The Government has taken very limited industry consultation on the proposed Residential Tenancies Bill 2009 and the result weighs heavily in favour of the tenants. 

Obviously the industry is all for protecting the rights of tenants, however if proposed clauses such as the tenants ability to break a fixed term lease and tenants being able to make cosmetic changes, just as two examples, are approved there is a very real chance that some investors will move away from residential property. 

Industry bodies such as the REINSW are trying to highlight the issues, however it is up to all of us to educate as many people as we can about the potential impact of this Bill, particularly at a time when there is a lot of comment about the possible level of rent increases in 2010.

If you have the opportunity to make comment in your local media, or feel it is an issue that your local member can assist with make the effort before we are all burdened with increased disputes and frustrated landlords.

http://www.fairtrading.nsw.gov.au/About_us/Legislation/Comment_on_proposed_legislation/Draft_Residential_Tenancies_Bill_2009.html?DCSext.ref=HomePageClick:Haveyoursay

10 Comments »

This is a letter from IP Australia in relation to the realestate.com.au trademark application.

April 2008
Statement regarding realestate.com.au‚

There has been considerable interest in the acceptance by IP Australia of the trade mark Œrealestate.com.au‚ for a range of goods and services including real estate affairs and advertising of real estate. The registration has been opposed by at least one party. Other parties have the opportunity to oppose until 17 April 2008.

Background
A trade mark‚s function is to distinguish, in a commercial sense, one person‚s goods or services from the similar goods or services of another.

Applications for trade mark registration are examined. Marks that other traders would ordinarily want to use, including those which are purely descriptive, would not normally be accepted. However, it is possible for an applicant to overcome problems of this nature with substantial evidence of use showing the trade mark has acquired distinctiveness or reputation.

If a trade mark is accepted, whether on the basis of evidence or not, it is advertised to allow others to oppose registration if they wish to do so.

Unlike examination, opposition allows both sides to fully put their case. It typically involves three stages of presentation of evidence which can in total take over 12 months. At the conclusion of the evidence stages, a Hearing Officer will decide whether to register or refuse the trade mark. This decision may be appealed to the Federal Court.

This particular trade mark application went through the normal examination process and as would be expected, evidence of use was required before it was accepted.

As noted above, registration of this trade mark has been opposed. The opposition process will allow opposing parties to express their views about the appropriateness of registration of the mark.

**If the mark were to be registered, registration would provide rights in the mark as a whole and not in specific parts of it. Moreover, where parts of a mark are descriptive, registration would not necessarily stop others from using those terms. The law also provides a range of defences to infringement action, including where the term is used descriptively. This type of conflict would be resolved by determining whether consumers are likely to be confused by the similarity in the respective terms. It would for instance be highly unlikely that the owner could prevent use of the term „real estate‰ by others.

IP Australia has no role in determining infringement matters. These are decided by the courts.

End of letter.

1 Comment »

Update: The REA Application has been passed by IP Australia, however this still can be rejected and is under review. There has been objection raised and now it will go to a hearing. The closing date for objections is nearing completion. If the trademark is successful then any legal matters are between the two parties concerned.

Realestate.com.au Limited (REA) has applied to register “realestate.com.au” as a trade mark for a very wide range of services relating to real estate, including ‘Real estate affairs’, ‘financial services’ and ‘advertising of real estate in electronic and printed format’. If this proceeds through it will be registered by the Australian Trade Mark Office.

I have received quite a few emails on this very subject. Here is an excerpt from one of these emails.

The Australian Trade Mark Office usually ignores “.com” or “.com.au” in assessing applications. In practical terms, the application for “realestate.com.au” is effectively an attempt to trade mark “realestate”. I currently control the domain name xxxrealestate.com.au. A lawyer working for REA has sent me a letter requiring me to “cease use of the domain name “xxxrealestate.com.au” (or any other name that includes “realestate.com.au”) and arrange for the transfer of that domain name to REA”. I have not responded to the letter. I know of at least 300 other domain names, perhaps your’s, that includes “realestate.com.au”

The email above has been going around the traps and points to a certain website receiving a notice from REA asking them to cease using this domain. I spoke with IP Australia today and not surprisingly they actually told me that they have had a great deal of response and any media enquiries for this Trademark are directed to one person, who has not returned my calls. However, I did get to have a brief conversation with one of their staff members.
Read the rest of this article »

18 Comments »