Residents of Maroochy Cabins Complex vow to take on landlord

Retirees and a single dad-of-two are among the residents of a Sunshine Coast park issued with a notice to back-pay years worth of rates to their landlord.

Vic Springall, Aaron Schjelde and Viv Kealley are residents at Maroochy River Resort, Diddillibah.

Residents at a Maroochy River front cabin park are vowing to fight demand notices from their landowner ordering payment of years worth of council rates.

Maroochy Cabins Complex residents at Diddillibah say they received a demand notice from landowner, Trinity Place Investments Pty Ltd, stating they owed years worth of rates.

The rates are either backdated to January 2017, when Trinity bought the land, or the date residents bought their cabin, for those who bought after 2017.

It is unclear how many long-term residents at the 81-cabin park received the notices, however it was understood most were at the value of about $2000.

The cabin owners, who pay monthly rent to Trinity, say they’ve been told they need to pay the rates by December.

Vic Springall has owned his cabin for 32 years and said the landowner “overstepped the mark this time”.

“The first question I asked them when I moved here was are the rates included in the ground fees, and they said ‘yes’,” Mr Springall said.

“(They are) now charging us for rates that we have never paid, not for 32 years, and (they) want to charge us for the past six years.”

Vic Springall bought his Diddillibah unit 32 years ago.

Another resident, Vivien Kealley has spent the past 15 years turning her cabin into a home, extending the deck and planting a garden, however she says she now faces eviction.

Ms Kealley claims the wording on the clause quoted in the demand notice is different to that of the original lease signed by the cabin owners, and appears to remove the mention of rates as the landowner’s responsibility.

“The original lease says that the landlord is responsible for land tax and rates assessable,” Ms Kealley said.

“Everyone is up in arms, people haven’t been happy for years but this is the last straw.”

Viv Kealley has lived at the Diddillibah property for 15 years.

Father-of-two and cabin owner for seven years, Aaron Schjelde said the demand notice was a shock, but what he feared the most was the impact it would have on the “elderly, vulnerable people” who make up most of the resort’s community.

One resident, who did not wish to be named, said there had been no consultation with the residents about a lease change for the payment of rates.

They also said no invoice for the rates bill had been sent before the demand notice.

According to residents, the demand notice arrived shortly before they were informed by the Australian Energy Regulator that Trinity Place Investments had been overcharging them on their electricity bills for around three years.

It found Trinity had overcharged by approximately $34,000 in total and ordered the company to refund the affected residents.

Sunshine Coast councillor Ted Hungerford said he had never seen a situation like the one between the residents and the landowner regarding the payment of council rates.

“Council has correctly sent the rates to the owner of the property and apparently in the terms of the lease the landlord can pass that on to the tenants,” Mr Hungerford said.

“That is a private lease and the council has no jurisdiction of the lease agreement.

“But I have never seen something like this before, it is an unusual case.”

Trinity Place Investments was approached for comment however they did not respond in time for publication.