Strata building rules, by-laws, and covenants are a fundamental part of strata building legal, management and operational structures. But they have been restricted, overturned, modified, and criticised by strata law reforms, Court decisions, and commentators [including me] for a while now. In many cases, those outcomes and comments have been appropriate as they reflect a desire to make better rules, by-laws, and covenants, because some of them don’t properly reflect societal changes, and, as a result of poor drafting or application. However, rules, by-laws, and covenants still provide strata stakeholders with the best ways to modify how their strata buildings work to better suit strata owners and managers, to adapt to changing circumstances, new challenges, crises, and to deal with strata law changes.
So, how do rules, by-laws, and covenants work, what issues exist for them, and how have they been used to customise strata buildings?