Property

Updated conveyancing tariff guidelines will come into operation on 1 June.

Featherbrooke is a secured residential estate. Burglars gained access and invaded the residence of one of its residents and shot/assaulted the family. The residents sued the estate, alleging that the homeowner’s association owed them a duty of care to prevent unauthorised access to the estate. The HOA had appointed a security company to secure the estate but, did the estate have a duty to protect residents simply because it is the association of the homeowners of the estate and the estate is a secured residential estate? No.
Reference

Does the Sectional Titles Act deprive individual owners in a sectional title scheme of legal standing to enforce zoning scheme provisions, applicable to common property owned by that scheme? Yes, it does deprive individual owners of that right: Reference

Property 360 ran an article stating that residential apartments are not necessarily a good investment for the future: it bases its opinion on vacancy rates and the prospect of flat rental growth. Take a look: Reference

Property Professional published statistics to the effect that single women are now our biggest group of property buyers: Reference

A note in the Real Estate Investor Magazine suggests that older persons make better tenants.

That same magazine has a note on life rights which may be interesting to read (in fact, a write-up on retirement villages follows): Reference

 

 

Practice

Grmintelligence reports that SA legal partners had received an increase of up to 15% in 2019, compared to associates who were looking at 7 – 10% increase. In large firms, junior partners earned from R1.2m upwards and equity partners earned fromR2.1m upwards.
Most practices have a rule of thumb that one is paid approximately ¼ of what one writes as fees.
An interesting comment, by Grmintelligence was that, in difficult times one does not hire for skills; one hires for a following.
Take a look: Reference

When attending to a transfer, where the status of a married owner has changed (generally to unmarried), it is practice to lodge proof of the divorce together with a certified copy of the settlement agreement, if any. If the divorce order emanates from outside of South Africa, that document must be authenticated.

Does Telkom become the possessor of its cables, within a sleeve, running under property belonging to another? If so, does the installation of optic fibre cables in those sleeves by another amount to spoliation? The SCA declined to pronounce on the first but decided that the shared use of such a sleeve did not deprive Telkom of anything and declined a spoliation order in its favour.
Reference

What is the difference between a surety and the guarantee? I was, recently confronted with this question and chanced upon the following, which is of assistance, although not technically up to much when one needs details: Reference

the Buffalo City municipality attempted to withdraw a case after commencement thereof by filing a settlement agreement which it wished to have made an order of court. One of the difficulties that the court had with this apparently sensible suggestion, was that the proposed settlement agreement built on an initially unlawful agreement. Take a look: Reference

 

Quotable

Time doesn’t go. Time stays. We go.
Ellerbee

 

Comment

Bayete! King Goodwill has launched a royal brandy which will retail for R2k a bottle: that will waste you!

To revert to our Moroccan visit: stones in southern Morocco are plentiful. Yet the locals build in mud. The result is that very little of lasting significance can be found. Does anyone know why they eschew one for the other?