Apartment Living

SPECIAL OFFER - APARTMENT LIVING - DESCRIBED BY 'THE AGE' AS "the Lonely Planet for apartments' IS NOW AVAILABLE only on the new flat-chat dedicated website http://www.flat-chat.com.au/?page_id=245 PRICE

. There are only 20 or so copies left so get in quick if you want to own the original for ony $20 including postage and packing.

Apartment Living was written by my partner Sue Williams and me in response to the fairly troubled times we faced when we first moved into a new apartment block in Sydney.

We ran the whole gamut of issues, from a dodgy Executive Committee the chair of which was a little too autocratic and close to the developers for comfort, to a building manager - also employed by the developers - who was not only utterly incompetent but ran nasty little vendettas against any residents who dared to criticise the way the building was being run.

It took a group of committed owners nine months to resolve this scandalous situation, sack the original EC and the building manager and get things running smoothly (for which I can take no credit).

Both being writers, our instinctive response was to get it down on paper and make some of the stuff that we'd discovered available to others. We also tried to make the book as entertaining and informative as we could.

It was published by ABC Books in June 2004 and one reviewer for The Age in Melbourne called it "The Lonely Planet for apartments" which was just about the feel we were looking for.

Although some specific laws have changed since we wrote it most of it is still very relevant. Apartment Living is now officially out of print but you can buy it directly from us at the above website. Apartment Living led to my weekly Flat Chat column in the Sydney Morning Herald. Ironically, based on the column, Fairfax Publications invited me to write The Ultimate Guide to Buying and Renting Houses and Apartments which is a much more practical and down-to-earth "how-to" book about buying, selling and renting - although it does have a "Best and Worst of Flat Chat" included.

The Ultimate Guide to was published in June 2006 and updated in April 2008(rrp $29.95).

If you can't get a hold of The Ultimate Guide ... in a bookshop or newsagency click on http://www.smhshop.com.au/details.php?section=books&id=1038and they'll sell you one.