I pride myself on lis­ten­ing to my clients, think­ing out­side the square, and find­ing solu­tions that meet their needs.

I con­duct pro­ceed­ings in the NSW Civ­il and Admin­is­tra­tive Tri­bunal, the Supreme Court of New South Wales, the Local Court of New South Wales, and in the Land and Envi­ron­ment Court of New South Wales.

Exper­tise

  • Con­struc­tion
  • Prop­er­ty
  • Stra­ta

Sec­tors

  • Pri­vate Clients & Fam­i­ly Businesses
  • Real Estate & Construction

Expe­ri­ence

With a legal career span­ning over 25 years in gen­er­al prac­tice, for the past decade I have spe­cialised in build­ing, con­struc­tion, stra­ta and prop­er­ty. I have worked for many own­ers cor­po­ra­tions, devel­op­ers and builders in all facets of build­ing and con­struc­tion law in all jurisdictions

  • Act­ing for own­ers cor­po­ra­tions, own­ers and builders in build­ing defect claims under the Home Build­ing Act 1989 in NCAT and Supreme Court of NSW
  • Act­ing for devel­op­ers, own­ers cor­po­ra­tions and lot own­ers at the fore­front of stra­ta renew­al leg­is­la­tion intro­duced in Novem­ber 2016 includ­ing all steps required under Part 10, prepa­ra­tion of stra­ta renew­al pro­pos­als, stra­ta renew­al plans, nec­es­sary meet­ing agen­das, sup­port notices, Court appli­ca­tions, col­lab­o­ra­tive agree­ments, bloc deeds and con­duct of mediations
  • Act­ing for own­ers cor­po­ra­tions and own­ers in stra­ta dis­putes aris­ing under the Stra­ta Schemes Man­age­ment Act 2015 includ­ing s237 appli­ca­tions and s106 claims
  • Act­ing for own­ers cor­po­ra­tions draft­ing motions for gen­er­al meet­ings and pro­vid­ing advice as to tech­ni­cal com­pli­ance with the Stra­ta Schemes Man­age­ment Act 2015, attend­ing gen­er­al meet­ings, attend­ing to prepa­ra­tion of proxy forms, com­pa­ny nom­i­nee forms
  • Nego­ti­a­tion and draft­ing of build­ing con­tracts, project man­age­ment and super­in­ten­dent agree­ments, call option deeds and con­tracts for sale
  • Act­ing in bound­ary and devel­op­ment mat­ters includ­ing ease­ments, crane and ground anchor licence deeds, bound­ary, tree and fenc­ing dis­putes and plan­ning issues

Roles, mem­ber­ships and education

  • Mas­ter of Laws (Uni­ver­si­ty of Syd­ney) 2000
  • Diplo­ma of Law (LPAB) 1994
  • Mem­ber of Law Soci­ety of NSW

Direct Contact

Publications

Impor­tant Stra­ta Law Changes — Effec­tive 1 July 2025

The Stra­ta Schemes Leg­is­la­tion Amend­ment Act 2025 (Amend­ing Act) intro­duces fur­ther reform in Gov­ern­men­t’s ongo­ing review of the stra­ta legislation. On 1 July…

Own­ers Cor­po­ra­tions / Asso­ci­a­tions now sub­ject to Unfair Con­tract Terms 

Under the new stra­ta law reforms com­menc­ing 1 July 2025 (the Stra­ta Schemes Leg­is­la­tion Amend­ment Act 2025 (No. 14) NSW) a key change…

Unfair con­tract terms in out­dat­ed stan­dard form con­tracts could cost you a fine of $50 mil­lion (Com­pa­nies) or $2.5 mil­lion (Indi­vid­u­als)

If you have not reviewed your stan­dard form con­struc­tion con­tracts since 9 Novem­ber 2023 (when the amend­ed Com­pe­ti­tion and Con­sumer Act…

In the News

Helen Kow­al — Guest Speak­er at the inau­gur­al Your Stra­ta Prop­er­ty CPD Event in Mudgee

I’m hon­oured to have been invit­ed by Aman­da Farmer to join her 1‑Day CPD Event in Mudgee on 23 Feb­ru­ary…

Helen Kow­al dis­cuss­es with Stra­ta Plus the impli­ca­tions of recent leg­isla­tive and reg­u­la­to­ry reforms in the con­struc­tion indus­try of NSW

These reforms, while wide­ly acknowl­edged as nec­es­sary for enhanc­ing the qual­i­ty of con­struc­tion work in both new and exist­ing struc­tures…

Helen Kow­al appeared on Own­ers Cor­po­ra­tion Net­work’s webi­nar on Reme­di­al work and the Build­ing Prac­ti­tion­ers ACT

Helen Kow­al appeared on Own­ers Cor­po­ra­tion Net­work’s webi­nar on Reme­di­al work and the Build­ing Prac­ti­tion­ers ACT.  The OCN host­ed this impor­tant…

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