How is the PQ calculated and does it include the garage and if there is a storeroom, would the PQ include the storeroom as well?
Let’s look at this first – what is a PQ?
A PQ is the acronym that we use in the Sectional Title industry for the participation quota of a section.
This is not unique to Sectional Title schemes I have seen HOAs that also work on PQs.
The PQ of a section in a residential scheme is a percentage – based on the floor area of the section – that indicates the undivided share of the section owner in the common property. Each section is calculated separately so if the garage or storeroom are separate sections they will have their own PQ’s
The formula for calculating the PQ of a section is floor area of section divided by total floor area of all sections.
Example – The floor area of section 1 is 87 square meters; the total floor area of all sections is 21 345 square meters. To get the PQ you need to divide 87 by 21 345 – that is 0.004076. To show this as a percentage you have to multiply it by 100. So the PQ is 0.4076.
The calculation is only shown as an example – we should never calculate PQ’s. The sectional plans have the list of participation quotas, we have to work on what the plans state even if we can see that it is wrong.
Section 32(5) states that the PQ’s on the plans will be deemed to be correct until the contrary can be proved.
The STA stipulates that it must be shown with 4 decimal places. This has only been the stipulation since the current STA came into operation – under the 1971 Act the participation quotas had to be shown with 3 decimal places. You will therefor find some old schemes where it is shown with only 3 decimal places. Some PQ schedules shows the total PQ of all sections as 1 and others show it as 100. There are however some instances where they do not tally up to 1 or 100 if we calculate the total PQ of all sections, even though the sectional plans show that it does. We cannot change this – we have to work on what the plans state.
The PQ determines three things:
· The size of the undivided share in the common property
· The value of the vote of a section
· The share of levies
It also determines the owner’s liability for joined debts.
Quote from the STSM Act:
Section 1(1)
“participation quota”, in relation to a section or the owner of a section, means the percentage determined in accordance with the provisions of section 32(1) or (2) of the Sectional Titles Act in respect of that section for the purposes referred to in section 32(3) of that Act, and shown on a sectional plan in accordance with the provisions of section 5(3)(g) of that Act