Residents of Vicinity apartments in Canterbury, Sydney face an uncertain future with major structural defects in the building not yet rectified, rendering the development unsafe and uninhabitable.

Completed in 2017 by Sydney developer Toplace, the Vicinity complex has 254 apartments distributed across three buildings.

Troubles began for residents of the 10-storey tower in late 2021 when an engineer’s report commissioned by apartment owners identified serious structural flaws in the building, which could potentially lead to a collapse and also cause catastrophic damage to the adjacent apartment buildings.

Acting on the report, emergency inspections were carried out by officials from the NSW Public Works Advisory, who ruled out evacuation after concluding that there was no immediate safety risk to residents.

The inspectors also advised that the structural cracks would need to be monitored. Following the inspection, NSW Building Commissioner David Chandler had noted that the building would need additional works to make it building code-compliant as well as safe for residents.

Since the initial inspection, emergency propping has been carried out to support inadequate transfer beams and slabs (mostly paid for by the owners), while a series of remediation works has been ordered by the NSW Building Commissioner.

Meanwhile, in December 2022, following an investigation by NSW Fair Trading into large-scale defects at Toplace’s residential developments, the company’s building licence was permanently cancelled and its owner, Jean Nassif had his licence suspended in NSW for 10 years.

Toplace has now entered into administration, further exacerbating the situation not only for Vicinity residents but also the buyers of several projects being developed by the company. To make matters worse, Nassif is wanted by the NSW Police over fraud allegations and is currently absconding.

For the apartment owners at Vicinity, they say that their financial burden is huge and growing, as they are paying for the rectification works, which may run into millions of dollars.

Image: Toplace Group

Branko Miletic

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