This article is from the Australian Property Journal archive
LEGISLATION introduced to the Queensland parliament aiming to modernise the state’s property law, which includes disclosure rules to make it easier for home buyers to know more about the property they are buying, are “unnecessarily complicated” , according to the Real Estate Institute of Queensland.
The Property Law Bill 2023 will replace the current Property Law Act 1974, which has not been comprehensively reformed since it was introduced.
The Bill is based largely on the recommendations of the Commercial and Property Law Research Centre at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), following an independent review of the state’s property law.
The new scheme will make it mandatory for a seller of freehold land to disclose relevant information to the buyer in a single document along with any prescribed certificates, including a body corporate certificate, where relevant, and will prominently alert buyers to the need to undertake their own due diligence on flood information, and direct buyers to appropriate resources to access a property’s flood information.
“Owning and dealing with property, establishing co-ownership arrangements, signing and enforcing lease agreements, and managing mortgages are major transactions that affect Queenslanders everywhere,” said Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, Minister for Women and Minister for the Prevention of Domestic and Family Violence, Shannon Fentiman.
“The Queensland Government is taking action to ensure our state’s property laws are modern and fit for purpose.”
But the REIQ says it’s “disappointed” that the Bill has been “prematurely” introduced “while there’s still material matters to be worked through”.
REIQ CEO Antonia Mercorella “it’s alarming that the proposed legislation has been introduced into Parliament while we are still in the process of working through key stakeholder consultation”.
She said that while the body supported the introduction of a uniform statutory seller disclosure regime, this support was subject to the establishment of appropriate disclosure parameters and reasonable costs and accessibility to information associated with disclosure requirements.
The REIQ said its issues with the Bill include “impractical and unnecessarily complex” requirements associated with the provision of a disclosure statement at auctions, depending on whether a bidder arrived before or just after the commencement of an auction.
“The proposed requirements are unnecessarily complicated and demonstrate a lack of understanding of the principles of an auction sale,” REIQ CEO Antonia Mercorella said.
It took aim at the “counter-productive and regressive” reintroduction of community management statement (CMS) disclosure when selling lots in a community titles scheme. Mercorella said CMS “can be complex and voluminous and research has shown that consumers are often overwhelmed by too much paperwork and the information is therefore largely ignored”.
The REIQ also took umbrage with the Bill’s “ambiguity regarding circumstances giving rise to buyer termination rights; onerous obligations on sellers to disclose and describe unregistered encumbrances to buyers; (and) yet to be determined flood-related disclosures and warnings”.
