Is my new house ex-council?

pickles13

This is probably a daft question with an obvious answer but can anyone tell me is there is a way to find out if the house we are buying has ever been a council house and if there other houses on the street are council or privately owned?

TIA

silvercar

People used to say you could tell by looking at the front doors. I don't know whether that is still true.

You could check for sold prices, if there are a lot of properties that have never been sold it may indicate ex-council or it could mean that churn rate is low.

If you can't tell, does it matter?

pickles13

Well both the mortgage and insurance companies have asked us and it matters to us in so much as we would like to know everything possible before buying a house. It would not put us off as we already love the area but it would be nice to know.

McKneff

Have you asked the people you are buying the house from, if not, do that. If they don't know, then ask the council.

davidmcn

The surveyor usually puts it in the general description of the property/area if it is ex-council.
Check on Web for landlord-related stuff for local streets eg council housing dept.

pickles13

No we haven't asked her as it wasn't something I thought about until after our 3rd viewing. I asked the EA who said 'err, good question, err, no i shouldn't think so". I will ask the council. Thanks

dirty_magic

You can usually tell by looking at the street. If it is on a council street, council houses tend to be the ones that haven't been changed too much, no block paving etc.

We looked at a house that was ex council, though they'd changed it so much we couldn't tell. The only reason we found out was because I Googled the address and some houses on the street came up as a result on this website: http://council-housing.findthebest-re.co.uk

It can be a bit of a giveaway of there haven't been many houses sold when you do a search on zoopla too, though so many have been bought these days that it might not tell you anything.

If nothing helps, you could ask some of the neighbours!

Rambosmum

give us the google street view (via PM if you want). I've done a lot of work for a variety of L.As, mostly on council estates and they are pretty obvious to me.

pickles13

Thank you so much Jennuwat001.

McKneff

And if you cant notice it while there, you are lucky, because council houses are normally solid and really well built.

rosie383

When we got the original deeds for one we were going to buy it stated very clearly that it was ex-council.