Brody Schmidt is taking on Vantage Strata in ACAT over his stolen motorcycle. Photo: Ian Bushnell.
A Canberra strata company is facing a damages claim over the theft of a resident’s motorcycle from a building’s basement carpark in a case that might have ramifications for the way apartment complexes are managed.
Brody Schmidt is seeking $6914, including costs, from Vantage Strata, alleging that it failed to properly secure the carpark of On Forbes, an apartment block in Turner.
In his application to the ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal, Mr Schmidt is claiming the value of the motorcycle and the cost of having to buy a secondhand vehicle for transport.
The motorcycle disappeared from the carpark in January 2025 when Mr Schmidt was away camping.
The carpark door had been damaged and left open, so Vantage hired a security firm to look over the vehicles within the property.
A 24 September letter of demand to Vantage Strata, said it had a duty of care to ensure that vehicles parked by tenants of the property were safely secured in the garage below.
On discovering the bike missing after his return from camping, Mr Schmidt reported the theft to police, which sought a review of CCTV footage from the theft window of 9-12 January.
The building manager then informed Mr Schmidt he would be charged a fee of $210 an hour, amounting to about $4000, because this was considered outside of core duties.
Mr Schmidt refused and informed police who told Vantage the fee was excessive and it would be hindering a police investigation by not reviewing the footage.
The building manager then proceeded to review the CCTV, taking until early March to complete the task but not finding any evidence of the theft, which meant police closed the file.
Mr Schmidt remains sceptical that nothing could be found, and is claiming negligence and unconscionable conduct in an attempt to impede a police investigation to profit from a tenant.
“They found no footage of the bike being stolen, but there’s only one exit to this underground carpark, and there’s two cameras with two different angles, facing the only exit that the bike would have had to be ridden or pushed out of,” he said.
“I’m claiming that they haven’t reviewed the footage properly because if they did, then they would have found evidence of the bike being stolen. Especially with the initial treatment I received, it just seems unlikely that they did this properly.”
In a 24 March response to a complaint from Mr Schmidt, Vantage said the CCTV footage had been reviewed from two different angles, police had been advised and the matter was closed.
On the fee issue, Vantage said there had been a misunderstanding about who the fee would be paid to but did not address whether the quoted figure was excessive. Nor did the response address the issue of liability, saying only that Vantage was sorry about the loss, but could not assist Mr Schmidt any further.
Mr Schmidt’s letter of demand said that given the door was broken, Vantage Strata should have taken effective additional measures to ensure there was no theft on the dates when the property was vulnerable.
“The hiring of a security guard who was unable to properly verify incoming tenants of the property was an insufficient safeguard,” it said.
The letter also said the CCTV system was ineffective.
Mr Schmidt said he decided to pursue the matter because the more he researched the situation and spoke to friends, including a lawyer, about it, he did not think apartment residents should be treated like he had.
“I was incredibly frustrated by the whole experience,” he said.
“I felt as if I was a victim of a crime and then someone was trying to exploit me because of that.”
Mr Schmidt said strata companies’ treatment of residents, especially in Canberra, tended to be unfair.
“They’ve got quite a lot of power over people, especially as more and more people live in these kind of high-density housing,” he said.
“I don’t think people should be able to get away with this kind of thing.”
Mr Schmidt is no longer a resident at On Forbes.
A directions hearing was held last month and a preliminary conference is scheduled in February.
Vantage Strata did not wish to comment.
