Sarah Heuv­el

I am a spe­cialised prac­ti­tion­er, act­ing on mat­ters for the real estate indus­try. I am a qual­i­fied real estate agent and have worked with and in the indus­try for 20 years. Dur­ing this time, I have devel­oped a strong rep­u­ta­tion for being acces­si­ble, trans­par­ent, and commercial. 

Pri­or to being admit­ted in 2016, I worked as an award-win­n­ing senior port­fo­lio man­ag­er for arguably Australia’s most recog­nis­able real estate brand. I there­fore have first-hand knowl­edge of what my clients expe­ri­ence in their busi­ness­es which places me in a key posi­tion to prop­er­ly under­stand the issues at hand and there­fore work close­ly with them to find prac­ti­cal solutions. 

A key aspect of my prac­tice is the buy­ing and sell­ing of rent rolls. A rent roll trans­ac­tion is very niche as it is a flu­id asset. It is there­fore imper­a­tive that the doc­u­men­ta­tion gov­ern­ing the sale/​purchase cov­ers all pos­si­bil­i­ties that could arise with­in the rent roll itself. The same prin­ci­ples apply in the buy­ing and sell­ing of real estate busi­ness­es or com­pa­nies (by way of a share sale). In addi­tion to this, I also draft Inde­pen­dent Con­trac­tor Agree­ments, pre­pare Share­hold­er Agree­ments, advise agents/​agencies in rela­tion to their cor­po­rate struc­tures, and act on com­mis­sion claims. 

I also advise agen­cies in rela­tion to NSW Fair Trad­ing issues, such as respond­ing to Notices to Show Cause in rela­tion to poten­tial under­quot­ing or trust account fraud. I work close­ly with the Reg­u­la­tor and the Agent to ensure that there is trans­paren­cy and con­tin­ued edu­ca­tion with­in the indus­try itself. 

Giv­en my expe­ri­ence as a real estate agent, I have prac­ti­cal knowl­edge in draft­ing agency agree­ments and ensur­ing com­pli­ance with the rel­e­vant leg­is­la­tion. Addi­tion­al­ly, I advise land­lords and ten­ants about their oblig­a­tions with­in the res­i­den­tial ten­an­cy space and reg­u­lar­ly appear at NCAT or assist in the prepa­ra­tion of evi­dence and documents. 

I have appeared before NCAT and the Local, Dis­trict and Supreme Courts, as well as before the Fed­er­al Cir­cuit Court for Fair Work matters. 

I am a strong pro­po­nent for the real estate indus­try and am a proud mem­ber of the REINSW.