2 bed Flat De-valued massively by commercial premises

Guilefox

Hi All,

Bad day today. We were looking to complete a re-mortgage on our leasehold flat with RBS in a small river side town right on the Thames. The property market here has seen a knock on effect on London and is booming.

We bought it for £200k, 8 years ago. It was stationed above Blockbusters Video. And we have renovated both the inside of flat and the shared entrance and hallways with the other leaseholders.

In last year, the council approved a change of use below and planning to split the old Blockbusters into the towns 9th Pizza restaurant (a famous chain that sponsors the Simpsons) and a bookies.

Obviously all the leaseholders, the pub next door, the local MP the local community fought the council as hard as we could. Obviously we lost.

So back to the remortgage, the surveyor said some lenders wont lend against places above Dominoes! That was a concern Then he valued it at £200k saying it has not gone up in 8 years!

• Zoopla estimate flat at £250k
• Zoopla average price in area is £863k (£250k for flat)
• All 2 bed flats out of town are selling or have sold for £250k+

What is the deal here?

kaya

Nobody wants to live above a takeaway or resteraunt, besides the awful smell created and fired out of the kitchen chimneys there is also the fact that there are most likley going to be a lot of drunk people leaving and visiting until late every night of the week in addition to staff probably not leaving till midnight, add the chaos caused when big delivery lorries are trying to park every week and the noise of the pizza delivery drivers mopeds and you have your answer, not sure if there is anything you can do about it legally though

ETA forgot to mention food waste, removal of said waste and the possibility of the rats it would attract if not done correctly , don't mean to depress you but that pretty much covers everything

Mallotum_X

You may have over paid, the market may not have moved by much, your flat may be less than average, there may be less demand from purchasers to buy over a dominos pizza shop

Lots of possible reasons, but probably the dominos, late night opening, noise, smells etc will mean less people would want to buy your flat, and those that do will want a deal.

Would you want to buy a flat over a dominos pizza for the same prize as a similar one over something quiet? or would it need to be a good deal to make you consider it

Guilefox

I understand what your saying but the average rental for this type of property for this street is £1200 really high on such a low value property. That is surely appealing to investors. Perhaps friends of the Surveyor The flat above the Wimpy for example round the corner is still valued highly.

The vents of the pizza place are also out the back (and nowhere near our property - obviously people do not know that).

The drainage and vents mean are state of the art and so there is not smell, although that might be because it is new

We are also right next to a pub with a late license. It has never affected our value before. Even with the same lender!

Guilefox

20% (50k) below Zoopla estimate is really tough to swallow too.

Is Zoopla really that inaccurate or can a Dominoes moving next door reduce your price by a staggering 20%?

If so everyone please be aware!

[Deleted User]

You probably took a chance buying above a commercial premises in the first place

G_M

Guilefox wrote: »

Is Zoopla really that inaccurate!

Yes - it is !

Mallotum_X

Zoopla dont do valuations, they take the last sale price and multiply it by a value based on rate based on a combination of local land registry/nationwide/halifax indexes.

It gives a rough indication the way the market has moved but does not take into account anything else

harrys_dad

What class of use does the premises below have for planning? Shops like Blockbuster have a different class (A1) to food and drink (A3) like Pizza places. See here for details:

http://p4l.co.uk/guidtocomuse.html

If there was a planning application for moving from A1 to A3 you should have been consulted. If there wasn't then it is likely that the shop always had planning permission for food and drink and you and/or your solicitor should have known this when you bought previously.

Worth a call to the local planning department I suggest.

Guilefox

We were consulted. And we tried to fight tooth and nail to stop it along with The other residents, Local MP and the local community (there were about 25 letters against it on the planning application).
But despite the 10 other italian restaurants and pizza outlets we lost.
But somehow there was no stopping this one!

I guess we will have to put this down to experience. At the end of the day it will still rent quite easily. It is a young batchelors dream to have lively pub, dominoes and a bookies nearby in a very popular picturesque town I guess.

theEnd

Still sounds like the valuation is too low.
Not many renters will be put off by Dominos downstairs.