High Hedge Act - unusual case needs advice

Davesnave

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

I guess one way to "test the waters" is to put the house ostensibly on the market at it's proper price (ie trees in place price) and see what happens as to whether people "refuse to bite" except at a £20k lower price than it's worth because of those houses the other side.

As for the households ("households" - not emotive language like "families" !!!) the other side of the hedge = they knew what they were getting into. Presumably they saw the places prior to renting them and could work that fact out for themselves and went ahead and rented them anyway. "They made their bed...." and so why are they complaining now about something that was clearly visible during their viewings?

What would be the point of marketing the house if there's no intention to sell? Even if there was a desire to move, it would still be a waste of everyone's time, since no compensation would be due to anyone, regardless of outcome.

Thousands of people have houses built adjacent to their property each year. They don't receive compensation. As you well know from many answers on MSE, the only way to prevent this happening is to own the adjacent land.

We don't know if the tenants have complained of their own accord, or have been 'encouraged' to do so. Whether each property needs to be treated as a seperate entity under the Act is something the OP could explore. Don't forget, a fee of £400 (when I last looked) has to be lodged first as well.....but all that should come after mediation has failed.

Doozergirl

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

Sounds worth investigating further re the possibility of a TPO (whether already in existence or needing to be created).

My sympathies, on this occasion, are with "the person that was there first" - it's surely a totally different ballgame having leylandii where there is no housing already there the other side v. putting leylandii in where there is housing already there.

I guess one way to "test the waters" is to put the house ostensibly on the market at it's proper price (ie trees in place price) and see what happens as to whether people "refuse to bite" except at a £20k lower price than it's worth because of those houses the other side.

As for the households ("households" - not emotive language like "families" !!!) the other side of the hedge = they knew what they were getting into. Presumably they saw the places prior to renting them and could work that fact out for themselves and went ahead and rented them anyway. "They made their bed...." and so why are they complaining now about something that was clearly visible during their viewings?

Who talks about households other than insurance companies and surveys? How many cars in your household? What is your household income? People talk about their families. It may well be emotive to you, but it is fact. Calling a family a "household" is purposefully depersonalising a situation to suit yourself.

I imagine that they took the property because the quality of a new home will be above that of the majority of rental stock in an area. Much of it is awful. Viewing a house is very different to living in one, as many people discover.

The idea of putting the house on the market is useless. There is no "proper" price for a house. House prices move up and down all the time. Different people like different things. There is no empirical way of measuring a house price in the way you suggest. It will sell when it sells at the price it sells. The asking price is a total guess and the assumption that is knocks £20k off is purely that. Probably written down by someone who was paid to offer an opinion.

Fencing and hedges are acceptable at 2 metres because it protects the privacy of people close to the boundary at ground level because most of us live at ground level during the day. We spend little time conscious in bedrooms with the curtains open and even less time staring at the neighbours doing the same. There are plenty of other ways of maintaining privacy as well.

If your neighbours had a 12 metre high conifer, I suspect your reply would be very different. You are fiercely territorial, beyond the logic of many of us.

Richard_RM

Ho hum....well, to address your points:


1) House value - will it be affected? Well the current situation is that the view is of a row of tall conifer trees. You can't see the other houses at all and the garden has almost complete privacy. Let's suppose the Developer "wins" and my neighbour has to cut the hedge down to 2m. We now have a situation where the view is of a row of 3-storey town houses right on the boundary. Garden privacy now zero. Will this increase the value of her house? Um no I don't think so. Will it stay the same? Again unlikely, as the "no hedge" situation would not be preferred. So logically it will reduce the worth of the house. You are right that by how much is subjective...no-one will ever really know. But the three estate agents she has had come up with an estimate based on their experience were all within the "expect to receive offers 10% less than market value" range. It will cost £3-5k to reduce the hedge (landscaping firm quote) and 10% off market value will be £15-18k, hence my estimate of an average of £20k. Go figure...


2) The houses are owned by a housing association, I would assume the houses were offered on a "take it or leave it" basis. To be clear - I have nothing against the people who live there, and I sympathise with the fact they have little light. My main gripe is with the Developers who rammed 8 houses on a site where normally there would have been 4 or less. The average density of housing in the area in 25-30 dph (dwellings per hectare) whereas the new development (excluding ancillary works) is closer to 100 dph, way above the average for the area. Also the layout of the houses, driveways and gardens was all to maximise density above all else. They are 3-bed family houses with tiny gardens, well below recommend internal space and garages too small to park a car in. The Developer had full control over the design and this is what they chose to do.


