Ferdinand

Have a look at some on previous similar planning apps, until you are clear that you understand what is required (also compare the Planning Conditions). Then find yourself a pro to do it - I do not think you can do this one yourself. If i am wrong a n other will shout up. And welcome.

These have been very popular for a few years now. Half of it is dedicated to cleaning plants, and the rest for swimming, with some sort of divider. I always fancied the idea of having one with water running through it at less than the unlicensed limit of 20 cubic m per day, next to a local river. But that would be different. My dream would be a sandy bottom over a liner on the swimming half. Budgets for a built-for-you one are substantially more than an outdoor swimming pool. Get a HaHa with a liner. F

I was going to lower the tone there but I'll just give you another Partridge-esque shrug. Perhaps a wrong call on tor part imo. I think COVID will have a significant effect on all of this. Not perhaps in my area ... here prices are low enough that the market has always been functional, even for eg minimum wage couples. Here trad 2 bed terraces are available at around 70-75k or 60k for a doer upper. You can get a new 2 bed semi on a new estate for under 140k. That is the same in cash terms as the peak of 2003/4 when they previously doubled in 18 months in the Blair property boom, and then drifted back down by nearly half. It took 15 years to recover. But imo there will be a change in London. I monitor a small no of developments for rents and prices, and even the desirable have *far* more availability than usual. Many Central London asking rents are 5-25% down, after several years of static or down-ward drift before that. Add in that it is reported to be 300k down in population, plus COVID fleeing work-from-homers. And that will imo may well take down quite a few of the highly leveraged zombie LL businesses, who have been under the cosh since 2015. I'm expecting a lot of letting-sized flats going through auctions in the next 2 years. There will be some investment from LLs, but investment plummeted after the various Osborne taxes. The upshot will be more availability, and perhaps lower prices for a catchup period. Given that there are particular segments of the population that have fared better financially during COVID - yes some service pros, but also public sector working every hour God sends. I think that some of those will be buying in some parts of London and other places. Maybe not a sea change, but a change. F

Oh, and go in and read through *all* the file. Take an iPad for notes, and subtle pictures though not allowed. Something like a Photoshop or Pintshop Pro can pull out the distortion via a stretch tool.

I would go and talk to people with the other garages to see if anyone has had thee Council going beserk before. It might also be a good Q for Planning Aid (run by RICS) to see if they can advise you on the legal principle of enforcing a condition 50 years later when there are extant breaches, and when the original planning docs used appear to be the non-approved plan (if that is the case). You have to ascertain your facts yourself, then ask a general Q about the planning principles. Find them via google. I would consult your Planning Solicitor or member of the Royal Town Planning Institute (MRTPI) about arguing that the condition is no longer enforcible. If it were a covenant not a condition then you would I think not have much trouble with it, as breaches of the same covenant close by undermine its enforcibility. I do not knows the ins and outs, or how the "requirements" apply to old planning conditions that are breached elsewhere: "planning conditions should only be imposed where they are: (i) necessary (ii) relevant to planning and (iii) to the development to be permitted (iv) enforceable (v) precise and (vi) reasonable in all other respects;" iv, v, and vi look questionable here, to me. But it is obscure, so you need an expert to worry them - and ultimately that is an MRTPI. Ferdinand

Wait until COVID is over then take a torch down your local nightclub. (Can't see it with 2 black eyes, mind). For a serious solution, consider either trad Dymo Tape (which does come in at least 5 colours of Flourescent) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Compatible-FLUORESCENT-Embossing-Label-Maker/dp/B01M22VXXG or the stuff the RNIB call "Liquid Plastic", which goes on as a liquid and then sets (in Orange and Black) (*) https://shop.rnib.org.uk/rnib-tacti-mark-tactile-labelling or you could even use the sort of "nipples" I put at the right spot on the back of a cupboard door to stop it hitting something, or on the wall where the handle with hit. El-cheapo from Amazon. or if it is temporarily to see them, get a head torch F (*) Comes with large print instructions in case you take a few years to get round to it.

I think there are still places which are below their 2003-7 levels, in cash terms ... never mind inflation. I would look for success to be that prices rise broadly in line with somewhere between inflation and wage inflation.

Running a few numbers on mine. For my personal property it would be virtually neutral. For a rental at say 100k value, Council Tax could be £1000 very ish, and the new one would be £480. I think my Ts would agree to such a change in rent, as it is a split of benefit and that is a principle I often use. One fly in the ointment is if they tried to do the Osborne "business expenses are part of taxed income" thing, which would make it more difficult.

OTOH might it encourage an adjustment through moves and different supply/demand balance? London rents are substantially down after COVID - like 5-20% down, and have been softer than everywhere else for several years. No idea how it will go.

