Agricultural Occupancy Condition - Help please!

Tommy1

I have just come across this site and would be grateful if someone could give me advice. I have a neighbour with a cottage which has an aoc on it. He got the aoc put on the cottage in order to retain it as it was meant to be removed as is usually the case when he built a large replacement bungalow in 1985. He now "says" the bungalow is too large for him to live in and has said he would like to renovate or replace the cottage to live in and rent his existing large bungalow. The cottage has not been lived in since the order has been put on, certinaly by no-one in agriculture but has been maintained in a liveable condition. This man has been employed as a civil servant within an agricultural science laboratory, so he probably leagally live in it but he has just put an application into local planning office requesting permission to have the clause removed. I would like to know how successful applicants are. This affects myself, my mother and my family as we all live on the same lane which we own and this man has only right of way over. At the moment there is very little traffic on the lane but if he gets the restriction lifted he may sell the site for a large fee and someone could possible build a large house on the site and add a possible 3 - 4 more cars daily to our lane which is already hard enough to maintain. If his true intention is to live in the property surely he does not need the restriction lifted. Please advice us how we can go about maintaining this aoc is kept in place.

MobileSaver

lincroft1710 wrote: »

I think you could be forced to sell the property if you are in breach of an AOC.

Interesting, I wonder what would stop someone in that position from putting an inflated price on such a property so that no-one else was interested in buying it?

planning_officer

MobileSaver wrote: »

Having looked at similar properties to the OP I've often wondered exactly what powers do the LPA have if you are in breach of an AOC? Knock it down? Evict you? Fine you?

A lot more power than most people think - certainly to go to court, fine the occupier and evict them from the home. Can't force them to sell it - they're only in breach of the condition if they're living there. So they just can't live there, so in effect they would have to sell it (properties with AOCs are usually worth around 30% less than the equivalent market value of a similar unencumbered house).

planning_officer

Tommy1 wrote: »

I have just come across this site and would be grateful if someone could give me advice. I have a neighbour with a cottage which has an aoc on it. He got the aoc put on the cottage in order to retain it as it was meant to be removed as is usually the case when he built a large replacement bungalow in 1985.

Hi - the owner wouldn't have 'got the AOC put on' as it's purely up to the planning dept of the Council to assess if it was justified. Basically, an AOC is only put on a dwelling where a 'normal' dwelling would not be permitted, and the dwelling has been justified as being essential for an agricultural worker - e.g. somewhere like the Green Belt.

I'm confused re. the dates you quote - when was the cottage first built? What happened in 1985? Did he build a larger replacement house? Is this subject to the AOC?

Tommy1 wrote: »

He now "says" the bungalow is too large for him to live in and has said he would like to renovate or replace the cottage to live in and rent his existing large bungalow. The cottage has not been lived in since the order has been put on, certinaly by no-one in agriculture but has been maintained in a liveable condition. This man has been employed as a civil servant within an agricultural science laboratory, so he probably leagally live in it but he has just put an application into local planning office requesting permission to have the clause removed. I would like to know how successful applicants are.

Firstly, AOCs are very very difficult to remove - the Council will be well aware of every trick in the book used by applicants to try and get them removed, as the property obviously then increases in value. The applicant must prove that there is no demand for agricultural workers dwellings in the locality - that is normally done by way of a thorough marketing exercise, commonly over a period of between 1 and 2 years, and only if no interest is shown in the dwelling (and at a fully justified price), then the Council may then consider lifting the tie.

This man would not qualify to live in the dwelling in the position you quote, as he's not directly employed in agriculture - he sounds like a scientist or lab technician! Even if the dwelling has not been lived in during his ownership, the tie still needs to be complied with. On a separate point, only if the tie had not been complied with for ten years (i.e. the dwelling had been actually lived in by someone who didn't comply with the AOC), then it would be immune from enforcement action.

lincroft1710

planning_officer wrote: »

A lot more power than most people think - certainly to go to court, fine the occupier and evict them from the home. Can't force them to sell it - they're only in breach of the condition if they're living there. So they just can't live there, so in effect they would have to sell it (properties with AOCs are usually worth around 30% less than the equivalent market value of a similar unencumbered house).

So unless the offending owner kept the property but left it vacant, he would be indirectly forced to sell it

Tommy1

Thanks planning officer, the cottage has been there for at least 100 years and is stone built. In 1985 he applied and got planning permission to replace the cottage, then when the new larger replacement bungalow, which has no restrictions on it, was up a short distance from the cottage he put in another application to get keeping the cottage, which was passed with an AOC on it. If he applies and gets another replacement the same house will have been replaced twice. How do we stop him getting the AOC lifted.

planning_officer

Hi Tommy - I must admit, I'm still confused about this!

Let me see if I understand this correctly (tell me if I'm wrong!)- there are two dwellings here - a cottage and a bungalow. The cottage was originally very old (so it can't have been subject to an AOC, as it pre-dated the planning system, which started in 1947). He got planning permission to replace the cottage in 1985 and replaced it with a larger dwelling, which is subject to an AOC. There must have been a sound planning reason to apply an AOC to the permission, otherwise it would have been unreasonable to do so, if the previous cottage had no such restriction. I'm guessing this was due to the increase in size and the increase in size must have otherwise been objectionable - so you are probably located in a sensitive rural area, and maybe in the Green Belt?

