Developers and access

Gladys94

Hello - I'll try to keep a long story short. Our home is a detached house on the edge of an imminent development - a new garden suburb. This has been going on for 7 years - the development trust has been made up of the landowner and two building firms, and recently the landowner has sold the project to the builders. We had several meetings with the original team and I have to be careful what I say here, but they were awful. After 5 years of meetings, we found out that we have a Deed of Grant over our access through the site, to our exit road - a major A road (never acknowledged in those meetings). New plans have appeared recently with our access changed. We've contacted the builders to make them aware of our Deed of Access (devil's advocate - of course they knew) and now they want a meeting with us. Basically, they can't begin work without us agreeing to their changing the access - it literally sits at the edge of the site, precisely where they want to build their new roundabout.. They're building 2000 houses and an industrial sector amongst many other things. Does anybody else have experience of things like this? Does anyone have advice for how we approach this meeting? TIA

tacpot12

I would say you need to have a clear view of what you want from them, and what you are prepared to give them in exchange.

Have you thought about selling them your house, and moving to somewhere where the development won't be an issue for you. If you offer to sell them the house for double what it is worth, they might snap your hand off if they think it will allow them to proceed as planned and have some extra land that they can build some more houses on. 

user1977

I would seek professional advice (from surveyors who are used to dealing with developers) before agreeing to anything.

Gladys94

user1977 said:

I would seek professional advice (from surveyors who are used to dealing with developers) before agreeing to anything.

This is a long and complex (boring) story and we do have a land agent with a sympathetic ear on the sidelines. I'm just wondering what their opening gambit might be. We'll go to this first meeting but, agreed, anything from thereon shouldn't be us as the householders. It should be a professional. 

Gladys94

tacpot12 said:

I would say you need to have a clear view of what you want from them, and what you are prepared to give them in exchange.

Have you thought about selling them your house, and moving to somewhere where the development won't be an issue for you. If you offer to sell them the house for double what it is worth, they might snap your hand off if they think it will allow them to proceed as planned and have some extra land that they can build some more houses on. 

Yes - we've thought about selling. We just need to make sure it's for the right price. The old 'landowner' team offered us a price lower than it had been valued at 10 years earlier for a remortgage (they did no research on interim valuations, just went by our purchase price). The new team (builders) seem much more switched on and I half feel they didn't even know about our easement. We do have a professional surveyor to send in if they'll pay for it (the old team wouldn't) but even so, I'm wondering how this will start and what their lowest level of compensation would be. The plans are all through and work is imminent so they do need us to relinquish our access.

eidand

Sounds like you have the upper hand. I am no expert in this kind of situations but I would get as much as possible, because it's you who has to turn their life around so there has to be a big benefit to you. Imagine the price you want and double it.  Maybe that allows you improve your life and buy something you normally couldn't. If not, they can forget about building there.

Section62

Gladys94 said:

...Basically, they can't begin work without us agreeing to their changing the access - it literally sits at the edge of the site, precisely where they want to build their new roundabout.. They're building 2000 houses and an industrial sector amongst many other things. Does anybody else have experience of things like this? Does anyone have advice for how we approach this meeting? TIA

A mixed-use development of that kind presumably has a lot of support from the local council?

If so, be careful about overplaying your hand.  Councils can (and increasingly are) use powers of compulsory purchase to acquire third-party land to facilitate development.  If the issue here is the need for land to create a safe access/egress for the development then the use of CPO would be relatively straightforward.

The "can't begin work" is likely to be only as the result of a planning condition - which the planning authority have the ability to vary (or ignore), so again, don't rely on this as you having the developer over a barrel.

TL;DR - You could probably offer to let them buy you out, but likely only for a margin above the market value of your property which represents the hassle involved in getting the council to CPO the required land/rights to use the land.

Section62

eidand said:

I am no expert in this kind of situations but I would get as much as possible.... Imagine the price you want and double it....

There will be experts dealing with this, they will know ways of getting what they want as cheaply and rapidly as possible.  There's a need for realism in what the OP can obtain...

eidand said:

If not, they can forget about building there.

...and this isn't realism.  The development has probably been in formation for 10 years or more, a lot of money will have been invested in getting it to this stage. The local council will be under pressure to build more homes and will be eyeing the increases in council tax revenue as well as local job creation.  There is zero chance anyone will "forget about building there".

user1977

Gladys94 said:

tacpot12 said:

I would say you need to have a clear view of what you want from them, and what you are prepared to give them in exchange.

Have you thought about selling them your house, and moving to somewhere where the development won't be an issue for you. If you offer to sell them the house for double what it is worth, they might snap your hand off if they think it will allow them to proceed as planned and have some extra land that they can build some more houses on. 

I'm wondering how this will start and what their lowest level of compensation would be.

Not much point guessing what their initial offer will be, other than it's not going to be their best offer. If you want to know how these things typically pan out, have a chat with your agent.

Spreadsheetman

The local council will almost certainly use a compulsory purchase order (https://www.gov.uk/guidance/compulsory-purchase-and-compensation-guide-1-procedure) if you don't reach an agreement with the developer. I imagine this will be very expensive to fight and with such a large development with obvious local benefit there is a very slim chance of winning.

The advice to be guided by your agent in obtaining the best price reasonable seems the way to go.

sheramber

is the changed access a problem for you or are you just being awkward?