Council Tax Cost Cutting: reduce your band and grab any discounts Discussion Area

powerful_Rogue

guppy wrote: »

This would suggest either house prices in your street have risen slower than the Nationwide's average for your region since 1991, or that the VOA have made a gargantuan error and no one has realised since 1993.

My money would probably be on the former, but you have absolutely nothing to lose from asking for a review provided your house isn't undervalued (also unlikely here).

Thanks guppy. I am very tempted to appeal. If the worst happen then my house would need to have been worth between £52,001 - £68,000 in 1991 to be rebanded to a band c, which is quite a jump from the 33,000 being quoted. So im presuming if im not downgraded then it will remain the same at band b.

Havind just checked some more, the most expensive house to sell in the street recently was for £128,000 - which equates to £38,187 back in 1991 - so still band a.

The avergage price they seem to have sold for recently is £110,00.

dmcm9

Hello

I first posted a few weeks ago - the situation being that i have been disputing the band of my house with the Assessors office since March. Unusually i actually have an abundance of information that proves i am in the wrong band!

I have taken my complaint all the way to the Assessor himself and then to my local Councillor but all to no avail.

I now plan to take my complaint to the Local Ombudsman. Has anyone had any experience of this and how successful is this line of approach?

vivatifosi

Hi dmcm9,

We have discussed the Ombudsman on this thread in the past. I have gone to the Local Govt Ombudsman on a different issue and I don't think that they cover the VOA. The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman has however addressed council tax cases in the past, as has the Information Commissioners Office. It is worth putting Council Tax into both their websites and see what comes up.

Good luck!

Zebedeee

powerful_Rogue wrote: »

Thanks guppy. I am very tempted to appeal. If the worst happen then my house would need to have been worth between £52,001 - £68,000 in 1991 to be rebanded to a band c, which is quite a jump from the 33,000 being quoted. So im presuming if im not downgraded then it will remain the same at band b.

Havind just checked some more, the most expensive house to sell in the street recently was for £128,000 - which equates to £38,187 back in 1991 - so still band a.

The avergage price they seem to have sold for recently is £110,00.

Rogue, if I might make a suggestion, you really need to get more solid evidence than the price calculators. They are really only a guide for you and the VOA and a tribunal will take very little notice of them, as they can be way out. Depending on what you use as your starting date you can get very different results for the same property.

I went to a tribunal and the evidence that seemed to carry the most weight with the panel was the evidence I got from newspaper archives of houses for sale in 1991. If you can find houses identical to your own then great, but if not then simillar ones (eg. both 3 bed semis, simillar area, etc) will do a lot more for you than even mentioning the calculators.

HTH!

Zebedee

vivatifosi

A thought on the house price calculators...

As Zebedee just said, the house price calcs are just averages and the VOA pays little regard to them. In the town where I live, one bed flats and starter homes fell by 40% between 1991 and 1994, three bed semis by just 6%. And that's just one town.

Towns in and of themselves also behave differently to regional norms. In 2005, the last time it looked like the government might commit political suicide - sorry - I meant to say tackle Council Tax and revalue properties including putting a lot of bands UP, HBOS published a list of local authorities that would likely see their houses down-banded as house prices had not increased in line with local norms.

The worst performing of these saw house prices rise by 10-20% less than the national average, so unless they have had recent growth spurts above the national average (which Southwark for example may well have), the house price calculators could be massively out when considering these locations.

The worst performing (10-20% down) incidentally, starting with the very worst, as at 2005 were:

Bradford, Stoke, Ashford, Wolverhampton, Barrow in Furness, Harlow, Preston, Pendle, Sheffield, Southwark, Chichester and Tandridge.

The best performing (ie those where the calculator may give a less favourable reading and it is still worth checking even if slightly above band) were:

Hammersmith and Fulham, Mid Suffolk, North Cornwall, Westminster, Carrick, Brent, Chester-le-Street, Oxford, Hastings and Derwentside.

