Advice re half sold development

jollyrosiemac

Hi there
Newbie here and i'm not sure if i've posted in the right place but here goes. Sorry if I am on the wrong forum.

filbert_2

I can sympathise with your disappointment. It must be a worry. However, I think that any housing development with more than 14 houses has to include social housing anyway? Or have I got that number wrong?

That said, from bitter experience, private house owners do not necessarily make the best neighbours. My MIL lives in a council house and most of her neighbours are council tenants as well. They may not have fancy houses or cars, but they are nicer neighbours than the ones round here.

poppysarah

If you feel that strongly then borrow the money and be landlord and control who your neighbours are.
It was a risk moving onto an unsold half empty estate. Ah well I'm sure the social housing tenants will make the place feel more lived in!

If it's social housing you'll have a neighbour nusiance policy in place - unlike those who own or rent privately it's much easier to sort issues out.

If you confirmed in writing with the developers that none was for social housing you might have more of a leg to stand on, but it's unlikely you did.

Pssst

Private developers are just that. They build private housing.

Howver,as i predicted some times ago and i shall predict again,I am quite sure that sections of new build developments ,especially those with flats on them,will be leased or sold to social housing. It is a stop loss mechanism that developers will use to shift homes and cut losses/stablilise their cashflows. They dont care about anyone who has already bought one.

Someone mentioned about new developments having to have some social housing.

That is incorrect and you may be confusing it with the Governments morally corrupt Pathfinder scheme in which developers do bent deals to get land cheaply on brownfiled sites,compulsory purchase existing homes for a pittance,throw the owners off and then build part private,part social housing on them.

Everyones a winner apart from the private buyers who may not know what they are buying into AND the people who have had their homes compulsory purchased.

Meanwhile social tenants get to live in a nice new home alongside those people who are flogging their tripe out to pay a mortgage on a home that may be slipping into negative equity.

You will know who the social tenants are. They will be sat outside in summer sunning themselves with cans of beer and some hardcore like Cascada on the hi fi and a plasma on the living room wall as you sweat up your pathway from work.

You can then sit in your home relaxing and listening to their noise.

Premier_2

jollyrosiemac wrote: »

... but I was wondering if there is anything I could do about this or seek legal advice or something like that??????? or maybe someone else is going through the same. I just feel if this goes ahead, this is not what I bought into as one of my 1st questions on visiting the showhouse as to confirm that none of the houses were reserved for council/associaton etc....

Cut your losses and sell now.

Next time buy somewhere in an established development.

The risk taken with any new development is not knowing who your neighbours will be (you can't dictate who the vendor may sell to), what type of property will be built next to yours (subject to gaining new planning permission) or even if the site is left undeveloped (or worse still, as a building site)

whitfreak

I wouldnt be too worried. If its an estate of any real size atleast 10% will be "affordable housing" aka housing association aka council house from the start (it would have been a planning requirement, well if its down south anyway). Also bare in mind that housing associations also (ultimately) run the part ownerships schemes for key workers, so just because its housing association doesnt mean its going to be single mums with hoards of kids (although to be fair it could be). If your that fussed, you'll have to move to an estabilished estate built before labour came to power again.

And pssst you dont need to predict it, according to my dad (a planning officer), housing associations arnt having to beg too much to get money out of the government atm, so they are buying up places left right and centre. Probably the governments way of proping the builders up.

One thing the OP might want to look at is checking that everything that they said would be built has been. There have been a couple of estates around here where the roads havent been completely finished, the play area not built and alike. In this situation you do have a claim against the developer although not as big a one you'd hope.

jollyrosiemac

filbert wrote: »

I can sympathise with your disappointment. It must be a worry. However, I think that any housing development with more than 14 houses has to include social housing anyway? Or have I got that number wrong?

That said, from bitter experience, private house owners do not necessarily make the best neighbours. My MIL lives in a council house and most of her neighbours are council tenants as well. They may not have fancy houses or cars, but they are nicer neighbours than the ones round here.

Social Housing wasn't a requirement here too small a development.

jollyrosiemac

poppysarah wrote: »

If you feel that strongly then borrow the money and be landlord and control who your neighbours are.
It was a risk moving onto an unsold half empty estate. Ah well I'm sure the social housing tenants will make the place feel more lived in!

If it's social housing you'll have a neighbour nusiance policy in place - unlike those who own or rent privately it's much easier to sort issues out.

If you confirmed in writing with the developers that none was for social housing you might have more of a leg to stand on, but it's unlikely you did.

That reminds me, i must check my lottery ticket lol..... no seriously, when we reserved our house, the market was very strong and when we moved in early May 2008, houses were still selling. It was really June, July-ish things started slowing and we realised we'd end up living in a half sold development. We just assumed all of the houses would sell as you would normally with any new build. Good point re neighbour nusiance policy - didn't think about that. thanks

jollyrosiemac

Pssst wrote: »

Private developers are just that. They build private housing.

Howver,as i predicted some times ago and i shall predict again,I am quite sure that sections of new build developments ,especially those with flats on them,will be leased or sold to social housing. It is a stop loss mechanism that developers will use to shift homes and cut losses/stablilise their cashflows. They dont care about anyone who has already bought one.

Someone mentioned about new developments having to have some social housing.

That is incorrect and you may be confusing it with the Governments morally corrupt Pathfinder scheme in which developers do bent deals to get land cheaply on brownfiled sites,compulsory purchase existing homes for a pittance,throw the owners off and then build part private,part social housing on them.

Everyones a winner apart from the private buyers who may not know what they are buying into AND the people who have had their homes compulsory purchased.

Meanwhile social tenants get to live in a nice new home alongside those people who are flogging their tripe out to pay a mortgage on a home that may be slipping into negative equity.

You will know who the social tenants are. They will be sat outside in summer sunning themselves with cans of beer and some hardcore like Cascada on the hi fi and a plasma on the living room wall as you sweat up your pathway from work.

You can then sit in your home relaxing and listening to their noise.

Well thank you ! Have you read thishttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/newhomes/4223879/New-homes-First-person.html

jollyrosiemac

Premier wrote: »

Cut your losses and sell now.

Next time buy somewhere in an established development.

The risk taken with any new development is not knowing who your neighbours will be (you can't dictate who the vendor may sell to), what type of property will be built next to yours (subject to gaining new planning permission) or even if the site is left undeveloped (or worse still, as a building site)

We assumed the remaining houses would be sold as were the first half - didn't need to think otherwise as the market was still strong when we reserved.

jollyrosiemac

whitfreak wrote: »

I wouldnt be too worried. If its an estate of any real size atleast 10% will be "affordable housing" aka housing association aka council house from the start (it would have been a planning requirement, well if its down south anyway). Also bare in mind that housing associations also (ultimately) run the part ownerships schemes for key workers, so just because its housing association doesnt mean its going to be single mums with hoards of kids (although to be fair it could be). If your that fussed, you'll have to move to an estabilished estate built before labour came to power again.

And pssst you dont need to predict it, according to my dad (a planning officer), housing associations arnt having to beg too much to get money out of the government atm, so they are buying up places left right and centre. Probably the governments way of proping the builders up.

One thing the OP might want to look at is checking that everything that they said would be built has been. There have been a couple of estates around here where the roads havent been completely finished, the play area not built and alike. In this situation you do have a claim against the developer although not as big a one you'd hope.

I'm worried, infact very worried. We cant move - see previous post.