The peak body representing strata owners is urging Fair Trading Minister Matthew Mason-Cox to change the Home Building Amendment Act before what it calls the potentially "catastrophic" legislation comes into force on December 1.

"I guess we haven't had enough deaths yet for this to not be funny any more," said Owners Corporation Network chairman Stephen Goddard, a strata lawyer.

The criticism comes as the state government is doing more to promote apartment living. This week it announced new design standards that remove parking requirements in some areas – a measure it said would make units more affordable.

But critics like the OCN say the separate changes to home building legislation fail to deal with poor-quality workmanship and erode the ability of owners to make claims about defects.

"Half a trillion dollars of the national wealth is invested in strata schemes ... and for some reason government doesn't think consumer protection in the building sector is important," Mr Goddard said.

The OCN has used a submission about regulations to be developed to accompany the new laws to make its appeal to Mr Mason-Cox about the act, which passed through Parliament this year. OCN said its requests to meet the minister to discuss its concerns had so far been ignored.

A key change is a new "major defect" definition. As the new act stands, this sets out that a building would need to be uninhabitable or under threat of collapse for a problem to fall under the maximum six-year statutory warranty period after December 1.

This potentially omits serious structural problems like fire safety or waterproofing issues, which would otherwise only be covered for two years.

"The fact that a building is a vertical barbecue doesn't mean you have to move out, it just means you take your life into your own hands and don't know it until the place catches alight," Mr Goddard said, who added some owners might lose their right to claim defects even before signs of any problems emerged.

Apartments, where volunteer-led owners' corporations have several procedural hurdles to jump before making a claim, are expected to be particularly affected by the new timeline.

New consumer protections that had been expected to mitigate some of the issues with the act – such as a 2 per cent defects bond – have been tied up in delayed strata reforms.

Hazel Easthope from the University of NSW's City Futures Research Centre, the lead author of a 2012 study that found about two-thirds of the state's strata schemes had defects arising from their construction, said this delay created a "limbo" period for home owners.

"I think people are going to be upset and disappointed when they realise that they don't have the consumer protection they thought they should have when they buy a new property, which is possibly the biggest and most expensive purchase they're going to make in their lives," Dr Easthope said.

A spokeswoman for Mr Mason-Cox said he "is always happy to meet with stakeholders" and the government was looking at the definition of a defect in the regulations to accompany the new laws, which would bring "clarity and certainty" to the home-building process.

Clearer defect definitions would "help reduce the number and complexity of disputes, savings costs for all parties", she said, adding an "integrated package of reforms" including strata and home warranty insurance would be introduced next year.

Urban Development Institute of Australia NSW chief executive Stephen Albin said the industry would have preferred the strata and home-building reforms to be rolled out at the same time.

Urban Taskforce chief executive Chris Johnson said it supported the major defect definition as "a good balance between consumers and the development industry".