How to recognize an ex council house?

BigAunty

I think that around 2 million ex-council properties have been bought by their tenants since the Right to Buy was introduced. Good luck in making generalisations over those properties, often neigbouring ones, that still remain in social housing and the ones that were purchased...

dizziblonde

I think if you live in an area any length of time you just get to know your council's "styles" for the housing stock it's put up over different eras really, and the areas that were originally built as council estates.

Where I'm originally from you can tell the ones that remain in council control by the fact they've all been refurbished with a choice of 3-4 different UPVC front doors - so the ones with those doors, and the little over-door mini-roof things (I'm sure there's a proper name - they're not front porches or anything like that) tend to be the ones that are still social housing stock.

A few years back when right to buy was just coming into effect you used to be able to tell WHEN a house had been right to bought - because every year the council would paint all the council house doors in a different coloured paint - and the ones that had been bought didn't get their doors repainted so stood out and you could tell they were bought in the year the council had done blue paint, or red or whatever.

The council also had a fad for naming every street on one of the estates it built starting with the same letter as that part of town - again, this used to be a fair giveaway, until relatively recently they started renaming the more notorious streets (because if you call a turd a television it'll suddenly start showing you Eastenders obviously).

patman99

Council & HA properties are a much better buy than built-for-private-sale properties. I know a manager for one of the majors and he said they hate building social housing as they have to make the rooms to a minimum size. Whereas with general private housing, they can make the rooms as small as they can get away with.

In my town, you can spot the Council houses as they are fully double-glazed, have a really nice front door with 8-point locking (the tenants even had a choice of which colour they wanted as well), and are fully centrally heated. They normally have a decent motor on the drive and decking with gazebo in the back garden.

Zero_Sum

Jo84 wrote: »

www.fssproperty.co.uk/property-details/north-yorkshire/harrogate/110-newby-crescent/auctionviewings

as you can see the house on the left was bought.

would've said it was the other way round

Zero_Sum

ruggedtoast wrote: »

The main giveaway is signs in the street or thereabouts that say "No ball games".

nope, parents live in one of the better parts of the town & totally private estate. There are a fair few of said signs dotted about

Zero_Sum

joannaspanner wrote: »

the number of the house painted onto the brickwork and wheelie bin?

:-)

nope, sensible thing to do if you don't live by a roadside to make sure someone else doesn't take your bin in by mistake

chrissie57

JodyBPM wrote: »

I would live here without any concerns. The fact that it was ex council wouldn't bother me at all:)

Me too actually - sadly could not afford to live there now (inc house I grew up):o

The other aspect of where I grew up was that as well as private and council you had 'tied' housing - the house I was raised in went for £250,000 basically just for the plot with structures on it, after the agricultural tenancy was removed.

There were also the various estate houses like this

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-37832399.html

certainly instantly recognizable but don't seem to bother the rich folks that buy them.:D

ruggedtoast

bluedrop wrote: »

Yes!! This was there! What does it mean ? Pls share ur thoughts...

Also, we had a second viewing of the property yesterday....while leaving, I noticed this sticker on the main door... It says
" all items in this property are security tagged - police"

Should this make me suspicious?

All council estates have these signs, and unless someone takes them down they linger on when / if all the houses end up privately owned.

If you see them on a new estate then it isn;t council, because councils unfortunately no longer build estates.

I think you're worrying about this a bit too much, if the area looks and feels fine, you've chatted to the neighbours and asked some people on the street what its like to live there, and visited at different times; and you still like it then it has fulfilled the criteria for being a place you want to live.

The main thing to watch out for is that on the whole council houses wont ever fetch as much as non council houses nearby despite being larger with bigger gardens on average.

They are usually built with little exterior period features (most post war private builds attempt some kind of build style no matter how misguided) and look a little like featureless red brick boxes with windows, a bit like how a kid draws houses.

Often there are shared access rights with council houses, and occasionally your neighbours will have the right to walk through your garden so you see doors in the garden fences.

KatsMeow1980

This is what I would say is typical round here

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-33976447.html

The over the door slab and the brick built store in the back garden are common features in other ex LA houses I've seen up and down the country.

Your best bet to find what is typical round your area is to search out a council estate and see what the houses look like as (as has been said in previous posts) councils tend to have a style and a lot of the LA/ex LA in your area will be similar.

If the houses aren't on an estate I won't let the fact they are ex LA put me off as (as had been said before)they tend to be well built and a decent size. If they do have the brick built store they make a great utility room.

If they are on an estate then it wouldn't automatically put me off, it would depend on the estate in question. I think you can find info on the demographic of an area on upmystreet. It is worth remembering that lots of very respectable people live in council properties. At least if you do have problems with your neighbours and they are council tenants you know exactly how to complain to. (Not so easy if they are owner occupiers).

I currently live in an ex LA property on an estate and it is fine. We are moving soon but have considered other properties on our estate (but ruled out some on other estates in the area!)