Checking if house is former social housing

andy444

Is there a way to check if a certain property was formerly social housing before it became privately owned? I don't know if there is an online database or procedure to check something like that. 

theartfullodger

Talk to neighbours, estate agents.  If leasehold see who is freeholder - if council V V likely.

Is there a problem - or an advantage?? In my experience ex-social or council properties frequently have (well for me..) been built to higher standards than some profiteering developer. 

I always prefer the neighbours in an council or ex-council estate to middle classes banging on about house prices, but others no doubt think otherwise.

Best regards to all

elsien

It’s also slightly different nowadays as well because instead of building big estates you might get a few social housing properties in the middle of a big private estate as a planning to permission condition.
I am curious as to what a difference you think it makes, because if it’s in the middle of a council estate then yes, it probably was council housing which should be obvious anyway, but otherwise what’s the reason you want to find out?

Herzlos

Why?

You can probably get a good guess if it's surrounded by social housing but there's really no way to tell unless you know the area.

RelievedSheff

theartfullodger said:

Talk to neighbours, estate agents.  If leasehold see who is freeholder - if council V V likely.

Is there a problem - or an advantage?? In my experience ex-social or council properties frequently have (well for me..) been built to higher standards than some profiteering developer. 

I always prefer the neighbours in an council or ex-council estate to middle classes banging on about house prices, but others no doubt think otherwise.

Best regards to all

Interestingly we found completely the opposite.

Our previous ex-local authority house was a really poor quality build, sound insulation or complete lack of between properties being a major problem. A lot of which was in all likelihood down to the very poor workmanship. Our current 4 year old house which we bought new is of far superior build quality and is built to a much higher standard.

The neighbours in the local authority property were an absolute nightmare and caused us no end of problems in the time we lived there. We are fortunate to be surrounded by great neighbours now but that is luck of the draw. You can get good and bad neighbours anywhere. That said we would never buy another ex-local authority property again. Once bitten twice shy and all that.

user1977

Give us a link or photo and I'm sure we can have a good guess about it. It's usually pretty obvious.

andy444

The reason I am asking is that I'm not against social housing or anything (my Dad grew up living in council houses/flats) but that I bought my current house two years ago and have done some work on it since then and I've had some tradesmen enquire if the property was formerly a council house because of how the electrics were set up and other factors. 

My property is an end-of-terrace house built in the 70's and my two immediate neighbours privately own their two places but I think one house two doors down is owned by the council based on an online search I did for my village. So my question is just to satisfy my own curiosity on this subject really.

Grumpy_chap

andy444 said:

My property is an end-of-terrace house built in the 70's and my two immediate neighbours privately own their two places but I think one house two doors down is owned by the council 

If yours is in a 1970's terrace and one of the other properties in the terrace is Council / Housing Association property, then it is likely that all the properties in the terrace were at one point LA properties.  Or other similar body, such as MoD estate.
Other than for the sake of interest, I don't see that it makes any difference either way.

Sometimes, there are ways to tell from the deeds. 
My property is mid-terrace but we have a path to the rear gardens under an arch between the two properties (so the bathrooms share the upper floor above the arch).  For some reason, the ownership of the path is still owned by the Council.  Similar anomalies arise when there are former-MoD estate.
Do your deeds have any tell-tale signs like that?

andy444

Grumpy_chap said:

Do your deeds have any tell-tale signs like that?

It's quite a while since I last fully looked through the deeds but I don't remember anything that categorically states in any direction. The property was built by a now defunct housing developer and the access pathway at the back of our gardens is owned/maintained jointly by the seven properties that use it.

I know it doesn't matter really but I just wondered if there was a quick way to check.

EssexHebridean

elsien said:

It’s also slightly different nowadays as well because instead of building big estates you might get a few social housing properties in the middle of a big private estate as a planning to permission condition.
I am curious as to what a difference you think it makes, because if it’s in the middle of a council estate then yes, it probably was council housing which should be obvious anyway, but otherwise what’s the reason you want to find out?

I'm unsure if things have changed in the past 13 years since I have been out of construction, they may have done. It used to be however that the spec for the build of a social housing property amongst private was very different - inside and out. From memory I can recall less roof insulation (with the private ones being overspec'ed), lower quality windows, smaller plots were pretty much standard. Then of course the interior fittings usually varied wildly too. This could feasibly be a reason for someone wanting to clarify whether a house they are considering purchasing might have originally been built as SH. 

In the OP's case, and with the electrics, it may well be that at the time it was built the heating would have been electric for council properties, but GCH for private builds? This might well leave a "footprint" on the property electically even now when it may well have had GCH installed anyway.

fullyrendered

Usually if it was social housing originally then the individual deeds only exist from the point of first purchase, either Right To Buy or open market sale. The Transfer Agreement in the case of a freehold house, or the lease in the case of a flat. These would reference the seller as being the local authority or housing association.

Your comment about the deeds suggests the developer sold it at the point of construction, usually the first owner's name is on those deeds.