Strata title is a form of ownership and housing tenure devised for multi-level apartment blocks and horizontal subdivisions with shared areas. The word "strata" refers to apartments on different levels.
Strata title was first introduced in 1961 in the state of New South Wales, Australia, to better cope with the legal ownership of apartment blocks. Previously, the only adequate method of dividing ownership was company title, which had a number of defects, such as the difficulty of instituting mortgages. This term also applies to house-type strata title units in Australia.