Livable Housing Australia Applicant Information

Work with us to create more comfortable, versatile and accessible homes for everybody, everyday, at all stages of life.

July 2013

2

What is Livable Housing Design? A livable designed home incorporates key easy living features that aim to make a dwelling easier and safer to live in for all occupants including people with disability, ageing Australians, people with temporary injuries and families with young children.

A livable home is designed to:

§ be easy to enter and exit § be easy to move around in § be capable of easy and cost effective adaptation, and § respond to the changing needs of home occupants.

Introducing Livable Housing Australia Livable Housing Australia (LHA) is a not-for-profit organisation established through a unique industry, consumer and government initiative, LHA’s role is to champion the adoption of livable housing design features in all new homes and, where possible, renovated homes in Australia.

LHA is responsible for the development, dissemination and revision of the nationally agreed Livable Housing Design Guidelines (the Guidelines). LHA is also responsible for the issuing of the Livable Housing Design Quality Mark.

What are the LHD Guidelines? The Guidelines describe 16 easy living design elements. Each element details the performance expected to achieve silver, gold or platinum level accreditation. The performance levels can be applied to all newly built and renovated detached and semi-detached houses, terraces and townhouses (Class 1a) and apartment dwellings (Class 2).

Please note: Some of the common areas of Class 2 buildings are covered by the Disability (Access to Premises-Buildings) Standards 2010. The requirements detailed in the Premises Standards take precedence over the LHD Guidelines for this building class.

The LHD Guidelines can be downloaded from the LHA website www.lha.org.au.

How do I attain the Livable Housing Design Quality Mark? The Livable Housing Design Quality Mark is issued subject to accreditation of your building project by LHA. This involves an assessment undertaken at the design and as-built stages of the development by a designated third party assessor. The Registered Assessors List can be downloaded from the LHA website www.lha.org.au.

3

Design Element Silver Gold Platinum

1 There is a safe, continuous, level and step-free path of travel from the street entrance and/or parking area to your home’s entrance. P P P

2 There is at least one step-free entrance into your home. P P P 3

Where access to your home is through the car park, the parking space has been designed to ensure you can fully open your car doors and move around the vehicle with ease.

P P P 4 Internal doors and corridors facilitate comfortable and unimpeded

movement between spaces. P P P 5 A toilet on ground or entry level supports easy access for both home

occupants and visitors. P P P 6 The bathroom and shower has been designed for easy and independent

access for everyone in your home. P P P 7 The bathroom and toilet walls are built to enable grabrails to be installed

in the future. P P P 8 Stairways are designed to reduce the likelihood of injury and also enable

future adaptation. P P P 9 The kitchen space has been designed to support ease of movement and

to support easy adaptation. � P P

10 The laundry space has been designed to support ease of movement and to support easy adaptation. �

P P 11 There is a space on the ground or entry level that can be used as a

bedroom. � P P

12 Light switches and power points are easy for everyone in your home to reach and operate. �

P P 13 Handles and hardware on doors and tapware have been designed to

make them easy for you to open and close. � P P

14 The family/living room features clear space to enable you to move in and around the room with ease. �

�

P 15 Windows sills are installed at a height that enables you to view the

outdoor space from either a seated or standing position. �

� P

16 Floor coverings are slip resistant to reduce the likelihood of slips, trips and falls in the home. �

�

P

Livable Housing Design

Quality Mark Criteria

4

Quality Mark and Assessment and Verification Pathway (Design and As-Built stages)

Once Issued, a Provisional Quality Mark can be used for up to 2 years or 30 days after the Certificate of Completion is achieved – whichever occurs first. The Final Quality Mark can be used for up to 7 years.

Key Contacts Andrew Aitken Livable Housing Australia aaitken@lha.org.au

Step 1 Register with

LHA

• Complete the project registration form and return to info@lha.org.au • LHA will prepare a License Agreement and will send an invoice for the Verification Fees (see fee schedule below.).

Step 2 Contact assessor  

• Contact one of the LHA Registered Assessors and request a fee proposal from them. They will probably need a copy of your plans to prepare this.

• The list of LHA Registered Assessors can be downloaded from the LHA website www.lha.org.au.

Step 3 Assessment of design.

