"Dear Hon Marlene Kairouz, Minister for CAV,
My disabled wife and I moved into a retirement village 14 years ago, and a month later the operator needed the monthly service/maintenance charge to rise by 50%. That got my attention, and I helped found the RRVV and was on the committee for a number of years.
Since then I have studied the state legislation and the resultant skewed contracts across Australasia, that allow developer operators to charge the costs of their incompetence to retirees, who have had no option but to pay an interest free capital loan, a ransom, to be granted a skewed contract to down size into a unit in a Retirement Village.
Those biased contracts are the result of the legislated definition of a retirement village mandating an interest free capital loan, the ransom.
I also took a trip to the USA to study their contracts. They have 15% of the over 65 year olds in retirement villages. They have simple clear residential tenancy contracts, which show the cost rate.
Australasian contracts mandating interest free capital for the developer/operators make the contracts so complex that as the LSIC inquiry found very few people think they understand theirs. Furthermore it is impractical to calculate a monthly rate because there are too many variables to consider. The contract cost complexity prevents free market competition. Those contracts are a serious disincentive to prospective retiree lessees such that the comparable percentage of Australasian over 65s in retirement villages is 5.7%, according to the Property Council Australia.
Retirement villages are great, except for the contracts. Victoria and Australia need more, if they had fair contracts.
As a result of 14 years investigation the attachment sets out the only essential changes to fix this unacceptable consumer legislation for your parents generation, future lessees.
The developer/operator PCA industry will put up some smoke and mirror explanation of why these simple changes are unacceptable. They have been able to convince CAV, or one person in it, that the interest free loan for capital, is the only possible way of funding retirement villages. So far they have been successful in stymieing every one of the 6 attempts to get fair contracts in a free market for over 30 years.
Whether Consumer Affairs Victoria don't understand the implications of the legislated Retirement Village definition, or worse, is impossible for consumers to say. The misinformation on this issue is a serious barrier for all of the people in independent quangos or other organizations trying to expedite a complete review of an Act to solve a simple problem, a skewed definition.
There is nothing to be gained by referring this letter to CAV to answer, they are the main barrier to retirement village progress.
Kind regards,Charles Adams."
Initial story here:- http://www.retvill.net/legislation/amend-retirement-village-legislation
Amend the Retirement Village Definition.
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