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Strata Cleaners Plan of common property
One strata scheme from above: eight lots off a corridor in a block, and four townhouses on their own land, with everything that is not a lot shaded 12345678 stair lift bin room corridor entry shared garden T1T2T3T4 shared driveway street common property a lot LIT: ALL THE COMMON PROPERTY N One strata scheme from above, drawn tall: the corridor runs down the sheet with four lots either side, and the townhouse row sits below a ruled line marked on its own land 12345678 binrooma stairb liftc corridord entrye on its own land shared gardenf T1T2T3T4 shared drivewayg street
  1. a b c f g the bin room, the stair, the lift, the shared garden and the shared driveway: who cleans the common property
  2. d the corridor: who hires the cleaner, and on what terms
  3. e the entry lobby: what to do when the common areas are not being cleaned
  4. 1 to 8 the lots, and the share of the cleaning each one pays: who pays for cleaning the common areas
  5. T1 to T4 the townhouses on their own land: balconies and courtyards
  6. walls the wall between a lot and the common property: where a lot ends and the common property begins
  7. LIT: ALL THE COMMON PROPERTY
Question 1 of 6

Who cleans the common property in a strata building?

An owners corporation or strata committee in New South Wales; an owners corporation in Victoria and the ACT; a body corporate in Queensland, South Australia and Tasmania; a strata company in Western Australia.

Covers Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia, the ACT and Tasmania. General information about strata law in seven jurisdictions, not legal advice; your scheme’s own plan and by-laws decide.

The official pages

The pages behind this answer, jurisdiction by jurisdiction:

What counts as common property

Common property is the negative of a lot: any part of a parcel that is not comprised in a lot (New South Wales), or property jointly owned by all the owners and not contained within any lot (Western Australia).

Victoria’s pages list what it may include: gardens, passages, walls, pathways, driveways, stairs, lifts, foyers and fences. New South Wales gives driveways, gardens, roofs, pipes, cables and external walls as examples.

Who is responsible for it

New South Wales’s Act says an owners corporation must properly maintain and keep the common property in a state of good and serviceable repair.

  • Western Australia: the strata company’s responsibilities include managing the common property, the scheme’s financial management, enforcing by-laws and obtaining insurance for the scheme.
  • Victoria: the owners corporation must manage and administer the common property.
  • For a cleaning contract in practice, Queensland’s pages say the manager is not responsible for maintenance of the common property, but may organise the work if the committee asks them to.

What an owner looks after inside a lot

Inside the lot is the owner’s: Queensland says a lot owner is responsible for the maintenance of most things inside the boundary of their lot, and New South Wales says owners repair and maintain anything within their own property.

Which side of that line a balcony, a window or a courtyard falls on has its own question: Where does my lot end and the common property begin?

Seven jurisdictions, side by side

How far a lot reaches is worded differently. In New South Wales it is the inner surface of the wall, or the boundaries the floor plan describes.

In South Australia it is the inside face of the walls, floors and ceilings, unless the strata plan says otherwise.

In the ACT a Class B unit, such as a townhouse, has a boundary defined by a surveyed line around the land.

What the official pages of each jurisdiction say about who is responsible for common property
JurisdictionWho is responsible
QLDThe body corporate administers the common property and the body corporate assets for the benefit of all of the owners.
NSWThe owners corporation or strata committee must repair and maintain the common property.
VICThe owners corporation must, among other things, manage, administer, repair and maintain the common property.
WAThe strata company’s responsibilities include managing the common property and the financial management of the scheme.
SAThe body corporate includes all owners, maintains the common property and enforces the rules.
ACTThe owners corporation, made up of the unit owners, manages finances and administration relating to the common property and the building.
TASThe body corporate holds the common property in trust for the owners of the lots.

What your own scheme decides

A scheme’s own plan and by-laws decide the rest: New South Wales says different schemes have different areas classified as common property, and you can check your strata plan and by-laws.

In New South Wales a scheme can choose to adopt the common property memorandum if its by-laws do not define common property.

An owner can check the records: Queensland says a body corporate must keep certain records and let some people see and copy them.

The ACT’s Unit Titles (Management) Act says that, on a written request from an eligible person with the fee the owners corporation fixes, records must be made available for inspection within 14 days; where a dispute exists, documents covered by legal professional privilege in relation to it may be withheld.

Where the rest of the question is answered

Who the cleaner is engaged by, and on what terms, is its own question: Who hires the strata cleaner, and on what terms? So is the share each lot pays: Who pays for cleaning the common areas?