Introducing community titles

Community schemes have been introduced to Western Australia through the Community Titles Act 2018. A community scheme is a new form of land tenure in WA that will enable the subdivision of a single parcel of freehold land into multiple schemes, called community titles schemes.

Community schemes create more opportunity in the State for the creation and management of developments which include mixed-use elements - such as retail outlets, commercial offices, recreational facilities and residential properties.

A community scheme could come in the form of a multi-storey building or a large-scale land development, and a wide range of developments in between.

Community schemes include some of the features of strata and survey-strata schemes, which will continue to operate under the Strata Titles Act 1985, but will offer many important distinctions.

While new to Western Australia, community schemes already exist in New South Wales, South Australia and Queensland - although there are variations between WA’s community titles law and the corresponding law in each of these states.