Miguel bought a car. Then there was a $2000 cost to charge it

When Miguel Frohlich bought his first electric vehicle, he was thrilled to be driving a car that wouldn’t contribute to pollution and would be so much cheaper to run.

But then, when he asked his apartment building if he could charge his Tesla on one of the no fewer than three power points in his garage and attach a meter to it so he could refund the cost, he drove into a blank wall.

Miguel Frohlich wants to charge his electric car at home, but can’t.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos

“They said no,” said Frohlich, 39, an environmental planner who’s been a renter in the apartment block on Sydney’s northern beaches for the past three years.

“Instead, they said I should install a fourth power point in the garage and directly connect it to my electricity meter. It was ridiculous.

“In addition, I would then have to pay for a lawyer to draft a bylaw to allow it to happen, cover the cost of holding a strata meeting to have it approved and pay for the installation by a qualified electrician. The total cost, I worked out, would be over $2000 – more than the cost of four years’ worth of electricity to power my car!”

Shocked and appalled, Frohlich is urging NSW politicians to introduce state government policy guidelines for apartment buildings to give their residents the right to charge EVs.

His case follows another reported by this masthead when an endocrinologist and obstetric physician was forced to dump his EV after his apartment building refused him permission, as a tenant, to use an existing power point.

And it’s not the only state that faces this challenge. In Victoria, about one in four Victorians live in strata-managed buildings that have not been set up for EV charging, says the state government, which warns that navigating often complex strata rules can make it a challenge to modify unit blocks.

And, when EV chargers require alterations to common property in Victoria, the owners’ corporation needs to pass a special resolution, which means 75 per cent of owners need to agree.

Frohlich’s building’s strata company, Robinson Strata Management, did not respond to this masthead’s approaches for comment about the decision.

“This is so frustrating, and I know I won’t be the only person in this kind of position,” Frohlich said of the Dee Why building with just 16 units. “EVs are the way of the future, but I don’t think there’s enough pressure on apartment buildings to install chargers or to allow residents to use power points.

“This problem will only increase the more people in apartments buy EVs. It’ll cost me less than $30 a month in electricity to charge my car, but now I’m going to have to go to shopping malls and car parks instead of doing it in my own building – or pay so much money, which doesn’t make sense, when I’m only on a one-year lease. I can hardly believe it.”

Leo Patterson Ross, chief executive of the Tenants’ Union of NSW, says there’s a lot of uncertainty around EVs in strata buildings for renters, for whom it’s particularly difficult as they have little say in an owners’ corporation’s decision-making. New strata laws being introduced by the NSW government say nothing about this.

“It’s an issue that’s been floating around for a while, and I certainly think that strata bodies should be given some guidance and help from the government on how to consider this,” Patterson Ross said.

“When someone’s coming to you, and is prepared to cover the costs, then that seems a very commonsense solution. Such a refusal is short-sighted. I think there’s too much focus on the financial aspect and not enough on communal living.”

At the apartment owners’ peak body, the Owners Corporation Network (OCN), chair Fred Tuckwell agrees, saying both strata owners and tenants should be free to use their EVs.

“We are advocating for a right to charge,” he said. “There should be a set of criteria that, if satisfied, the owners’ corporation can’t reasonably reject the application.

“People who live in strata should have the right to charge, just like people in houses can. It should be a level playing field, and we’re now working with the Electric Vehicle Council [EVC] to try to establish a set of guidelines.”

At the EVC, head of energy and infrastructure Ross De Rango says working out shares of energy charges for common property can be complicated, and checks have to be made on the electricity supply to make sure an EV doesn’t trip a circuit breaker.

Then a bylaw may need to be done to work out how to scale up over time to accommodate more EV users. “The EVC acknowledges that retrofitting chargers to apartment complexes can be tricky,” he said. “But we’re working with the OCN and state governments on guidance materials.”