Bought new house, parking not as advised

kevinyork

Bought a new house on a development earlier this year. The house is in a cul de sac with no pavements, just dropped kerbs to everyones' own drive, including mine so there is nowhere to park second vehicles/visitor vehicles without blocking access to other's drives or bloking the narrow road. The rest of the development does have kerbs and places on the road for other vehicles to park.

We queried parking before purchase as we thought it was a bit limited and were shown a plan which showed two visitor parking bays, one opposite and one further down the cul de sac. A 'service bay' was also indicated and we were told this was just for visiting trade vehicles and was not for residents or visitors (although this is being parked in permanently by people who dont want to use their allocated parking space as it is tucked to the side of their house out of view).

On moving in, we noted that the visitor bay opposite was being used full time by occupants in a house opposite that had two cars, so visitors to us or anyone else could not use it at all. We spoke to the development office and the site manager and asked if maybe the visitor bays could be marked up as such. They said they couldnt as they were block paved and cant be properly marked up. The development office said that if the parking remained a problem they would write to the owners down our cul-de-sac and point out that the visitor bays should not be permanently occupied and that the service bay was for visiting trade vehicles only.

I had a friendly chat with the bloke opposite that was using the visitor bay and he said that they part owned that bay with their neighbouring house and that it wasnt for visitors.

Ive now gone back to the development office and queried this again and a different sales advisor (original one has left) showed me more elaborate plans that show that the visitor bays are part owned by the houses who's bays are to each side of the visitor bay e.g my neighbour I spoke to is correct that he owns half of that visitor bay.

OK, this isnt a major issue as we only have one vehicle and dont get many visitors (sad or what) however when we do get the occassional one the only place to park is back up on the main road through the development round the corner. Also when we come to sell Im sure a buyer will spot a potential issue with the lack of visitor parking and it could reduce the attractiveness of the house.

We feel a bit misled. We had the visitor parking explained to us before paying our reservation fee. I know you could also say we should have ensured our solicitor looked at this issue when purchasing but it isnt part of our deeds and wasnt a major issue, more of an annoyance now we have found out that we have not been given the right info by the developer.

Does anyone think we have a case for some compensation or are we fighting a loosing battle?

Any useful advice gratefully received.


Kev

lilyann1

We have had this for the past 13 years!!!!
We bought a new build with allocated spaces opposite and visitors spaces.
We have our own drive way and garage and have 2 cars,but any visitors would use the visitor spaces if allowed!!!
After we moved in, the others houses were then sold and the owners said they have 1 space as their own and the other visitors space is theirs also as they have a second car and want to occupy it permanently.Every time we had a visitor parked in it they would come knocking on our door in a rage and demand us to move!!!
I showed them a copy of the deeds and said the 2 visitors spaces were for the use of everyone in the cul de sac,ie 5 houses.
Still we kept on getting the nastiness and I eventually went to the CAB who sent them a letter and I never heard any more.
Luckily they have moved on now and we have wonderful neighbours who say that it's good to share
This seems to be the problem with alot of new builds and it's just a case of speaking to the neighbours.
We were told by the developers that the spaces couldn't be marked out and they just didn't seem interested in helping.
Your developer may be different so I'd keep on at them,but you might be fighting a losing battle.

samspam

Your neighbour is saying that the visitor space belongs to him as it is on his deed plan. This is done because the space has to be deeded to somebody. However it should be in the deeds of covenent that the space is for visitor useage and not soley for the owner that it is deeded to.

I would have a polite word after you have checked that there is something in your documents that you can show as proof.

I presume that as there are some communal spaces that you are all paying a management fee somewhere along the lines to keep the block paving and landscaping tidy?

You might want to remind your neighbour of this point as if you are all paying, then it is for everyones use!

Norbert_Colon

Sadly this is the case in many places. The flats I live in have visitor spaces in the car park which are permanently filled by people's second cars.

That's not surprising, because when flats here come up for sale or letting, they're always advertised as having '2 allocated parking spaces'.

kevinyork

samspam wrote:

Your neighbour is saying that the visitor space belongs to him as it is on his deed plan. This is done because the space has to be deeded to somebody. However it should be in the deeds of covenent that the space is for visitor useage and not soley for the owner that it is deeded to.

I would have a polite word after you have checked that there is something in your documents that you can show as proof.

I presume that as there are some communal spaces that you are all paying a management fee somewhere along the lines to keep the block paving and landscaping tidy?

You might want to remind your neighbour of this point as if you are all paying, then it is for everyones use!

