The building is on the combustible cladding register — what does that mean for me?
Registration means the building owner has notified the NSW government that the building has external combustible cladding. It is a disclosure, not a finding that the building is unsafe — but it has real consequences for cost, insurance and finance.
After the Grenfell Tower fire, NSW required owners of certain buildings with combustible external cladding to register them. Being on the register tells you the cladding exists and has been declared. It does not by itself tell you the risk rating, whether rectification has been ordered, or what it would cost.
For a buyer, the three questions that actually matter are cost, timing and money:
- Has a fire engineering assessment been done, and what did it rate the risk?
- Has any order been issued requiring rectification, and by when?
- Has the work been COSTED, and is there any provision for it in the capital works fund?
“No provision for cladding rectification appears in the capital works fund forecast sighted at inspection.”
An uncosted cladding liability is worse than an expensive one. An expensive one you can price into your offer. An uncosted one is an open-ended claim on future levies, and it is the version that most often appears in strata reports.
There is also a financing dimension worth checking early. Some lenders have restricted or declined lending on buildings with registered combustible cladding, and lender policies vary and change. If you are borrowing, this is a question for your broker before you bid, not after.
What to ask
Copy these into an email. The people below can answer them; we can’t.
- To your mortgage broker or lender: will you lend on a unit in a building on the cladding register, and on what terms?
- To your strata manager: is there a fire engineering assessment, any order, any quote, and any provision in the capital works fund for replacement?
Want this found in your own documents?
Home Decoded reads your building, pest, strata and contract reports and pulls out what matters — with the exact quote and page behind every finding, so you can check it against the original.
Related
General information about what these documents say — not legal, building or financial advice, and not a substitute for your conveyancer, solicitor or licensed inspector. Law and practice change, schemes differ, and your contract may say something different from the general position described here.