3) The tree issue was well known about in advance. It was highlight in the planning consultation phase, the planning committee phase, in writing, emails, conversations etc. They basically chose to ignore the glaringly obvious future problems it would cause.


4) Neither myself nor my neighbour are against development. Clearly much more housing is needed. What I'm against is developers buying up every scrap of land and then forcing as many houses on it as possible, to the detriment of the new and existing owners. I live in a village with ample spare land on the outskirts yet policy allows developers to cram new houses into every nook and cranny within the existing urban area without a thought for the impact. The Local Authority could designate the spare land around my village as developable land but they never do, they just keep forcing more houses into the existing areas which causes all sorts of problems in the long run.


5) In terms of privacy....this is the argument the Council used when I objected to the 4 houses that overlook my garden. Previously I had complete privacy, now I have none. I can stand in my kitchen and watch my neighbours TV in their lounge. The house next to that uses the spare bedroom as the ironing room so I am frequently overlooked by them. The house next to that has kids who spend a surprising amount of time hanging out the window watching me in the garden (I didn't know I was so interesting...)


Again, I don't have an issue with the new owners per se, or the fact something was built on the site, it's more to do with the planning process (complete farce in this case) and the developers bad planning and lack of thought for what they were actually building and how it would impact the future tenants and the existing houses.

System

Richard_RM wrote: »

Ho hum....well, to address your points:


1) House value - will it be affected? Well the current situation is that the view is of a row of tall conifer trees. You can't see the other houses at all and the garden has almost complete privacy. Let's suppose the Developer "wins" and my neighbour has to cut the hedge down to 2m. We now have a situation where the view is of a row of 3-storey town houses right on the boundary. Garden privacy now zero. Will this increase the value of her house? Um no I don't think so. Will it stay the same? Again unlikely, as the "no hedge" situation would not be preferred. So logically it will reduce the worth of the house. You are right that by how much is subjective...no-one will ever really know. But the three estate agents she has had come up with an estimate based on their experience were all within the "expect to receive offers 10% less than market value" range. It will cost £3-5k to reduce the hedge (landscaping firm quote) and 10% off market value will be £15-18k, hence my estimate of an average of £20k. Go figure...

But what's to say that when the house goes up for sale, the right buyer comes along and pays over the valuation price? there is no loss in value, it is purely speculative on your part, what if the housing market crashes tomorrw, would you be looking for compensation from the bank because they have devalued your home? it's a very turbulent market to try and prove that tree being reduced in height has a real impact on the actual sale figure.

Richard_RM wrote: »

2) The houses are owned by a housing association, I would assume the houses were offered on a "take it or leave it" basis. To be clear - I have nothing against the people who live there, and I sympathise with the fact they have little light. My main gripe is with the Developers who rammed 8 houses on a site where normally there would have been 4 or less. The average density of housing in the area in 25-30 dph (dwellings per hectare) whereas the new development (excluding ancillary works) is closer to 100 dph, way above the average for the area. Also the layout of the houses, driveways and gardens was all to maximise density above all else. They are 3-bed family houses with tiny gardens, well below recommend internal space and garages too small to park a car in. The Developer had full control over the design and this is what they chose to do.

Is the developer different to the housing association? sounds like it could be affordable units which are easy to justify reduced amenity space and increased density - generally these type of units are not built for profit, housing associations will look to maximise the number of units on site within the local plan designations, and sometimes look to increase density where there is housing pressure. It's not the case of a "greedy developer" if they are housing assocation.

Richard_RM wrote: »

3) The tree issue was well known about in advance. It was highlight in the planning consultation phase, the planning committee phase, in writing, emails, conversations etc. They basically chose to ignore the glaringly obvious future problems it would cause.

Or they fully understood the legislation they needed to comply with and how to use other legislation in future

Richard_RM wrote: »

4) Neither myself nor my neighbour are against development. Clearly much more housing is needed. What I'm against is developers buying up every scrap of land and then forcing as many houses on it as possible, to the detriment of the new and existing owners. I live in a village with ample spare land on the outskirts yet policy allows developers to cram new houses into every nook and cranny within the existing urban area without a thought for the impact. The Local Authority could designate the spare land around my village as developable land but they never do, they just keep forcing more houses into the existing areas which causes all sorts of problems in the long run.

Again, if this is housing association properties your argument doesn't really stand - if a piece of land is developable then its really just a matter of time before it is developed, you/your neighbour should have bought the land to stop development of it.

