Paving and retaining repairs in a WA rental: who pays and how fast.
The owner pays. Under the Residential Tenancies Act 1987 (WA) the lessor must keep the premises in a reasonable state of repair, and driveways, paths, pool surrounds and retaining walls are part of the premises. If the fault makes the property unsafe, which a leaning wall or a void in a driveway does, it is an urgent repair and must be arranged within 48 hours of notice, or within 24 hours where an essential service is affected. Everything else is non-urgent and must be done within a reasonable time. The tenant only pays for damage beyond fair wear and tear.
Who is responsible, by how soon, and what it costs.
This is the table to keep next to the work order. It covers the paving and retaining situations that actually come up on Geraldton rentals, who carries them under WA law, the timeframe where the Act sets one, and a realistic 2026 cost so you can sanity check a quote before you approve it.
| Situation | Who is responsible | Timeframe | Typical 2026 cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Retaining wall leaning, bulging or partly collapsed | Lessor. It makes the premises unsafe, so it is an urgent repair. | Arrange within 48 hours of being notified | Make-safe $600 to $1,800; rebuild $350 to $650 per m² of wall face |
| Water service or sewer damaged during paving works, property has no water | Lessor, through the contractor. Essential service fault. | Arrange within 24 hours of being notified | $400 to $1,500 to repair and reinstate the paving over it |
| Trip lip of 15mm or more on the main entry path or the only accessible route | Lessor. Treat as urgent where it makes the premises unsafe. | 48 hours if unsafe, otherwise a reasonable time | Lift and relay a small area $350 to $900 |
| Void or hole opening in the driveway near a downpipe or the garage | Lessor. Barricade it the same day. | 48 hours to make safe | Soakwell replacement $900 to $2,600, plus relay at $45 to $80 per m² |
| Pool surround pavers moved enough to affect the barrier height or the non-climbable zone | Lessor. Barrier compliance sits with the owner, and WA local governments inspect private pool barriers at least once every 4 years. | Urgent. 48 hours to make safe, then rectify | Relay and re-level $600 to $1,600 |
| Sunken or rocking driveway pavers with no hazard and no vehicle risk | Lessor, as ordinary repair and maintenance. | Non-urgent: within a reasonable time | Lift and relay $45 to $80 per m² |
| Empty joints and weeds through the paving | Split. Routine weeding usually sits with the tenant under the agreement; replacing lost jointing sand is the lessor. | No statutory timeframe | Re-sand with stabilised jointing sand $15 to $35 per m² |
| Oil or fuel staining from the tenant vehicle | Tenant, if it is beyond fair wear and tear and shows against the property condition report. | Usually settled at vacate | Cleaning $150 to $400; replacing stained pavers $250 to $600 |
| Wall or edging struck by the tenant vehicle | Tenant. Report it to the lessor promptly; the lessor arranges the repair. | Report immediately, repair as urgent if unsafe | $800 to $3,000 depending on length and height |
| Paving a bare or gravel area that was never paved | Lessor, and it is optional. This is an improvement, not a repair. | None | $75 to $170 per m² supplied and laid |
| Access for the contractor to quote or to work | Lessor or agent gives the notice; the tenant must allow reasonable access. | Written notice of 72 hours to 14 days for repairs and maintenance | Nothing. The measure and written quote are free |
| Routine inspection that picks up paving faults | Lessor or agent. | 7 to 14 days written notice, maximum 4 routine inspections in 12 months | Nothing |
Timeframes reflect the WA residential tenancies rules as they apply to repairs. Costs are indicative Geraldton 2026 ranges for a normal residential block with reasonable access. This is general information, not legal advice.
Urgent or not urgent: the distinction that sets your clock running.
WA does not have a paving-specific rule. What it has is a general obligation on the lessor to keep the premises in a reasonable state of repair, and a definition of urgent repairs that captures anything making the premises unsafe or insecure. Paving usually sits outside that definition, which is why a sunken driveway is a non-urgent repair and can reasonably be scheduled. Retaining walls and trip hazards usually sit inside it, because a wall that can fall and a 30mm lip on the front path both make the property unsafe.
Once a tenant notifies you of an urgent repair, the clock starts. A fault to an essential service must be arranged within 24 hours. Other urgent repairs must be arranged within 48 hours. Note the word arranged. You are not required to have the wall rebuilt inside two days, which would be impossible; you are required to have organised a suitable tradesperson to make it safe. That is exactly what a make-safe is for, and it is the reason a $600 to $1,800 make-safe followed by a properly scoped rebuild three weeks later is both compliant and sensible.
If a tenant cannot reach you or your agent about an urgent repair, WA law allows them to arrange the work with a suitable tradesperson and seek reimbursement, up to the limit set in the Act. Check the current limit with Consumer Protection WA rather than assuming, because it is the kind of figure that gets updated. The practical lesson for owners and managers is simple: answer urgent repair notifications quickly, in writing, even if the answer is that a contractor is booked for Thursday.
Non-urgent repairs have no fixed number attached in WA. They must be done within a reasonable time, and reasonable is judged against the nature of the fault. A rocking paver on a back path in a wet July can reasonably wait for a dry week, and it should, because compacting a base in saturated ground produces a repair that fails again. A driveway the tenant cannot use is not reasonable to leave for a month.
