a number of different parties in the community titles sector. Some common topics of the enquiries we received included:

–          Committee membership, processes and decision-making
–          Maintenance and improvements
–          General meeting procedures
–          Dispute resolution processes
–          By-laws.

We will be working on the information we provide around these topics in the year ahead to help ensure we are continuing to provide our clients with the information they need, when they need it.

This article was contributed by Strata Community Association (QLD) and the Commissioner for Body Corporate and Community Management.

If you would like further information or have a question about this article, please contact the Office of the Commissioner for Body Corporate and Community Management by phone on 1800 060 119 or by submitting an online enquiry at www.qld.gov.au/bodycorporatequestion