Hmmm. Another benefit of Stamp Duty going would be to reduce savings required by first time buyers. F

I think the logical time to do it would be either at the end of a short extension to the Stamp Duty holiday, or immediately. That would entirely lance the kind of chaos Nigel Lawson caused in 1988 when he gave 4 months warning of major change to close a huge loophole. I have not got my head around whether likely house price fluctuations after COVID would make it easier or harder to implement. Liability on rented property would make a big difference to me, as Council Tax tends to be around 20% ish of the rent. That would be punishing, and I am already well into 5 figures in Corona in adjustments, rent rise delays, and writeoffs helping tenants get through intact. If adjustments are not too lumpy, I may really like this. F

Back on topic. The genesis of this idea seems to be in a piece on Conservative Home by Kevin Hollinrake MP, from the All Party Housing Group. "In place of the administrative challenge of council tax, in which properties are taxed through a confusing and distorting system of bands and exemptions, the PPT would apply a single rate of tax – 0.48 per cent of property value – to all homes. Owners rather than tenants would be responsible for the tax, removing over 8.7 million households from property tax altogether and saving councils an annual £400 million in administrative costs. To incentivise more efficient usage of existing property, a surcharge on second, empty and offshore-owned homes would be introduced, as well as on plots of land that received council planning permission yet have been left vacant by developers. The policy is revenue neutral – raising the same amount of money for the Treasury as the scrapped taxes currently do. To maintain the important democratic link between local expenditure and local taxation, Fairer Share recommends that the 0.48 per cent rate should consist of two components. A fixed national rate (0.32 per cent) which would go to central government for redistribution and an initial floating local rate (0.16 per cent) which would go straight to the local authority and could subsequently be moved up or down by that authority. In this way local authorities retain flexibility over taxation and voters can still judge them on value for money. And importantly, this approach includes the complete abolition of stamp duty land tax (SDLT) on owner-occupied residential property. " https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2020/09/kevin-hollinrake-conservatives-must-consider-a-proportional-property-tax.html It is quite a long, interesting piece. Looking at that, it seems to aim to solve the "granny in a £2 million house" problem, by reducing the transaction costs of leaving, and slightly increasing those of staying. F

It's not the big one though. CGT relief on main dwelling needs to just go to undistort the market. That is worth £25bn a year and the benefit is heavily tilted to the better off and the rich areas. As it is a tax on gain, all that happens is that the gain is a little smaller. ?

Interesting one. Looks carefully pitched in value terms. £2400 on a 500k property. Not too out of balance for normal houses in Outer London in CT terms. Would cost buyer there a few hundred a year and save approx 15k on the Stamp. Would seriously impact those places like Westminster / Wandsworth where CT has traditionally been low, but would save more on the Stamp. Impacts elsewhere less extreme. Works for all of those. Also works for the Red Wall and other areas as SD levels are very small for the vast majority. Also in such areas CT is higher, so it would play to "levelling up". Peter is right that renting is the hard case. They could try keeping and increasing Stamp Surcharge. I wonder if coming London price adjustments may make a difference. One issue is greater centralisation nationally, as there may need to be inter-area adjustments. F

The ones I am trying for will only be 2008-9 so microfiche should not be involved. I have heard stories on both sides. And I have never seen a clear answer from mine. A couple of years ago some BR information - eg if it had cavity venilation or not, suddenly came onto the website. When asked the rationale was budget savings so people could check themselves. It seems they had just added a layer of data. But at the same time the large scale maps (down to about 1:250 online) vanished, presumably for the same reason - and it now something strange. The previous ones allowed things like gaps between houses to be worked out quite reliably to plus or minus a few inches, which was great. Despite a convo with the Council's mapping officer I never got to the bottom of it. F

Has anyone tried obtaining the docs on an existing house, or know what their status is? My understanding is that Planning Documents are essentially public, and Building Regs docs are essentially private ie I can't get a copy. I am going to see what my Council says, but I have 2 agendas here: 1 - I am planning work on my house (rebuilt from 3 walls and a hole after nearly-demolition12 years ago by the previous owner), to extend somewhat and improve the fabric, and it would be useful to know as much as possible. 2 - I plan to write to my MP suggesting that all Building Regs documents become basically public, as one response to the Grenfell Enquiry. And as a way of introducing a culture to encourage scrutiny. Any perspectives would be most welcome. Cheers Ferdinand

Our Council made one not unlike the Russ video for our local duckpond after some were killed by dogs. Then the Council Leader made a video sitting in a canoe next to it telling us how clever he was. We expect a similar presentation.

Welcome. That would be ... quickly. And beware colleagues who pretend to be disinterested. (Not sure if it is genuine, but the soundtrack makes it.)

If the Environmental Scheme was not actually in operation at the time of Appeal it should imo not have been refused on that basis. But if that is the case it looks like a right battle to get that turned over. And it is probably a better practical option to get the Council to accept a payment, as the other arguments about planning principle and "where horses may safely graze" have now been won. If the payment is not prohibitive. They must want the money, so they should know how they want it to work. Could you try asking the Officer or the Head of Planning directly, or getting your Councillor to do so. (Bear in mind possible elections in May in your area, which may distract councillor.) Ferdinand

Missed that bit. It was a generic as I am not really acquainted with Free Go process, beyond that you get a second try with a little-changed project if refused.

OT: So what will you do when a roof tile cracks ?.? I try to have a couple in an exposed location so that they will vaguely colour match for replacements people can see. An option to get a few now, depending on relative cost, and use the rest for the edging if suitable?

But nicely built. Good job,

Bit phallic, that.

The rads are bled, aren't they? (Tops will be cold if not)

One question there is how much insulation is *under* the UFH. But that will not affect how you need to run it now as it is a sunk cost. It needs to be ideally about 125mm of PIR or 250-300mm of EPS. The chap who did my house just did 90mm of PIR, down there 10-12 years ago and I do not know really how good the attention to detail/cold bridges was down there.