The Sectional Titles Act and what it means for owners

You collect the keys to your new flat on a Friday. By Monday a letter from the body corporate arrives: levies to pay, rules about pets, a meeting next month you are urged to attend. You own the unit, yet you are suddenly a member of an organisation you didn't apply to join, with financial obligations you can't refuse. One law created this arrangement, and it is worth knowing before the next letter comes.

What is the Sectional Titles Act?

The Sectional Titles Act 95 of 1986 is the South African law making it possible to own one section of a shared building, a flat on the third floor, while sharing ownership of the land and everything communal. Before the Act, a buyer could own a house on its own stand but not a single unit inside a larger scheme. The Act defines what a section is, how a scheme is registered at the Deeds Office, how each owner's share of the common property is measured, and what rights and duties come with the title. The Sectional Titles Schemes Management Act of 2011 now carries the day-to-day management rules, but the ownership framework rests on the original Act.

Key takeaways

• Your section is privately owned: the flat, the garage, the store room on your title deed. The common property belongs to all owners together.
• Your levy is worked out from your participation quota, so a larger unit pays a larger share of the scheme's costs.
• Every registered scheme has a body corporate, and every owner is automatically a member from the day of registration.
• The scheme's rules can limit what you do inside your own unit, from pets to renovations to short-term letting.
• Unpaid levies follow the unit, not the previous owner. A levy clearance before transfer protects you from inheriting arrears.

What the Sectional Titles Act says you own

Buy a unit in a sectional title scheme and you receive a title deed for a defined section: the flat itself, measured to the middle of the walls, floors, and ceilings around it. Everything inside those boundaries is yours, from the tiles to the geyser in the ceiling. A garage or a store room can be a section too, if the scheme's plans register it as one.

Everything else is common property. The land, the driveway, the roof, the boundary walls, the garden, the pool, and the lift belong to all the owners together, in undivided shares. You can't fence off a piece of the garden, and the body corporate can't sell the driveway without the owners' consent.

The line between section and common property decides who pays when something breaks. A burst geyser inside your ceiling is usually your cost. A leaking roof above the top floor usually belongs to the body corporate. Read the sectional plan before you buy: it shows the boundaries in black and white, and it settles most arguments before they start. The plan is filed at the Deeds Office with the scheme's records, the same registry recording every other form of property in South Africa.

How participation quotas decide your share

Every section in a scheme carries a participation quota, a percentage comparing the floor area of your section with all the sections combined. A 120 square metre unit in a block where the sections total 2 400 square metres carries a quota of 5 percent. The quota appears on the sectional plan and doesn't change unless the scheme is formally amended.

The quota does two jobs. It sets your share of the scheme's expenses, so a 5 percent quota means 5 percent of the budget arrives on your levy statement. It also sets the value of your vote in most decisions taken at general meetings, which means the owner of a penthouse carries more voting power than the owner of a bachelor flat.

For residential schemes, the quota is based on floor area and fixed by the Act. The developer can't allocate quotas by preference, and a body corporate wanting a different levy split needs a formal resolution of the owners, with the bar set high. Before you buy, ask for the quota of the unit and multiply it against the annual budget. Worked out at the kitchen table, the result is your yearly commitment to the scheme.

Body corporate levies and what they cover

The body corporate comes into existence automatically when the first unit in a scheme transfers to a buyer. Every owner is a member, membership can't be resigned, and the body corporate's main income is the levy each owner pays monthly.

Levies fund the running of the scheme: insurance for the buildings, maintenance of the common property, municipal charges for shared services, security, cleaning, and the administration of the scheme's finances. A portion goes to a reserve fund for future maintenance, a requirement introduced under the management legislation so schemes stop meeting a failing roof with an empty account.

A special levy can be raised on top of the monthly levy when something unbudgeted arrives: a lift replacement, an urgent waterproofing project, a legal dispute. Special levies arrive with short notice and can run to tens of thousands of rand per unit in a badly maintained scheme.

The levy statement deserves the same attention as a bond statement. Ask for the scheme's financials and the reserve fund balance before you make an offer. A low levy in a scheme with peeling paint and a dry reserve fund isn't a bargain; it's a special levy waiting for a date.

The rules of the scheme and how they bind you

Every scheme runs on two sets of rules: management rules, dealing with how the body corporate operates, and conduct rules, dealing with how people live in the scheme. The conduct rules are the ones you feel day to day. Pets, parking, noise, laundry on balconies, renovations, and short-term letting all sit in this document.

The rules bind you from the day the unit registers in your name, whether you read them or not. A rule requiring written consent for a pet means your dog needs permission, and a rule restricting short-term letting can close a rental plan you were counting on. Rules can be changed, but only by resolution at a general meeting.

Tenants are bound too. An owner letting out a unit is responsible for the tenant's compliance, and a tenant's breach lands on the owner's doorstep. Ask the agent for the conduct rules before you sign an offer, and read them with your own plans in mind. Ten minutes with the rules and a mug of coffee on the porch beats a year of correspondence with trustees. If a rule affects your intended use of the unit, raise it before the offer, not after registration.

Exclusive use areas: yours to use, not yours to own

Some parts of the common property can be reserved for one owner alone: a parking bay, a garden patch, a courtyard, a store room. These are exclusive use areas. The ground stays common property, owned by everyone, but the right to use it belongs to you.

