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Sub-Division |
Vendor's obligation to register the plan |
A vendor selling a lot in a prospective sub-division must use their best endeavours to get the plan registered within six months. If not registered within that time-frame, the purchaser, or both parties jointly, may annul the contract. However, the vendor can withdraw only if he or she has done 'everything reasonable' to register the plan. |
Registering a plan for a subdivision, whether of numerous lots or only two, usually needs the specialised services of surveyors and engineers to comply with the requirements of the council and other statutory bodies, such as Sydney Water. A developer is rarely directly involved in the practical steps of registering a plan. |
However, the failure of a third-party specialist to do something that is necessary for registration of a plan within time will not give a vendor the right to rescind the contract. |
Some court decisions in the last three years show that the obligation to do everything reasonable under the Contract for Sale of Land can be troublesome. |
In one case the judge found that the contract imposed a strict obligation on the vendor. The vendor's personal circumstances, knowledge of or ignorance of what is required and reliance on agents or contractors, are all irrelevant to the vendor's obligations, the judge said. "If a step is reasonable the vendor must take it ... The only protection the purchaser has against rescission is the stringency of the condition." |
An earlier case found that liability for things which were within the seller's own personal responsibility was unqualified, but that the seller was not liable for delay caused by specialists, such as architects, engineers and builders, unless they failed to remedy the delay when they could have done so by, for example, hiring another builder. |
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