Thanks for that, thats very interesting. I'd never thought that they would need to be laid to someone in the deeds but could still be defined as visitor spaces in the convenants. I will have to dig out my paperwork.

There is a management fee for communal spaces but as the mamagement company have not made contact yet as the developed has only just finished the development we are not sure exactly what we get for our fee. Its only £20 per property per year and was said to be mainly to look after the many protected trees on the estate.

If it does turn out that they are proper visitor spaces, albeit shown on my neighbour's deeds, then I really want the developer to be the one writing letter to people as they are the ones who gave us the info when we were deciding to buy our home. Thats stops me getting into anything official which I might have to declare when I come to sell.

SaraSeahorse

parking drives me nuts too

deeds indicate the end of our cul-de-sac as turning points but get blocked with cars

we have a double width drive which comes straight off the end of the t-shaped cul-desac

If our drive was off a straight road then I don't think our drive would ever get blocked or parked across, but because of the way it comes off of this turning 'end' people seem to think it is okay to obstruct out drive - one time someone parked in the middle of the entrance in front of the dropped kerb - I had to go knocking on doors to find the owner of the vehicle.

My other major grrrrrrr is our neighbours - they have right of access over our double drive - their drive runs at right angles to ours and is large enough for two cars side by side including this huge 4x4 their daughter owns who visits in school holidays. The deeds state that the first section of OUR drive should be kept clear at all times. Their son lives locally and visits regularly and stops in the entrance to the drive slap bang in the MIDDLE. GRRRRRRRRRRRR

I hate having to approach people and wil have to at some point speak to them about their selfish git of a son. I can normally just about get off drive but it normally involves driving on the footpath and cutting across the corner of another neighbours drive. It just annoys the hell out of me - we paid for double drive and we get to use half of it.

I would not mind but if we have visitors we move either one car into garage or onto our front garden so never on the area that has to be kept clear. If we have people around for a birthday party etc. we always let them know ahead and ensure they have access to their drive - it hacks me off they cannot have the same consideration for us. Maybe they just don't realise what a pain their son's car is.

kevinyork

I think I may have opened a can of worms here......

dmg24

Hi all,

Sorry to go off post, but I have a problem with my management company, and as 'new build-ers', I wonder if you could give any advice? You'll find the post on this forum. Thanks in advance!

Am afraid I can't contribute anything constructive to this post, because my neighbours are really good, and everyone is happy to share the spaces. The only people we had trouble with are people coming to visit the showhome parking in our spaces (not the visitor ones, our allocated ones!) ... so the builders put double yellow lines everywhere (not sure how legal that bit is)!

SaraSeahorse

sorry to go off plot on thread but have found advice on this website great -
http://www.gardenlaw.co.uk/phpBB2/index.php

I have now printed off a copy of neighbours plan and transfer (from landregistry website - cost £2 plus £2) so that I full facts when approaching them now.

samspam

Kevin,

If the visitor spaces are block paved, they will almost certainly need maintenance, they need cleaning and re sanded on a regular basis (I know this as I am in dispute with my management company for not doing so!)

You need to find out for certain who is responsible for the visitor spaces.

Which builder did you buy from?

I would speak to the manager of the customer care department and ask them to send a letter without prejudice to all residents on your part of the estate asking to keep the spaces free for visitors.

See if it is possible to put a sign up somewhere if it isn't possible to paint a V on the spaces.

kevinyork

samspam wrote:

Kevin,

If the visitor spaces are block paved, they will almost certainly need maintenance, they need cleaning and re sanded on a regular basis (I know this as I am in dispute with my management company for not doing so!)

You need to find out for certain who is responsible for the visitor spaces.

Which builder did you buy from?

I would speak to the manager of the customer care department and ask them to send a letter without prejudice to all residents on your part of the estate asking to keep the spaces free for visitors.

See if it is possible to put a sign up somewhere if it isn't possible to paint a V on the spaces.

Thanks for this. Ive drafted another letter to the MD Ive been communicating with and included some of the help given here. Ive managed to locate some plans which do show the visitor spaces half owned by the neighbours who own the adjacent parking spaces to the visitor spaces but as mentioned above this could just be because someone has to own them however their use as a visitor space may be defined in the convenants/deeds. These are with my solicitor. Would they make sense if I asked to take a look at them? i.e. would it clearly define them as visitor spaces in those documents?

The developer is Persimmon, who have actually been pretty good throughout on all other snagging issues since we moved in. We did ask about getting the visitor spaces marked as I mentioned above but the site manager said it wasnt possible due to the block paving and the wall in front of them being owned by someone else (hence no sign).

Cheers to everyone for their help so far.