Foreclosure over Deductible
I'm so sorry to hear you are going through this. I know it is truly horrific. In my decades of experience when council has no defence for their own misconduct they use defamation of the victim to distract attention away from themselves. It's the same principle as "the best defence is a strong offence." Cognitive thinking exercises may provide the best evidence, and the best protection if you have enough strength and endurance to do them.
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I wish I
could agree that truth always prevails, but unfortunately, I cannot. The effect
of defamation is to twist thinking into blaming the victim who is trying to
defend themselves for costing the strata $10,000, instead of blaming the party
breaking the law and provoking litigation. Good luck!
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Decision
makers are not in the habit of visiting the scene of the crime. You have to
deliver the evidence proving it.
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Op claims
"(no need for details)" for why she is responsible to pay an
insurance deductible of $5000, which is by default a common expense of the
strata. That sounds like the cause of the loss was her responsibility for some
unstated reason, which may or may not be arguable.
Her
complaint is that there is no evidence of $5,000 being spent on those repairs.
Extortion and tampering with financials are MAJOR crimes, and reasonable
apprehensions of such misconduct are raised in stratas where other
misrepresentations are proven, or where nondisclosure of strata records in
contravention of the SPA is standard practice.
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What to do?
Raise awareness, for a start. Other than that, it sounds to me like OP is doing
everything possible under the circumstances.
No owner
should ever automatically pay the strata's insurance deductible, certainly not
without proof of the 5 Ws. Who is responsible? Why are they responsibile? What
was spent? Where are the repairs? When were they completed?