Council is stopping me from selling my house! (Planning permission refusal)

LittleMax

silvercar wrote: »

The boundaries of what might be termed student land in Manchester have not grown (In fact, the number of private halls of residence suggest it may have shrunk), so your home is exactly what it was when you bought it - a residential family home in an area with a lot of HMOs occupied by students. This would have been reflected in the price you paid.

I would concentrate on trying to sell it over the Summer months when the number of students in residence will be low.

The number of students has grown exponentially in the last 3 decades. Manchester Met was still a Poly when OP's family moved in. Both unis have expanded massively since the 1980's. Student housing across the UK has changed enormously since the mid 80's, slum areas in cities where you would previously have found students have been cleared and students have now moved into other residential areas.

davidmcn

Freecall wrote: »

Just to clarify for any Estate Agents reading (who will probably not be familiar with the term), an 'undesirable area' is normally described on the sales particulars as a 'very desirable area'.

ITYM "vibrant".

lincroft1710

"A neighbourhood blessed with young academics"

Dan-Dan

Alternativley aka !!!!hole alley

Crashy_Time

phoebe1989seb wrote: »

I remember your previous thread from 2014 and the advice given then about decluttering, redoing your house photos and getting your EA to amend the floorplan.

Sadly, looking at your current RM listing it seems as though you failed to take this advice onboard and as a result your house remains unsold. Perhaps you should at least be looking to address those issues?

As previous posters have said, all property will sell at the right price. As motivated sellers we previously had to take a substantial 'loss' (65k) to get out of an area we were less than happy with and to buy a new house closer to elderly parents. We priced our (extensively restored and immaculately presented ) house to sell and found a buyer in ten days.

Why do you say "loss" of 65k, had you bought the house a long long time ago and not really lost any actual capital?

csgohan4

theartfullodger wrote: »

As you've had all those disputes with neighbours (you're not american are you?) you'll need to declare those to any purchaser during the selling process.

Above is a good point and may also add further problems for the OP

nkkingston

As someone who is in the process of buying a house in a similar area (in a different city), I can assure you there are buyers out there. A lot of them may even be students you've complained about in the past.

Post grads and young professionals want houses in 'vibrant' areas, with easily accessible amenities, good transport links to the city centre, and where their friends are living. As more people continue to house share after university, student heavy areas are shifting more and more towards young professionals - our local area is now full of yummy mummies who graduated ten years ago and never left. The bars are becoming trendy delis, and the takeaways are street food restaurants. Change does happen.

rtho782

If you bought it 30 years ago, there is no way you're in negative equity, unless you've released equity over time with successive mortgages.

It's definitely worth more than when you bought it, the only think stopping you selling is an unrealistic expectation of value.

ReadingTim

Whilst I can sympathise with the issue the OP faces, the change in the character of the area hasn't happened overnight, or even in the space of a year or two - it will have taken 5+ years at least, although I'm sure that it gains momentum in the latter stages as a tipping point is reached.

However, any homeowner has to take some responsibility for keeping an eye on the area their home is in, in the same way as they need to keep an eye on the physical condition of the place. Basically, if you don't like the way things are going in the area, you might want to think about leaving. This is your responsibility, as the Council will only act clumsily and belatedly, as you're now finding out, to your cost.

Areas improve and decline over time, so to think somewhere's still going to be the same as it was 30+ years ago is often simply fanciful. Would the OP be as concerned if the area had gentrified and their house had massively increased in price? Would they instead choose to sell at a lower price based on when the area was a sh!thole? Thought not....

It will sell, and you will be able to move and get on with your life - just not at the price to which you think you're entitled.

Rosemary7391

nkkingston wrote: »

As someone who is in the process of buying a house in a similar area (in a different city), I can assure you there are buyers out there. A lot of them may even be students you've complained about in the past.

Post grads and young professionals want houses in 'vibrant' areas, with easily accessible amenities, good transport links to the city centre, and where their friends are living. As more people continue to house share after university, student heavy areas are shifting more and more towards young professionals - our local area is now full of yummy mummies who graduated ten years ago and never left. The bars are becoming trendy delis, and the takeaways are street food restaurants. Change does happen.

I'm not so sure - as a postgrad myself I'd not touch somewhere as bad as the OP describes with a bargepole. Parties every night? No chance, I need sleep or I'll never finish my PhD! Which makes me wonder why the university hasn't done anything - a handful of expulsions on the grounds of bringing the university into disrepute or disturbing the right of others to study would surely bring the rest of them under control and have a lasting effect on next years students (and where I did my undergrad, it was mentioned that that was a possibility, and I didn't have any problems with late night noise desite living in an area that was student heavy). Of course if the university is more interested in making money through tuition fees than in learning that won't happen, they'll just play lip service to 'community relations'...