About Us
Zlata Rous
Who am I?
Zlata Rous is a fierce advocate of strata owners’ rights in NSW.
Her background and experience in dealing with fraud in strata should ring alarm bells to all apartment owners.
It does not matter if you have several apartments in a scheme, the current system allows owners to be defrauded by strata companies and those same strata companies can easily repeat this pattern for years and decades as is the case in NSW.
Background
Zlata started in real estate more than 30 years ago. In those days some big banks openly refused loans to young women and discrimination was standard. As well as embarking on a professional teaching career, Zlata took her business elsewhere and purchased her first house a few months later.
Since those early years, Zlata has been involved in a myriad of investments, from dabbling in property development, buying more houses, and buying several apartments off the plan in an ever quest to get the right strategies in the right market conditions. She has also been involved in numerous court cases to untangle and protect her investments. Her extensive knowledge is a direct result of why Zlata remains today in the top bracket of property investors.
In addition to personal investing, Zlata also specialised in selling apartments to high-net individuals and syndicates in her real estate business 20 years ago. Her clientele base was doctors, high net-worth investors, and syndicate groups who sought her expertise and impeccable reputation. Markets inevitably changed and she developed a business in the specialised area of corporate executive rentals which was a lucrative area for investors. In those early days, Zlata gained valuable first-hand knowledge of how strata operate in many Sydney residential buildings.
Decades later with the introduction of short-term rental platforms like Airbnb, significant conflict was erupting in many strata schemes. As far back as 2013, it became apparent to Zlata (and her team) that strata living was far from the glossy lifestyle brochures and community marketing spin.
Strata today in NSW
The reality is owners are still seen as second-class citizens. This is not the case in other parts of the world. In NSW, strata companies can openly defraud owners by numerous means, and regulators like the Department of Fair Trading and Strata Community Association refuse to step in when formal complaints are made.
Even when disputes end up in the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal, individual owners are either brave or stupid to take on their strata committee and strata manager as they can operate in an open conflicted relationship. Added to these serious problems, the democratic process can be completely eroded in many schemes, and owners are left in the dark as to what is going on.
Apartment ownership in NSW has reached a crisis point where significant legislation must change to protect consumers’ biggest investments and restore confidence in a system lost to an industry still operating in a wild west mentality and boys networks of secret deals. Strata management companies are opportunists. They know legislation does not protect all owners and they exploit this with the unethical groups willing to play the games.
Zlata has seen and experienced it all. If a sophisticated investor can be targeted for fraud and could not stop it with her legal team, you bet most owners are and in most cases, they are not even aware of it. This explains her desire to change the industry and protect consumers. Where there are legal loopholes, there are opportunists ready to steal from you!
Society keeps evolving and today in 2023 we have over 2 million people living in apartments in Australia, and NSW accounts for over 47% of that figure. Not only is fraud on the rise in strata schemes but bullying and ongoing illegal attacks on owners are regularly reported.
Zlata has seen and personally experienced widespread massive fraud in her schemes. Zlata is one of the first brave owners in NSW to expose the illegal strategies used by strata companies to fleece owners of huge dollars in their strata scheme. Inevitably there are wider ramifications of the rise in fraud and bullying in schemes than is reported.