Residents in Wood Street, Chatswood are concerned about a Development Application for an attached dual occupancy dwelling. It is proposed that each dwelling will have five bedrooms (10 in total) over three stories.
In today’s world where the average family size is just north or 2 persons it is difficult to understand why so many bedrooms would be required.
Unless?
It appears that there is high demand in Chatswood for large AirBnB style accommodation.
Maybe organisations in the Chatswood area are looking for short term accommodation for employees. Evidently demand for serviced apartments outstrips supply.
For the run of the mill house in Willoughby there are no restrictions on the number of people that can live in the home. However, if the property is used for short-stay accommodation it might be considered to be a boarding house or other style of development that is controlled by legislation. Of course, obtaining evidence of such use could be very difficult.
Another feature of the current application is that it relies on the State Affordable Housing regulations to achieve higher development potential.
By the way,two car parking spaces are proposed. The residents are naturally concerned that quite number of cars will be parking in the street.
The development replaces a modest single storey home.
Chatswood West Ward History 
This is a response from Council provided by Clr. Saville:
There is an application for a dual occupancy development at 41 Wood Street (DA2019/29) which is relatively unusual in that it has been applied for under the provisions of State Environmental Policy (Affordable Rental Housing) 2009 (SEPP Affordable Housing). This is the first dual occupancy application Council has had under these provisions which enable significantly greater floor space than Council would otherwise allow on the basis that one of the dwellings will be used for affordable housing for 10 years. The application is still under assessment and will be reported to the Willoughby Local Planning Panel at a future meeting.
I can confirm that the application is for one five bedroom, four bathroom dwelling and one five bedroom, three bathroom dwelling. It does not propose a boarding house. Confusion may have arisen due to either the size of the dwellings proposed or that the application is submitted under SEPP Affordable Housing being the primary instrument under which boarding house applications are submitted.
A further response from Council provided by Clr. Saville:
The application is still under assessment which will determine numerical compliance or otherwise. We have had other applications (for residential flat buildings) which have been applied for under SEPP Affordable Housing requiring the 10 year affordable use. This has been addressed through conditions including evidence of engagement for 10 years of an affordable housing provider (such as Link Housing or others) together with a restriction on title. With these conditions in place the responsibility to monitor and ensure it is used for affordable housing purposes would primarily rest with the affordable housing provider.