Unfortunately I couldn't find a more up to date version, as this was written specifically because the govt was looking at rebanding.

You can read more at:

[SIZE=-1]www.hbosplc.com/economy/includes/16-07-05CouncilTaxRevaluations.doc[/SIZE]

kerhlkk

I dont know if any one will be able to help with this one ? Basically certain groups get a discount on thier council tax bill, ie single residency, in prison etc. I am employed as a special constable and in one area that is covered by this police force the council gives a discount to special constables, i have contacted my local council and they have said that they dont do discounts for specials only regular (full-time officers). My question is this - can i do anything about this as i do work for the police (all be it in a volutary position) but surely there should be some discount as part of the council tax goes towards police funding. Any ideas would be apreciated !

powerful_Rogue

Zebedeee wrote: »

Rogue, if I might make a suggestion, you really need to get more solid evidence than the price calculators. They are really only a guide for you and the VOA and a tribunal will take very little notice of them, as they can be way out. Depending on what you use as your starting date you can get very different results for the same property.

I went to a tribunal and the evidence that seemed to carry the most weight with the panel was the evidence I got from newspaper archives of houses for sale in 1991. If you can find houses identical to your own then great, but if not then simillar ones (eg. both 3 bed semis, simillar area, etc) will do a lot more for you than even mentioning the calculators.

HTH!

Zebedee

Hi Zebedee, Thanks for the advice.

Would you have any idea on where to start if I wanted to see how much properties sold for in my street back in 1991? Ive also used THIS site, however it only goes back to 2000 - and shows houseprices for similar types of properties in my street going for quite low prices.

Zebedeee

powerful_Rogue wrote: »

Hi Zebedee, Thanks for the advice.

Would you have any idea on where to start if I wanted to see how much properties sold for in my street back in 1991? Ive also used THIS site, however it only goes back to 2000 - and shows houseprices for similar types of properties in my street going for quite low prices.

Hi powerful_Rogue

Its not easy finding prices from 1991 - even the VOA doesn't have many from that time as the Poll Tax was in effect then and they didn't collect the house price data.

Like you I tried various websites - Landregistry, Ourproperty.co.uk, etc but none of them go back before 2000. The only way I found was to go to the main local library where they keep microfiche copies of the local newspaper. In my town the newspaper prints a Property paper on a friday and copies of that were also on the microfiche. They were quite helpful in the library, showed me how to operate the microfiche and found the reels for 1991 for me, I just had to trawl through them until I found what I wanted. My street wasn't even built until the end of 1994, but there were a few streets locally with simillar houses and I managed to find one or two for sale at the time complete with their prices. I also managed to find adverts in the paper put in by builders advertising houses like mine for sale, with their prices. I was able to take copies (10p each) and these were invaluable at my tribunal.

Hope that helps!

Zebedee

MarkH78

Hi

Ive recently started re-claiming/contesting my council tax banding
I found I was the only (mug) on a higher band to the rest of my Avenue/area.
It was turned down initially, I heard nothing for a while then got a letter saying a valuer was coming round.
She has just been round and I explained my reasons for contesting. She said that ours was probably higher because we have an extension on the back of the house.
The extention is not big and there are other houses in the area with similar extentions that are on a lower banding.

She basically took a few measurements then left saying that they would come back to us within a few weeks with an answer.
Does anyone know what my chances are at this stage? She gave me the impression that I didnt have a chance??

bex32

Ok, have just read the article and am not sure if i have a case. We are currently band c which is from £52k based on 1991. We bought the house in 1998 for £49950 which would indicate that we are wrongly banded? When i checked the band there was history that it was band b then changed to c in '93 which i guess was when it was converted from a bungalow to a chalet bungalow then sold. The neigbours are a mix of b's and c's though predominantly b's. When i followed the nationwide calculator it bought up '91 price of £66k, is this more accurate than me putting what we paid for it in? Lastly we underwent a massive extension last year and the property is now valued around £200k so will we be put up several bands if someone comes round to value? Thanks for your time, still confused!!