Council Tax Band Challenge failed

pinkelephant39

Hi there,

I’m in need of advice. I’ve lived in my property nearly 8 years and have only just been made aware that my council tax is too high. I’m in band D for a 2 bed semi-detached property built in 2018 and as this was my first house purchase, I was not aware that this is not normal, especially for my house value.
I have tried to challenge the band with the VOA, providing properties in bands B & C of the same size, type etc but built in years 2016-2019. There are no properties I can find in my local area of the same type built in 2018. The VO have rejected my challenge because the properties ‘differ in age’ and I have no clue what to do now.
It is also worth noting that there is only 4 properties on my development; and the higher value detached property is a band C, but as its detached I cannot use this as evidence.

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated, or any success stories of providing evidence of properties built a year after yours and still being used as evidence?

Thanks in advance.

lincroft1710

I have tried to challenge the band with the VOA, providing properties in bands B & C of the same size, type etc but built in years 2016-2019. There are no properties I can find in my local area of the same type built in 2018

There is something not quite right here. It is extremely unlikely for the VOA to reject properties built 2016 to 2019 as not comparable with similar property built in 2018. What did your home cost in 2018?

Are your comparables private built or housing association built and how far from your home?

pinkelephant39

Thank you for your reply. My house cost in 2018 was £220,000 at full value (we bought a 40% share). The properties I provided as evidence are all within 0.7m of my house. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure if they are all private built or HO built, but believe a couple I provided are HO built, and all have a very similar value to mine or actually slightly higher (for example £285,000 when purchased in 2019 and band B).
The response from the challenge was stating 3 of the properties I gave as evidence differed in age and the other 2 differs in age and size (I believe mines come back as 85 square meters, and the info I found on one of these properties had the size listed as 82 square meters, but not sure how I can check/find more accurate info on the size).

lincroft1710

Does not sound like a Band D to me, Band C would seem to be appropriate. Trouble is VOA are very intransigent. I am ex VOA (long time ago) and rarely suggest this as no guarantee it will succeed, but would suggest asking your MP to intervene. Hopefully they will write to the VOA and ask them to review your case

pinkelephant39

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81970937#Comment_81970937

Really appreciate you getting back to me. I have actually reached out to my local MP today also so fingers crossed I get a response 🤞.

Kybosh

Hi, we have just been through the process of challenging our council tax band on the bungalow we moved into 16 months ago. Our challenge was rejected, like you, by the VOA and so we appealed to the Valuation Tribunal and the VOA decision was overturned. I’m afraid that in your case it will be a matter of sitting down for several hours and just acquiring as much information as you can to back up your case. You will have 3 months, if I remember correctly, to lodge your appeal with the Valuation Tribunal. A few sites that may be of use to you are Property Checker, and the gov.uk council tax checker. Just scan roads and the local area to see if any similar sized properties are in the band that you think you should be in.
The whole appeals process for us took 15 months, but if you are sure you have a strong case, then keep going. Good luck.

pinkelephant39

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81974249#Comment_81974249

Thank you for your reply. From what I read online because we’ve lived in the house so long they don’t have to look into it properly? You only get a certain amount of time when you first move in to challenge it, But I will definitely follow this up as I cannot possibly see how we’re in the correct band, so it’s worth it on principle 😂

lincroft1710

As you correctly say you are out of tim to appeal to the VT.