Month: May 2013

NSW Fair Trading Announces New Trust Account Audit Rules

/ David Crombie / Leave a comment

Amendments to the Property, Stock and Business Agents Act 2002, will commence from 1 July 2013. These amendments will change the way licensees fulfil their responsibilities in relation to the auditing of trust accounts.

Currently, licensees who have held or received trust money during their audit year are required to have their trust accounts audited and lodge the audit returns with NSW Fair Trading whether the audit was qualified or not.

Licensees who did not hold or receive trust money during their audit year are required to lodge a statutory declaration with Fair Trading to that effect.

New Laws
The amendments provide a new framework for how licensees handle their trust account auditing responsibilities under the Act, commencing from the 2012/2013 audit year.

The changes include:

  • While all licensees who held or received trust money during their audit year will still need to have their trust accounts audited, only those audits which are qualified by the auditor are required to be lodged by the auditor and licensee with Fair Trading.
  • The term ‘qualified’ is now defined in the amendments to the Act.
  • The list of persons who are qualified to audit trust accounts under the Act is extended to include authorised audit companies, members of a Professional Accounting Body as defined under the ASIC Regulation 2001 (ie. CPA Australia, Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia and National Institute of Accountants) holding a Public Practising Certificate with one or more of those bodies.
  • A requirement on the auditor to forward a copy of the trust account audit (if qualified) to Fair Trading within 14 days after providing the report to the licensee.  A maximum penalty of 50 penalty units ($5,500) is provided for a breach of this requirement.
  • Licensees who did not hold or receive trust money during the audit year will no longer lodge a statutory declaration to that effect.  Instead, licensees will be required to note whether or not they did so when they next re-apply for their licence.
  • Licensees are now required to hold a copy of their trust account audit (whether qualified or not) at their registered place of business, for at least 3 years, and make it available to Fair Trading inspectors for examination if required.

Click here to view the New Trust Account Audit Rules in detail on the NSW Fair Trading website.

2013 Australasian Real Estate Institutes’ Auctioneering Championships

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The New South Wales heat of the 2013 Australasian Real Estate Institutes’ Auctioneering Championships hosted by Estate Agents Co-operative Ltd & Real Estate Institute of Australia is being held at the Novotel Sydney Olympic Park on the 25th June 2013.

The New South Wales competition will see two of the State’s top auctioneer’s progress onto the National championship to join contestants from around Australia & New Zealand at the final event which is being held at Crown Perth on the 23rd-25th of September.

This competition will test the auctioneers’ aptitude, attention and ability to think on their feet. To be successful, competitors have to deal with a range of testing questions and unpredictable bids judged by some of the industry’s leading auctioneer professionals.

The NSW Heat Judging Panel includes:

Scott Kennedy-Green – Chief Auctioneer of McGrath Estate Agents
Chris Mourd – Head of Network for LJ Hooker Group
Stephen Pratt – One of Sydney’s leading Auctioneers
Neil Laws – Fellow of the Real Estate Institute of Australia
Brett Roenfeldt OAM – 4 times News Australia SA~BankSA Golden Gavel Winner

For more information on our Judges and to view the Official Guidelines and Entry Form please click here.

NSW Auctioneering Championships Sponsors

In the Pipeline – What’s Happening at EAC

/ David Crombie / Leave a comment

Talking to agents across the state there seems to be a shortage of listings now in many areas and while some agents are experiencing financial difficulty others have experienced some of their best trading performance in many years.

Things here at EAC are a hub of activity as usual and I am busy working with the managers on implementing some of the changes discussed at the recent Board Planning
Day. Our current focus is on operational efficiencies in order to keep our fees down and the revamping of our services to ensure that they continue to meet the needs of Members.

In January Peter Bushby (President) and Amanda Lynch (CEO) of the Real Estate Institute of Australia (REIA) attended the EAC Board Meeting to talk to the Board and Management team about the benefits of becoming an affiliate member of the REIA. As a result of the presentation the EAC Board resolved to accept the invitation and in February we announced our appointment to the REIA Affiliates’ Council.

In late February I attended the first Affiliates’ Council meeting of which First National and The Professionals are also part of and I have to say that I found the meeting very beneficial. As part of the new relationship Dale Whittaker and I attended the REIA Awards for Excellence at Parliament House in Canberra on the 14th March.

Discussions are now taking place with the REIA for EAC to assist and jointly run the NSW Finals of the Australasian Real Estate Institutes’ Auctioneering Championships. This event will take place on the 25th June 2013 and information will be distributed shortly.

While the relationship with the REIA provides us with a voice at a national level we continue to build on our relationship with government at a state level and to this end Dale Whittaker and I attended a function to celebrate Honourable Anthony Roberts’, Minister
of Fair Trading and Member for Lane Cove, 10 years in parliament where we had the opportunity to discuss EAC’s views on National Licencing and other industry matters with the Minister.

On the National Licencing front NOLA is pushing ahead with its aim to introduce uniform occupational and professional licensing in the property occupations in 2013. EAC is not opposed to National Licensing as a concept but does not agree with the proposed model which lowers professional standards and the level of consumer protection. We continue to work with the State Government and the REIA to make sure that the views of our members and the industry are put forward for consideration.

With realestateworld.com.au we now have over 60,000 listings on the site and traffic continues to grow. The content sharing arrangement with realestate1.com.au is now in place and we have recently put an upload to Nestoria in place for offices that are
on our Pro and Elite Packages which will provide an enhanced level of consumer exposure for their office and listings on realestateworld.com.au. We are now in the final stages of development for the new site which will contain many new features.

In March we had the EAC Board Meeting in Dubbo followed by a function where we invited the Principals from offices in Dubbo and the surrounding areas to meet the EAC Board. At the meeting we did a short presentation followed by a feedback session where we asked the agents what they thought were some of the challenges that their offices and the industry faced and how EAC could assist. It was a successful function and was well
received by the agents. We will be running similar meetings in others areas during the year.

In the meantime if you have any feedback please feel free to call me or comment below.