Richard_RM wrote: »

5) In terms of privacy....this is the argument the Council used when I objected to the 4 houses that overlook my garden. Previously I had complete privacy, now I have none. I can stand in my kitchen and watch my neighbours TV in their lounge. The house next to that uses the spare bedroom as the ironing room so I am frequently overlooked by them. The house next to that has kids who spend a surprising amount of time hanging out the window watching me in the garden (I didn't know I was so interesting...)

Is your garden not already overlooked by your neighbour? or do they have a single storey house hidden behind hedges?
Kitchens are not habitable rooms therefore it is not considered overlooking, overlooking between houses only is only considered between habitable rooms

Richard_RM wrote: »

Again, I don't have an issue with the new owners per se, or the fact something was built on the site, it's more to do with the planning process (complete farce in this case) and the developers bad planning and lack of thought for what they were actually building and how it would impact the future tenants and the existing houses.

Just because you don't understand something, doesn't make it farcical

Davesnave

Richard_RM wrote: »

Ho hum....well, to address your points:


1) House value - will it be affected? Well the current situation is that the view is of a row of tall conifer trees. You can't see the other houses at all and the garden has almost complete privacy. Let's suppose the Developer "wins" and my neighbour has to cut the hedge down to 2m. We now have a situation where the view is of a row of 3-storey town houses right on the boundary. Garden privacy now zero. Will this increase the value of her house? Um no I don't think so

Look at it another way.

How many people would be glad to buy a house with trees of that size to maintain? They haven't been maintained, so they're now a liability at 40' with plenty of growth left still to come....unless someone calls a halt. Leylandii and similar trees will grow 80- 100' eventually.

Yes, it will cost serious money to remove them. Had they been maintained, removing them might not have come into anyone's thinking. Reduction would have been possible, but now they'll just look a mess.

These trees were most likely devaluing the piece of land behind them. Was their effect on its owner ever considered? It doesn't appear so. No need to worry about that, apparently, because it was just 'scrappy' land. Obviously, the land was developable, but what private individual would willingly choose a site like that? The existence of the trees may well have sealed its fate as a HA development, so we may be hearing here the sound of pigeons coming home to roost in them!

Maybe I'm being unfair, or I have something slightly wrong, but it's good to consider other points of view. The main consideration now the HA houses are built is to weigh their occupant's comfort against one neighbour's desire for privacy, not rake over what is done and dusted in the planning process. It won't do any good.

Richard_RM

Is your garden not already overlooked by your neighbour? or do they have a single storey house hidden behind hedges?
Kitchens are not habitable rooms therefore it is not considered overlooking, overlooking between houses only is only considered between habitable rooms

No the garden was not overlooked. Possibly the front street-side garden but that's only small, the larger side and rear garden had complete privacy. Now that is completely gone.


Kitchens are habitable rooms according to the relevant LA's UDP. Kitchen to Lounge window distance should be min. of 18 metres according to their own guidance. In this case it's more like 8m.


Re; house valuation. Yes it's always going to be subjective and a function of current market conditions etc. You're just been awkward though if you think having a view of trees replaced with a row of terraced housing and losing all your privacy isn't going to have some negative impact on the price.

Richard_RM

Just because you don't understand something, doesn't make it farcical

Actually I do understand what happened, as I used to work regularly with local planners so I understand the planning system pretty well. I was also heavily involved in the local opposition and went over the developer proposals with a fine tooth comb and had a report written highlighting the multiple breaches of UDP guidelines, best building practice, RIBA guidelines for min. room sizes, guidance on min. garden sizes, loss of privacy issues and so on. We threw everything including the kitchen sink at them but they basically ignored it all and gave the go ahead anyway (hence it was a farce...).

Richard_RM

Again, if this is housing association properties your argument doesn't really stand - if a piece of land is developable then its really just a matter of time before it is developed, you/your neighbour should have bought the land to stop development of it.

Was never against some form of development, it should just not have been *this* development IMO.

Aylesbury_Duck

I have an idea for your neighbour: Plant another row of conifers much nearer her own house. Then she can cut the other ones down when told to do so. Once the new trees have been allowed to grow unchecked to a stupid height she will have a good privacy screen and consequently regain the supposed loss in value of her house. Problem solved.

Aylesbury_Duck

Richard_RM wrote: »

Was never against some form of development, it should just not have been *this* development IMO.

That is the very definition of NIMBYism.