Water Damage in a Queensland Body Corporate: Who Pays?

The starting split: common property vs the lot

The body corporate must maintain the common property in good condition — in a building format plan (most apartment buildings), that includes the structure, roofing membranes, and the boundary structures between lots and common property. The lot owner, in turn, must maintain their lot in good condition, including the fixtures and fittings within it.

So far, so simple. Water complicates it because water travels — the thing that failed and the thing that got damaged are usually in different places, owned by different people.

The myth to let go of

"The body corporate must keep the building watertight" is the most common misconception in Queensland strata, and it isn't the law. The body corporate is responsible for water ingress only where the cause is something the body corporate must maintain. If rain gets in through a failed waterproofing membrane in the roof or a balcony — common property in a building format plan — that's the body corporate. If it gets in because of failed tiles or an improvement the owner installed, that can be the owner's problem, even though it feels like "the building leaking."

The cause decides — which is why the first dollar spent on any serious water event should be on identifying the source properly, not patching the symptom.

Pipes: the "who does it serve?" test

For utility infrastructure — pipes, wiring, ducts — the BCCM Act draws the line by service, not location. Infrastructure that services more than one lot is generally common property, even where it runs inside a lot's walls. Infrastructure that services only one lot is generally that owner's responsibility — hot water systems, air conditioning units, the branch pipe feeding a single unit.

The test turns on service, not location: a pipe that bursts inside the wall of an owner's bathroom can still be common property if it doesn't supply that lot alone — and where common property infrastructure fails, responsibility for the resulting damage sits with the body corporate. Establishing which kind of pipe failed — usually a plumber's report — is what settles the question.

When damage crosses lots

The classic case: a failure upstairs, a ruined ceiling downstairs. Where property is damaged because someone contravened the Act or the community management statement — a body corporate failing to maintain a common property membrane, or an owner failing to maintain something in their lot — an adjudicator can order the responsible party to carry out repairs (up to $75,000) or reimburse repair costs already incurred (up to $10,000).

The example written into the legislation itself is a leaking waterproofing membrane in the roof damaging wallpaper and carpet in a lot below: common property membrane, body corporate failed to maintain it, body corporate can be ordered to fix the lot.

But responsibility follows fault, not gravity. Where the source is a tenant's overflowing bath and there was no failure by the body corporate to maintain anything, the body corporate is generally not liable for the downstairs damage — that sits between the owners and their insurers.

Where insurance fits

The body corporate's building insurance typically responds to damage from sudden events, and the practical fights are usually about the excess. Under the Standard Module, for an insurable event affecting only one lot, the starting position is that the lot's owner bears the excess unless the body corporate decides that would be unreasonable in the circumstances — and where the leak traces to someone's utility infrastructure, the body corporate can resolve to place the excess with that person. Contents are the owner's own insurance, always.

The record decides the dispute

Every water dispute that reaches an adjudicator turns on evidence: when the problem was reported, what the committee did, which trade inspected, what they found, what was quoted, what was decided, and when. Committees that can produce that trail resolve disputes quickly — often without an adjudicator at all.