Commercial property to be knocked down,and the rubble left!!

friar

In a move to put two fingers up to the goverment, developers are going to knock down empty shops,warehouses,etc,to avoid paying the commercial rates,which were introduced six months ago.
Previously there was 50% discount or more I believe.
Because it cost's to move rubble,we'll leave it there!(Spokesman said)

kazwookie

Yep I read a page about this in one of the Sunday papers, it seems it is cheaper owing to a change in the law, knock it down and leave the rubble there....

lynzpower

I work in commercial property and many many of our owners have to apply for planning permission to demolish.

I am staggered that some owners are resorting to thids, I mssed this story.

Do you have a link?

epz_2

round my way there have been a lot of suspicious fires.

frankly i think its obscene that rather than sell a property to another business who could make a living and pay tax it is acceptable for people to hoard property making out main street unsightly and lacking facilities.

tax the rubble at the value of the building previous to it being knocked down until a new one is put in place, it will hurt absentee owners and force the prices down to a point where eventually a business will be feasible to run from the site.

i would also give the local council powers to seize and auction off any sites with 2 years unpaid taxes, hold the proceeds in trust and keep them if not claimed in 7 years.


i dont get tax breaks, why should a company hoarding a resource to the detriment of the local community get one.

friar

Sorry forgot link. >HERE<

tomstickland

In a nutshell:
-old buildings awaiting redevelopment
-often rented out cheaply whilst the development plans are put into place
-now cheaper to demolish them and leave a pile of rubbish

Looks like another desperate tax grab.

MissMoneypenny

It's time to bring in land taxes.

classixuk

This thread kind of stinks of ignorance.

Some of you need to consider "Just how desperate is a person who buys a building and then knocks it down?"

If it were as simple as "selling it on", don't you think they would do that? Even let it out so that somebody could start up a business?

The reason these buildings are empty is that they were previously in an area that had lot's of foot traffic, but has since become a ghost town due to council's "moving" entire city centres.

Imagine the worst part of your city, and all of the shops and buildings that are boarded up. Would you open a business there?

Exactly. But even though the shops are empty, on crime ridden streets where even the police dare not go, the owners of the buildings are being made to pay full business rates as if there was a shop trading there anyway.

Faced with no way to sell or attract people who would rent the buildings to open businesses, the landlords are being crippled with taxes of many thousands of pounds per year.

The government has left them with no choice but to demolish the buildings in many cases.

Previously, the owners were given 6 months grace to find tenants or open a business, and then after that, if they were unsuccessful, they paid 50% of the rates.

tomstickland

classixuk wrote: »

This thread kind of stinks of ignorance.

Can you please highlight the ignorance? Your description fits exactly what I read in the article.

epz_2

classixuk, they could always sell it for £1 or gift it to the council. if it were possible to open a business with negligible rent then you would see a resurgence in lots of little weird shops offering services to specialist to be offered by bigger players.

instead these owners prefer to hold empty properties making the town center look unsightly and then demolish it so they can retain the land but have no benefit from it, i'm the ignorant one?

WTF?_2

epz wrote: »

classixuk, they could always sell it for £1 or gift it to the council. if it were possible to open a business with negligible rent then you would see a resurgence in lots of little weird shops offering services to specialist to be offered by bigger players.

instead these owners prefer to hold empty properties making the town center look unsightly and then demolish it so they can retain the land but have no benefit from it, i'm the ignorant one?

I don't see why they should gift the land to the council as it has real worth. The problem is that they have to pay a fair whack of rates even if they can't find a renter for it.

They should have to clear the site properly of rubble if they do demolish, though. Perhaps some sort of agreed standard like a fenced off green space.