Council tax "Improvement Indicator"

lincroft1710

booksurr wrote: »

it means your local council has, at some point in the past, received a planning application for an "improvement" to your property, typically that means an extension...

there is no way to "discretely" find out, if you don't know if your property has been extended in the past then I take it you are not the owner who had the work done. In which case you have nothing to work about as a rebanding will only apply to a new purchaser of the property so it would have kicked in when you bought.

It can take a year from date of purchase before the VOA deals with a "previous owner improvement".

The fact your CT hasn't changed means you can ignore it. (until there is a global revaluation done of every property in the country as a tax raising measure,

Councils don't need a Revaluation to increase their revenue from Council Tax. Revaluations cost money, so it is not a money grabbing exercise.

so far thankfully no political party has the nerve to do that - other than the Welsh!)

It was the Labour Government who authorised the Welsh Revaluation If it was a "success", then an English Revaluation would follow, which was set to happen in 2007. Work was progressing on the 2007 Revaluation, then Blair cancelled it in August 2005

See above^^^

Hoploz

The house I've bought had a big extension in 2000 but has apparently always been in the same band, and has no improvement indicator. That's a bit weird.

Hoploz

Just checked my old house - we put a huge extension on that in 2008 almost doubling the size and it doesn't have an improvement indicator either!
Guess this is not an exact science. Weird though, because clearly the council know which houses have had work done!

drdpj

I suspect the involvement of building control will have something to do with it.

Just to correct some of the old information above - any increase in council tax is due from the date that VOA decide to re-band the house, not from the date you move in. That will be a few months after - they get notified by the land registry when it updates the register, so the more laid back your solicitor is about getting the forms in the longer you'll be on the lower rate...

phoebe1989seb

Hoploz wrote: »

Just checked my old house - we put a huge extension on that in 2008 almost doubling the size and it doesn't have an improvement indicator either!
Guess this is not an exact science. Weird though, because clearly the council know which houses have had work done!

Same with the house we just sold. In our case the work didn't require planning permission but was done under permitted development - not sure if that makes a difference? We had building regs of course, but fwiw used an independent building inspector....

Another house in our old vilłage had an extension quite a few years back that *did* require PP and that does have an indicator on it.....

lincroft1710

Hoploz wrote: »

Just checked my old house - we put a huge extension on that in 2008 almost doubling the size and it doesn't have an improvement indicator either!
Guess this is not an exact science. Weird though, because clearly the council know which houses have had work done!

The extension may have been inspected by the VOA so the improvement indicator no longer applies.

lincroft1710

Hoploz wrote: »

Just checked my old house - we put a huge extension on that in 2008 almost doubling the size and it doesn't have an improvement indicator either!
Guess this is not an exact science. Weird though, because clearly the council know which houses have had work done!

The extension may have been inspected by the VOA so the improvement indicator no longer applies.

deanos

I have put in a offer on a house and just been to check the council band and this has an improvement indicator on it.

I have been on the calculator and it states the house may have been worth 55k in 1991 on a purchase of £164k today

It is currently in band C (£52,001 to £68k) i presume this means that the extension would have to have added more than £16k back in 1991 to go up into the next band ?

I spoke to the EA and he thinks its added £15k to the price today , i have put 15k into the calculator which brings up a 5k valuation back in 1991

So do i add 55k to 5k to get the estimated 1991 tax value ?

Not sure if that's how you work it out ?

Does this sound right ?

EDIT: the current owners bought the house in 2008 and it already had the extension from the previous owners, does this indicator stay on the property all the time ? of is this just a recent thing that's been introduced

AdrianC

deanos wrote: »

Not sure if that's how you work it out ?

More-or-less, but you don't work it out - the VOA does.

deanos

AdrianC wrote: »

More-or-less, but you don't work it out - the VOA does.

Thanks at least im understanding it right !

If i do go up an extra band we can afford it, fingers crossed it does not though