That carport you built. The balcony you enclosed. The wall you moved. They might not be as yours as you think.
Most sectional title owners have a working understanding of their property boundaries. They know where their unit starts and ends. They know what they can decorate, what they can replace, and what they can upgrade.
What many don't know is where their legal ownership actually stops — and what happens when they make changes beyond that boundary without permission.
In South Africa's sectional title environment, the consequences of getting this wrong don't stay hidden forever. They surface at the worst possible moment: when you try to sell.
The Boundary Most Owners Don't Think About
In sectional title, your ownership begins at the middle of the brick. Everything from that point inwards — the interior walls, the floors, the ceiling, the fixtures and fittings inside your unit — is yours.
Everything from the middle of the brick outwards is common property. This includes the external walls, the roof, the gardens, the driveways, the security infrastructure, and the land on which the scheme stands. Common property is owned jointly by all unit holders in the scheme, in proportion to their Participation Quota.
This means that the wall you share with your neighbour is, legally, not fully yours. The garden outside your ground floor unit is not yours. The space above your ceiling is not yours. The roof over your head is not yours.
As Willie Roos, CEO of Stratafin and one of South Africa's foremost sectional title experts, puts it: "Whatever is on the outside is common property. So if you are erecting a carport in the garden and you think it's your garden — it's not. It's common property. It belongs to everybody."
Why You Need Approval for More Than You Think
Because common property belongs to all owners collectively, you cannot make any changes to it without body corporate approval. This is not a bureaucratic nicety — it is a legal requirement.
Changes that require body corporate approval include:
- Enclosing a balcony or converting it into a room
- Building a carport, pergola, or garden structure in your exclusive use area
- Installing an awning or shade cloth on an external wall
- Changing external windows or doors
- Installing a satellite dish on the roof
- Walling in a carport to create additional living space
- Any structural change that affects the exterior of the building
The fact that something sits within your exclusive use area — your private garden or parking bay — does not change this. An exclusive use area is still common property. You have the right to use it exclusively, but you do not have the right to build on it or alter it without approval.
The Coverage Problem
There is a second layer to this that most owners — and many trustees — don't fully appreciate.
When a township is established, town planning zoning rights determine the maximum extent to which land in that area may be built upon. This is called coverage — the proportion of the land that may be covered by structures.
Every sectional title scheme was built within those coverage limits. When owners start enclosing balconies, building carports, and adding garden rooms without approval, the scheme's total coverage increases. In some cases it exceeds what the town planning scheme allows.
Willie Roos described a scheme his company was appointed to administer where 60% of owners had enclosed their balconies — collectively pushing the scheme well beyond its permitted coverage. Not only were those individual alterations non-compliant, the scheme as a whole was in breach of its zoning rights.
The consequence in that case was stark: a court order requiring the enclosures to come down. Not some of them. All of them.
Crucially, even trustees cannot authorise something that exceeds permitted coverage. As Roos notes: "Even the trustees if they allow it but they are acting outside the act then they are acting ultra vires." They are acting beyond their legal powers, and any permission they grant for an illegal alteration is itself invalid.
Non-Compliant Alterations Don't Disappear
Here is the part that catches sellers off guard.
When you sell a sectional title unit, non-compliant alterations do not transfer away with you. They follow the property. The buyer inherits them — along with all the legal exposure they carry.
A buyer who purchases a unit with a non-compliant enclosed balcony becomes the owner of a non-compliant enclosed balcony. If the body corporate subsequently obtains a court order requiring reinstatement, the cost of removing the enclosure and restoring the balcony to its original state falls to whoever owns the unit at the time of that order.
That could be someone who bought the property in good faith, paid market value, and had no involvement in the original alteration.
This is not a hypothetical. In the scheme Willie Roos described, buyers from up to three years prior were potentially exposed to claims — because the agents and sellers at the time of those transactions had a duty to disclose the non-compliant alterations and in many cases did not.
The Disclosure Obligation
South African property law requires sellers to disclose latent defects — defects not visible on inspection that the seller knows about. A non-compliant alteration is a latent defect.
If you have enclosed your balcony without body corporate approval, converted your garage into a living room, or built a structure in your garden without permission — you are legally obligated to disclose this when you sell. It must appear in your disclosure documentation.
Failure to disclose a known defect does not simply create an awkward conversation with the buyer. It can result in:
- The sale being cancelled after transfer
- A damages claim against you as the seller
- A damages claim against the agent who sold the property
The voetstoots clause — the standard protection that generally insulates sellers from claims arising from defects — does not protect a seller who knew about a defect and deliberately or negligently failed to disclose it.
Can Compliant Approval Be Obtained After the Fact?
Sometimes. But it is not straightforward.
For an alteration to be approved retrospectively, it must be:
- Consistent with the scheme's rules
- Within the scheme's permitted coverage under town planning
- Not already the subject of a body corporate enforcement action
If all of those conditions are met, the trustees may resolve to approve the alteration. The sectional plan may need to be amended. The PQ may need to be updated. The owner may need to pay for the associated professional and administrative costs.
Where the alteration has pushed the scheme beyond its permitted coverage — or where 60% of owners have all made the same alteration — retrospective approval is significantly more complicated. In some cases it is simply not possible without a formal application to the municipality to amend the zoning, which is a lengthy and uncertain process.
The practical message: get approval before you build, not after. The process of obtaining proper approval upfront — speaking to the managing agent, tabling it with the trustees, getting the correct professionals involved — is manageable. The process of trying to regularise an alteration that has already been built, already been flagged, and may already have triggered enforcement proceedings is not.
The Right Way to Do It
If you want to make a structural change to your sectional title unit, the correct sequence is:
1. Check the sectional plan. Understand exactly what you own and where the boundaries of your section are. Your conveyancer can help you obtain this from the Surveyor General if the managing agent doesn't have it.
2. Check the scheme's rules. Rules vary from scheme to scheme. Some explicitly prohibit certain types of alterations. Others make provision for them under specific conditions.
3. Check the scheme's coverage position. Has the scheme already used its full permitted coverage? If so, there may be no room for additional structures regardless of what the trustees decide.
4. Apply to the trustees. Submit a formal written application with plans or drawings showing what you intend to do. The trustees should consider it at a meeting and respond formally.
5. Get the right professionals involved. Depending on the nature of the alteration, you may need an architect, a town planner, or a conveyancer to amend the sectional plan or the PQ.
6. Get it in writing. Trustee approval must be documented. An informal verbal nod from a friendly neighbour who happens to be a trustee is not approval.
What to Check When Buying
If you are purchasing a sectional title unit, compare the sectional plan to the physical property. If there is a discrepancy — an enclosed balcony that appears as open on the plan, a garage that is now a living room, a garden structure that doesn't appear anywhere in the documentation — ask the question before you sign.
What was the nature of the alteration? Was body corporate approval obtained? Is there a resolution on file? Has the sectional plan been updated?
If the answers are unsatisfactory or unavailable, factor the risk into your decision and your price. A non-compliant alteration that you find charming today may cost you significantly more than you saved on the purchase price if enforcement follows.
Sectional title ownership is shared ownership. The benefits of that — shared costs, shared security, communal amenities — come with shared rules. And those rules exist not to frustrate individual owners but to protect the collective value of the scheme.
The wall you want to move, the balcony you want to enclose, the carport you want to build — these are not simply personal decisions in a sectional title environment. They affect the scheme, the coverage, the other owners, and ultimately the value and saleability of every unit.
Get the approval. Do it properly. And when you sell, disclose everything.
The alternative is someone else's problem becoming yours.