There are several things sectional title trustees can do to ease the financial pressure on owners who might be struggling to pay their levies, as well as their home loan instalments and other debt commitments, says Andrew Schaefer, managing director of Trafalgar.
“We are, of course, also getting many inquiries from trustees worried about the financial future of their sectional title schemes, if owners just stop paying levies because they are not receiving any income during the lockdown and possibly afterwards as well,” he adds.
Options available to trustees to assist tenants include:
- Allowing them to catch up their arrear levies by a certain date later in the year and not take any legal action against them for the arrears until that date.
- Drawing up and signing a new levy resolution which states that levies are only payable in certain months or periods of the financial year and giving owners a payment holiday for this month and possibly next month.
- Drawing up a new annual budget for the scheme with reduced expenses and thus reduced levies for the remainder of the financial year. Each option carries its own considerations for revised agreements.