• Your Registered Assessor will then undertake a desk top assessment of the project design using the LHA Assessment forms.

• Your Registered Assessor will provide you with a copy of the completed design assessment and a letter confirming the result of the assessment.

Step 4 LHA Design Verification

• You need to send the executed License Agreement and payment of the Verification fee invoice to LHA along with the LHA Assessment form completed by your Registered Assessor. LHA will then undertake the Verification review.

• LHA will then issue the development with the Provisional livability Quality Mark.

Step 5 As-built

inspection

• Once built, please contact your Registered Assessor to arrange for an as-built inspection.

• Your Registered Assessor will prepare an as-built assessment fee proposal for your approval.

• Once the fee proposal is approved, your Registered Assessor will undertake an on-site assessment of the development using the LHA Assessment form.

Step 6 LHA as-built verification

• You then need to submit the LHA Assessment form to LHA for verification. • Once verified, LHA will issue the development with the Final livability Quality Mark.

5

Documentation Requirements Assessments must be made on a formally-issued set of plans such as For Tender; For Construction; As Built; Council Approved; Final; etc. Documents marked Preliminary; Draft; For Information Only; for LHA Assessment or documents without formal title blocks, drawing numbers, date of issue and revision status are not acceptable. Where documents other than drawings are used to determine compliance, they should be similarly formally-issued and include document numbers or reference, date of issue and revision status information.

Any letters (such as a letter confirming the result of an assessment) provided by Assessors to clients/Applicants must be on letterhead and must be signed. All documents (other than the Assessment forms) must be provided as PDF files so that they can be included with the documentation submitted for verification.

Rulings Where, in the opinion of the Registered Assessor, documentation indicates that compliance has been achieved in a method not outlined in the Guideline or any published rulings, assessors must obtain a ruling from LHA to confirm that an alternative solution meets the intent of the relevant Performance Statement.

LHA publishes an updated list of rulings on the first business day of each month. There is no fee for accessing the list of published rulings.

Where Rulings have been used, they must be referenced in the relevant part of the assessment form.

Rulings include Corrections and Alternatives. Alternatives are optional.

Any corrections published before a project is registered with LHA for certification must be addressed in the assessment. Corrections published after the project is registered for certification are optional.

Fees are applied at $500 + GST per ruling. It should be noted that applications for rulings will not be processed until the associated fee has been received by LHA.

Once the fee has been received, the standard turn around time for Rulings is 10 days.

Ruling Applications that are poorly prepared or confusing may be rejected/refused after assessment. If a project/Assessor wants to amend the documentation provided to clarify the intent of the Ruling Application, then an additional Ruling fee will be applied and must be paid before the Ruling Application will be processed.

The Ruling Application Form can be downloaded from the LHA website www.lha.org.au.

Assessment Forms Assessors must use the LHA Assessment Form. The Assessment Form can be downloaded from the LHA website www.lha.org.au.

Should an Assessor consider a criterion in an assessment form to be “Not Applicable”, then the Assessor should check the compliance box and make a note in the notes section that describes why that criterion is “Not Applicable”.

6

DESIGN ASSESSMENT AND AS-BUILT INSPECTION FEE GUIDE LHA is not responsible for fees charged by third party assessors. This information is provided as a guide only.

Fee

Desk audit fee $200 to $500 (per design) + GST

As-built inspection fee $150 to $650 (per dwelling) + GST

All fees must be confirmed with your Registered Assessor.

LHA QUALITY MARK VERIFICATION FEE Dwellings LHA Supporters Non-supporters

Verification fee $200.00 (per design) + GST $400.00 (per design) + GST

These fees are valid to 30 December 2013. The single Verification fee is for BOTH the Design Verification and the As Built Verification.

If your project includes multiple dwellings in either a Class 2 building or with multiple buildings in a development, please contact LHA to obtain a fee proposal. The above fee schedule can be used as a guide, however a reduced fee may be negotiated for multiple dwelling projects.

The Supporter Prospectus can be downloaded from the LHA website www.lha.org.au.

Acknowledgement Livable Housing Australia would like to acknowledge the support of the Australian Government Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs.

GUIDE TO FEES

Livable Housing Design Quality Mark

7

© 2013 Livable Housing Australia