Seller didn't disclose neighbour's approved planning permission - do we have any recourse?

blackbaccararose

Hi there,

Just wanted to sound out a question please - we recently bought and moved into our first home. A week ago, the neighbours (who our garden backs on to) suddenly erected a fence down the middle of their large garden. Wondering what was going on, we managed to identify the house and checked any approved planning permissions for it online. We were surprised to find that several years ago, they received approval to partition their garden and build a whole extra multi-storey HOUSE! Permission should have expired in early 2022 (roughly when our seller put our new home on the market) but on checking this with the council, apparently they did go ahead with "minor initial works" before this and so the permission is still valid.

On our T6 form, the seller ticked "No" to questions 3.1 and 3.2 about any notices received or proposals to develop any property or land nearby. According to the council, he would have received notice about the proposals at the time, as an adjoining property.

To be honest I'm quite upset as a new house in that space will look directly into our own windows (goodbye privacy) and block off a lovely view of trees, which was a bit of a selling point to the property. Never mind the noise, dust etc. that we'll have to endure for many months on end.

Do we have any recourse to the seller in this situation? If we'd known about the plans to build a new house practically in our own back garden then I do think we would have reconsidered. For all we know he may have just forgotten about the notice, but I also can't help but wonder if he knew about the "initial minor works" taking place and decided to speed up his plans to sell, before he had to endure the noise himself or a building site in the back garden that would put potential buyers off.

It's a lesson for us to research nearby planning permissions more carefully for any future purchases, but naively I thought that was covered by the seller's statement in the T6 as a legal document.

Singlemummy_2

Did this not come up on your searches?

Grizebeck

Unlikely unless you want expensive legal action

user1977

Leaving aside any difficulties in proving whether or not the vendor ought to have disclosed it - what remedy would you be seeking? Also, didn't you get any searches which ought to have disclosed the planning? 

Sarahspangles

Information about planning permissions that have already been granted is in the public domain.

custardly

Caveat emptor. 

You would have to prove that the buyer knew about it and deliberately misled. Unless they have admitted this to you in writing you don't have a chance.

blackbaccararose

user1977 said:

Leaving aside any difficulties in proving whether or not the vendor ought to have disclosed it - what remedy would you be seeking? Also, didn't you get any searches which ought to have disclosed the planning? 

I'm not sure, as I don't know what options would be available in this situation - I wouldn't want to go after them for the sake of revenge (especially if legal costs would outweigh any possible compensation!) but am aware that sellers are bound to tell the truth on a T6.

Our solicitors did carry out searches, but they didn't flag anything about planning or actually even show us a copy of anything - I'd assumed they would only do so if they brought up anything to warn us about? We were FTB so first time we've been through this process.

Sarahspangles

Singlemummy_2 said:

Did this not come up on your searches?

It’s a common misunderstanding that the local authority search will report on planning consents. They only report where these apply to the property itself, where there might be enforcement action or planning conditions the buyer needs to know about. Planning consents for other properties aren’t included, they’re in the public domain.

blackbaccararose

custardly said:

Caveat emptor. 

You would have to prove that the buyer knew about it and deliberately misled. Unless they have admitted this to you in writing you don't have a chance.

Thank you, I did wonder about this - just wasn't sure how much weight ticking "no" on the T6 (and the council telling me that he would have received a notice) would hold. Definitely a caveat emptor lesson for us in future!

gazfocus

blackbaccararose said:

user1977 said:

Leaving aside any difficulties in proving whether or not the vendor ought to have disclosed it - what remedy would you be seeking? Also, didn't you get any searches which ought to have disclosed the planning? 

I'm not sure, as I don't know what options would be available in this situation - I wouldn't want to go after them for the sake of revenge (especially if legal costs would outweigh any possible compensation!) but am aware that sellers are bound to tell the truth on a T6.

Our solicitors did carry out searches, but they didn't flag anything about planning or actually even show us a copy of anything - I'd assumed they would only do so if they brought up anything to warn us about? We were FTB so first time we've been through this process.

Your solicitor should have given you a pre contract report containing the results of all the searches that you have paid for. This planning permission definitely should have come up in those searches. 

The wording on the TA6 form makes it very difficult to prove the seller acted in bad faith here. 3.1 says "have any notices been received or sent..." which unless the council sent them signed for (which they don't), you can't prove the seller received any notices and 3.2 says "is the seller aware of any proposals to develop property or land nearby", which again, is very difficult to prove.

The only way you might be able to prove 3.2 is dependant on the "minor works" that were started before the deadline of the approved planning permission, and whether those works were clearly visible to the seller.

macman

Your only potential recourse is to your conveyancer.