The bungalow doesn't seem to have an AOC on it, and this is where your neighbour currently lives. He wants to move out of the bungalow, rent the bungalow out, replace the cottage with a larger house and lift the AOC. Correct?

Your worry seems to be that a larger house would generate more traffic on the lane. Firstly, even if the AOC was lifted (if he had thoroughly justified it), then that doesn't give the automatic right to replace it with a larger dwelling - especially if you're in the Green Belt. National Green Belt policy says that replacement houses must not be materially larger than that they replace (and that's whether or not an AOC is in place).

Like I said before, removing an AOC is very difficult - there are a lot of marketing exercises to carry out before the Council would even seriously consider removing it. If the cottage has been empty for a while, then you could argue (if it hasn't been marketed for sale during that period), that there is no evidence to suggest that an agricultural workers dwelling is not needed in the area (as the market hasn't been tested, if it's not been on the market!). Do you know if it's been for sale at all?

If you want to pm me the name of your Council I can have a look at their Local Plan policies, to see what they require an applicant to do in terms of marketing, to remove an AOC.

Tommy1

You got it right when you said the bungalow that he lives in has no AOC on it and he wants to move out of the bungalow, rent the bungalow out, replace the cottage with a larger house and lift the AOC. Our local council is Down County Council in Northern Ireland and the divisional planning office is at Rathkeltair House, Downpatrick. I have been told by someone today that a recent new planning order PPS21 may make it easier for him to remove his AOC.

planning_officer

Ah, I didn't realise you were in Northern Ireland (I normally just search for 'planning' related threads in the forum) - the planning system is different over there and I'm afraid I'm no expert in it! My advice above was based on the English and Welsh planning system. I imagine the same kind of principles apply. I've had a look for some planning info on The NI Planning Service website, and I can see that your nearest planning office is the Downpatrick Divisional Planning Office. They also have a policy section on their website, with lists of the relevant Development Plans (which should contain the relevant planning policies), but some are not online.

PPS21 appears to be in a draft form at the moment (unless their website isn't updated very often!), and doesn't therefore have the same weight as current policies. However, Policy CTY3 of PPS21 relates to replacement dwellings in the countryside - can be viewed here: http://www.planningni.gov.uk/index/policy/policy_publications/planning_statements/pps21.pdf

Policy CTY3 broadly states that replacement dwellings will be acceptable, unless the existing dwelling is an important feature in the landscape, in which case it should ideally be retained. Policy CTY10 applies to new dwellings on farms, but doesn't mention the removal of existing AOCs, so not sure how they would assess that.

The current relevant policy appears to be contained in the 'Planning Strategy for Rural Northern Ireland' and is Regional Planning Policy GB/CPA 3. (can be viewed here: http://www.planningni.gov.uk/index/policy/policy_publications/rural_strategy/psrni_regional_policies/psrni_cpa/psrni_cpa03.htm)
This policy links to Policy HOU 9 - Farm Workers Houses (in Green Belt and Countryside Protection Areas), which contains a lot of useful info, and also to
Policy HOU 8, which applies to other rural areas that are not in the Green Belt or in CPAs. If you live in an AONB, then Policy DES 4 is also relevant.

Sorry this isn't of much specific help, but this should give you an idea of what policies the Planning Service will be looking at when they assess such a proposal, so have a read through the links above. You can always give the planning officer a call to ask which policies are relevant - I'm sure they would be helpful and point you in the right direction.

samual555

Hi

We have spent 1 year trying to buy a property with an agricultural tie. The Bank selling the property would not negotiate on the price so we told them to put it back on the market. They have but have not mentioned the tie or the public right of way going through the land. Are they not obliged to disclose this information now they know about it? We could not get indemnity insurance because the planners informed us of the tie and right of way when we went to see them to check the property had legal planning consents for the 2 extensions to the property.

The property was also in 3 title numbers, had no access rights to the sceptic tank or access rights down the access road these issues have now been resolved but we have spent hundreds of pounds on solicitors fees resolving these issues as at first the Bank refused saying it was "sold as seen" but none of the issues were disclosed by the estate agent at point of sale (I believe he did not know about these issues but he does now!).

Understandably, we are very annoyed at wasting so much time and money and whoever decides to buy it this time round is probably going to do the same although they will not need to resolve the title, sceptic tank or access road issues as we spent time and money resolving these and easments and title documents have been drawn up.

We have been informed by our solicitor that we can not claim our solicitors fees back from the Bank and that if we tried we would probably fail.

For information: the property was part of a farm but was re-titled (wrongly!) by the previous owner. The tie was added when he submitted a planning application for extending the property. There is a letter on the file from the environmental department saying it should be added because of farming odours and that agricultural workers would be used to the smell. There is also a letter from the owner asking for it to be removed because he wasn't an agricultural worker and a reply from the environmental department saying in the circumstances they thought it appropriate to remove the condition but the condition was never formally removed and still stands.

Many thanks