Selling takeway and no hot food planning permission

katy123

My sister is selling her takeaway shop and the seller solicitor is saying that there isn't planning permission for the usage of the property as a hot food takeway with the deeds. When she purchased the business 18 years ago (as a going concern), the solicitor verbally confirmed there was planning permission (she didn't think twice to question it). The solicitor she used 18 years ago has now gone bust and the seller solicitor says that she can get round this by swearing a statutory declaration confirming continuous use.

What exactly does this mean in layman terms and more importantly what are the risk/comebacks. Who can be complain too? Legal ombudsman?

lincroft1710

What is the point of complaining, she has no proof of what the solicitor said and she should have checked the premises had the correct planning permission herself.

Usually after 4 years breaches of planning permission cannot be acted upon, but your sister should check this herself, she may even be able to obtain a regularisation certificate

paddyrg

she can get round this by swearing a statutory declaration confirming continuous use

That seems like a very cheap, pragmatic answer

Savvy_Sue

lincroft1710 wrote: »

she may even be able to obtain a regularisation certificate

I'd confirm this: DH used to run a charity, which as part of its activities ran a coffee shop which opened in the evenings as well as during the day. At one point there were complaints from the neighbours and it then became apparent that the planning permission only covered the cafe during 'office hours'!

Fortunately, the charity was able to get permission for the opening hours to be extended. (And the neighbour complaints were resolved by moving to more suitable premises ...)

However, it would be a brave buyer who proceeded before this was regularised, so it would be in her interests to sort this out.

da_rule

katy123 wrote: »

What exactly does this mean in layman terms

A statutory declaration is simply a statement, signed and witnessed, that states that something is true. Signing a statutory declaration, which you know to be untrue is perjury.

In this case, it would probably be something along the lines of "property XX has been used for the preparation and sale of hot food to be consumed off of the premises since (date)".

In order to obtain a Lawful Development Certificate then the 'breach' of planning regulations must have been in existence for at least 10 years (as it relates to a commercial change of use rather than a change of use in relation to a dwelling). The statutory declaration is simply an accepted form of evidence to show that this time has elapsed.

The buyer can then obtain the relevant Lawful Development Certificate. Most buyers would probably insist on the seller providing the certificate, but either you have a very accommodating/keen buyer or a very good solicitor, who's been able to convince them to accept the statutory declaration.