Notice, access and getting the job done without a second visit.
For repairs and maintenance in WA the lessor or agent must give the tenant written notice of at least 72 hours and not more than 14 days, and entry has to be at reasonable hours. Routine inspections are different: 7 to 14 days written notice, and no more than four in any twelve months. Emergencies are the exception and permit entry without notice. Getting this wrong is the most common reason a straightforward paving job turns into three trips and an unhappy tenant.
The practical fix on external work is to write the notice so it covers the quote and the work in one window, and to say plainly that the tenant does not need to be home because the work is outside. Paving, driveway and retaining work almost never needs interior access. What it does need is a clear driveway, so tell the tenant which day the vehicles need to be off, and where they can park instead. On a Wandina or Mount Tarcoola block with a single driveway, that one line in the notice saves a wasted mobilisation.
One Geraldton-specific point. A new pavement should not be driven on until the jointing has been compacted and, on stabilised joints, has had time to set. Build a day or two of no-vehicle time into the notice rather than discovering it on the morning of the pour. The seasonal considerations that decide when this work goes best are set out in the guide to the best time of year to pave in Geraldton.
Managing a portfolio in Geraldton?
We quote from photos where we can, attend without the tenant needing to be home, and invoice the agency with before and after photos attached. Free measure, written itemised quotes.
The vacate inspection: what you can and cannot charge to the bond.
Everything at vacate is judged against the property condition report completed at the start of the tenancy. If the paving was already tired then, it is still tired now and that is the owner’s cost. Fair wear and tear is never chargeable to a tenant, and in Geraldton fair wear and tear covers a great deal of what people try to claim: joint sand scoured out by the wind, limestone that has gone paler in the sun, weeds in the gaps, minor settlement in the wheel tracks and a general loss of colour on concrete pavers.
What is chargeable is damage: oil and fuel staining, a wall or edge struck by a vehicle, pavers cracked by something dropped or driven that should not have been, chemical burns from a spill. Even then, the claim has to be reasonable and supported. Photograph the entry condition, photograph the exit condition from the same angles, and get a written quote rather than an estimate. The bond in WA is capped at four weeks rent, and a poorly evidenced claim over paving is an easy one for a tenant to dispute.
A note on timing that saves owners money. If you are between tenancies, that vacant window is the cheapest time to do any paving work, because the site is clear, the vehicles are gone and the job can run without interruption. If the property is also going to market rather than being re-let, read the pre-sale paving page before you spend, because the jobs worth doing before a sale are not the same as the jobs worth doing before a re-let.
Repair or capital improvement: the tax line that matters.
This is general information, not tax advice, and your accountant decides how it applies to your situation. The broad distinction the ATO draws is between a repair, which restores something to the condition it was in without changing its character, and a capital improvement, which replaces an asset or makes it better than it was.
- Usually an immediate deduction: relaying a sunken section of an existing driveway, re-sanding joints, replacing cracked pavers with the same product, reinstating edge restraint that has failed, clearing and repairing a blocked drain behind an existing wall.
- Usually capital works, written off over time: replacing an entire driveway, paving an area that was previously gravel or lawn, building a new retaining wall, upgrading from concrete pavers to limestone. Capital works on a rental are typically deducted at 2.5 per cent a year over 40 years.
- Usually not deductible at all as a repair: fixing defects that already existed when you bought the property. These are treated as initial repairs and are capital, even if you do the work in the first month of the tenancy.
The practical consequence is worth thinking about before you approve a scope. If a driveway needs 20 square metres relaid and you decide to replace all 55 square metres while the crew is on site, you have converted a deductible repair into capital works. Sometimes that is still the right call, because a patch repair on badly failed paving is money you spend twice. But it should be a decision you make knowingly, with the figures in front of you, rather than one that happens by accident on site. Ask the contractor to price the repair-only scope and the full replacement separately so your accountant can see both.
What we would tell you not to spend money on.
Rentals do not reward premium paving. A tenant in Geraldton will pay the same weekly rent for a sound concrete-paver driveway as for a sealed natural limestone one, so upgrading the material on a rental almost never returns the extra $40 to $60 per square metre. Spend the money on the base, the drainage and the edge restraint, which is what stops you paying for the same repair every three years, and leave the finish alone.
Three more things we would talk an owner out of. Sealing a rental driveway purely for looks, because a seal on a working driveway needs redoing every three to five years and no tenant notices. Repaving a back courtyard nobody uses while the front entry path still has a trip lip on it. And chasing a hairline crack in a limestone block face, which is cosmetic spalling, not structural. Fix the safety items, fix the water, ignore the cosmetics.
What is genuinely worth doing preventatively on a Geraldton rental is a re-sand with a stabilised jointing sand every three to five years at $15 to $35 per square metre, and a clean-out of the soakwells and any drainage behind a retaining wall before winter. Those two jobs prevent most of the expensive failures described on the warning signs page. The full routine is in our printable maintenance schedule, and the wider maintenance detail is on the paving maintenance guide. If a wall is already moving, work through the emergency steps first, and if the damage might be an insured event, read the insurance page before anything is cleared away.
Get an itemised quote for a Geraldton rental property
Tell us the address and the fault and we will attend without the tenant needing to be home, then send an itemised quote to you or the agency, normally within one business day.