Appeal against house Banding

medical

Dear all
has anyone out there appealed to get their house from a higher to a lower band
we have been givn band E by the local authority and we want to appael to go to band D

Where do we start and what can you all suggest we write in the letter
Any comments will be appreciated

Thanks
Medical

suekjw

Yes we did appeal, and yes we won!

We live in a 'new build' and in exactly the same situation as you, I got us reduced to an E band from F. Firstly, contact your CT department and tell them what you want to do, they should be able to tell you who to write to - it was a drawn out process! I found that our neighbours who's house was a slightly different spec to ours was on a lower band (the only diffrence was about 10ftsq upstairs) and used that as my baseline - saved us a fortune.

It was 3 years ago so my details are a bit sketchy - sorry, if I have the paperwork I'll post more.

Sue

Twopints

I haven't appealed because I was past the six month cut-off when I realised I could appeal (6 months applies when you move to a house). But this site has some details, and you can also find out what band other properties are in: CLICK HERE

bunking_off

I appealed and lost. You clearly can win as suekjw did, but I'd say the odds are heavily stacked against you.

To stand any chance of winning, you'll need to demonstrate that comparable properties to your own have a different banding. However, this may not be enough : there aren't any identical properties to my new build, but despite demonstrating that every other house on my 150+ property estate was a band D or E, and that many band E properties were >90% of the size of mine and on far, far better plots (a view borne out by subsequent sales), I still failed.

Unfortunately, all the VOA need to do is demonstrate that comparable properties have been given the same banding. To do this, they go back to the transactions in 1990, then see which are comparable to your property hence determine a value. Spot the flaw? How can a new build possibly be compared to a house that inherently must be >15 years old? In my view, the fairer approach would be to take the value of your property today and index it back to 1990 to determine it's value then, hence applicable band - they won't do that.

In my case, they identified 3 properties. One was patently nothing like mine, hence was dropped when I highlighted it. Another was on THE poshest estate in the town (unlike e.g. I look out at an electricity pylon), but they wouldn't take that into account. The final one had patently been bought by a mug in 1990, as it was clearly overvalued....put it this way, according to the records it was sold for £120k in 1990 and was (fairly priced) on the market at £165k in 2002 - I know because I viewed it when I bought my own. The way the system works, however, is that if the VoA can demonstrate that there are consistent properties, your "application for rebanding" will be declined.

I think what finally did for me was that all my submissions were in writing rather than in person. Realistically, I'd have had to take an unpaid day's leave to attend, which would have cost me approx £150. I considered that with the rebanding exercise imminent, I couldn't justify this "application fee" to attend in person, hence had to gamble on not being there in person to present counter arguments. Probably a bad move in hindsight.

Incidentally, all of the above assumes your house was valued pre-April this year...think the rules changed after that.

mini

We won a few years back, I know a few people who have appealed & won, don't know anyone who has lost in fact, may be worth looking on www.nethouseprices.com for a look at what houses like yours are selling for. From what I recall we appealed based on the purchase price being £25,000 less than the valuation band.

have you read this site? http://www.voa.gov.uk/council_tax/how_your_property_is_valued.htm

and can I appeal? http://www.voa.gov.uk/council_tax/can_i_appeal.htm

Carmen

Hi Medical, I appealed, and won!
I moved from a 4 bed bungalow to a 2 bed one and our local council (S.E.) kept us in band E. They sent someone to assess the property but we were not in at the time! The assesor phoned to tell us of his findings (he was able to go around the outside of the property) He said that our a conservatery was one of the reasons that we were in a higher band! This 'conservatery' he saw (on tip top over the fench) was a small porch, barely 3'x3' I suggested (in no uncertain terms) that he come and take another look :mad: This whole process took 1 year (you must keep paying during this time) and they adjust payments when/if the appealed is won :j
Question how they reach the descision on your band!

Good luck
Carmen x

libra10

We also appealed and won. We also advised a neighbour to do the same and she also won, saving a considerable sum on CT.

Good luck