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Investors’ guide to asbestos: What are your obligations?
Amid National Asbestos Awareness Week, a network’s head of property management has highlighted the role landlords play in disclosing asbestos, ensuring tenant safety, and complying with regulations to minimise risks.
Landlords have a key role in managing asbestos risks by ensuring they disclose its presence to tenants, according to LJ Hooker head of property management ANZ, Cathie Crampton.
As of 2025, Asbestos remains present in 1 in 3 Australian homes, with more than 4,000 Australian lives lost every year from related diseases.
While undisturbed asbestos does not necessarily pose a health risk, when damaged, its loose fibres can be a serious threat to residents.
Loose-fill asbestos has been considered to be the most hazardous form of the material, as it is raw, crushed asbestos that can easily become airborne fibres.
To check whether a property has been identified to contain loose-fill asbestos, tenants are able to search for the premises on NSW's Loose-fill Asbestos Insulation register.
Following the state guidelines, if a property has been listed on the site, landlords or property managers must disclose this to prospective tenants or must inform them later if the dwelling is found on the register.
According to Crampton, it is the owners’ responsibility to inform both prospective tenants and the property manager if asbestos is present in the property.
“The legal encumbrance is actually upon the owner – it's not upon the property manager,” she said.
She said that owners needed to inform the property manager whether they were aware of any asbestos on the property and, if so, whether it could pose a risk to tenants.
“Asbestos is probably in a majority of rental properties that are built pre-1985, and so the only time it's an issue is if it's disturbed. If it's been disturbed, it's going to be on a register.”
She added that if the asbestos had not yet been disturbed, the tenant needed to seek permission before making modifications that could pose a hazard.
“Let's say they want to drill a hole in the wall to hang a picture, that's already legislated that they need to seek that type of permission for anything that's not a minor modification.”
“It is in everyone's best interest for any modification to a property that everybody goes through a channel of transparency.”
Crampton said that if the asbestos had not yet been disturbed, the tenant needed to seek permission before making modifications that could pose a hazard.
“It's important to be very clear where the legal encumbrance sits – it does not sit with the property manager. The role of the property manager is to be the facilitator, the advisor, to effectively give guidance.”
“It is not incumbent upon them to know everything about the property, but they should ask questions of the owner, and the tenant should ask questions before making modifications.”
Crampton said there had been a recent push by the government to shift more housing responsibility onto industry professionals, but owners still need to be proactive in understanding regulations.
“The industry is doing its very best to educate owners, I think owners and tenants alike need to take practical responsibility for their own education.”
“To go onto the internet and just educate yourself is not always adequate because there are multiple acts and multiple applications of those acts in different contexts. So you can't just go to ChatGPT and go, ‘What's my asbestos responsibility?’.”
She said all stakeholders needed to be proactive and committed to staying informed about the latest rules.
“That means getting onto training sessions, having informed conversations with their property managers and tenants, and everybody committing to transparent communication,” she concluded.