The right arrives in one of two ways. It can be registered at the Deeds Office and noted against your title deed, which gives it the strength of a real right, or it can be granted through the scheme's rules, which is simpler but rests on the body corporate's processes. The difference shows when you sell: a registered right transfers with the unit through the conveyancer, while a rule-based right needs the paperwork to follow the sale.

Exclusive use areas usually carry their own levy contribution, because the body corporate still maintains the ground. A parking bay may add a modest monthly amount; a large private garden adds more.

Check what the unit's marketing calls your garden before you rely on it. If the sectional plan shows it as an exclusive use area, confirm how the right was created and whether it is properly allocated to the unit you are buying. Sellers sometimes offer what the scheme never granted.

What to check before you buy into a scheme

A sectional title purchase asks for more homework than a freestanding house, because you are buying into the scheme's finances and its rules along with the unit. The Sectional Titles Act sits alongside the other Acts governing property in a South African sale, but this one follows you home. The documents tell you most of what the walls can't.

Start with the levy position. Unpaid levies are a charge against the unit, and the conveyancer must obtain a clearance from the body corporate before transfer registers, the same way a municipal rates clearance works. Then ask for the last two years of financial statements, the current budget, the reserve fund balance, and the minutes of the last annual general meeting. Minutes reveal what the listing doesn't: the leaking roof, the dispute with the managing agent, the special levy under discussion.

Confirm the participation quota and the monthly levy in writing, and ask whether any special levies are approved or proposed. Read the conduct rules against your plans, whether those involve a pet, a renovation, or a tenant.

None of this paperwork takes long to gather, and a scheme with nothing to hide produces it quickly. Red dust on your boots after walking the common property teaches you something too: maintenance shows at ground level long before it shows in the financials.

Closing Reflection

The letter from the body corporate looked like an ambush on that first Monday. It reads differently once you know the framework behind it. The levies fund the building you now co-own, the rules protect the shared spaces, and the quota ties your share of the costs to the size of your section. Ownership inside a scheme is a partnership with neighbours you didn't choose, run according to a law older than most of the buildings it governs. Read the plan, read the rules, and the next letter arrives without surprise.

You shouldn't have to decode a scheme's rules and levies after the transfer has already registered. With Golden Homes you won't.

Contact Golden Homes to speak with an agent who knows the sectional title schemes in your area before you make an offer.

Sectional title raises questions freehold buyers have never had to ask. Here are the ones that come up most.

Frequently asked questions

Does the Sectional Titles Act still apply now the Sectional Titles Schemes Management Act exists?

Yes, both Acts apply, and they divide the work between them. The Sectional Titles Act of 1986 continues to govern the ownership side: how schemes are created and registered, how sections and common property are defined, how participation quotas are calculated, and how sectional title transfers are registered at the Deeds Office. The Sectional Titles Schemes Management Act of 2011 took over the management side: the functions of the body corporate, the rules, the reserve fund, and the running of meetings.

The management Act also brought in the Community Schemes Ombud Service, which handles disputes between owners and bodies corporate. In practice, a buyer or owner rarely needs to know which Act a rule comes from; the conveyancer and the managing agent work across both. What is worth remembering is the split: ownership questions trace back to the 1986 Act, and day-to-day governance questions trace to the 2011 Act. The two read as one system.

How does the Sectional Titles Act affect levy arrears when a unit is sold?

Arrears sit against the unit, so a buyer can't take transfer until the body corporate has been satisfied. Before registration, the conveyancer must obtain a clearance from the body corporate confirming all amounts due have been paid or secured. The seller usually settles the arrears from the sale proceeds, and the conveyancer manages this in the settlement figures. The protection works in the buyer's favour, but only if the clearance is done properly: without it, the transfer can't register.

As a buyer, ask early whether the unit's levy account is in arrears and whether any special levy has been approved but not yet billed. An approved special levy can become a dispute about who pays it: the seller who owned the unit when it was approved, or the buyer who owns it when it falls due. Put the answer in the Offer to Purchase, in writing, before either party signs.

Does the Sectional Titles Act cover exclusive use areas?

Yes. Exclusive use areas are part of the framework the Act created, and it provides for them to be registered at the Deeds Office and noted against the title deed of the unit entitled to them. A registered exclusive use right is a real right: it survives changes of ownership and transfers through the conveyancing process when the unit is sold. The management legislation added a second route, allowing schemes to grant exclusive use through their rules instead.

A rule-based right is easier to create but depends on the scheme's rules staying in place and being properly recorded. For a buyer, the distinction is practical. A registered right appears in the Deeds Office records and your conveyancer can verify it. A rule-based right needs the scheme's rules and the allocation to be checked by hand. If a parking bay or garden is part of why you are buying, confirm which kind of right it is before you sign.

What should you check under the Sectional Titles Act before signing an offer?

Start with the sectional plan, which shows the boundaries of the section, the common property, and any exclusive use areas, and confirms the participation quota. The quota tells you your share of the scheme's expenses and your voting power at general meetings.

Then move to the scheme's paperwork: the conduct rules, the last two years of financial statements, the reserve fund balance, and the minutes of the most recent annual general meeting. Ask in writing whether any special levies are approved or under discussion, and whether the unit's levy account is up to date. Confirm what happens to any exclusive use rights on transfer. Your conveyancer verifies the registered details at the Deeds Office as part of the transfer, but the financial and governance checks are yours to make before the offer, because an Offer to Purchase signed without them binds you to the scheme as it is, not as the listing described it.