A homeowner has proved that people living nearby could not afford his house against an ‘only sell to locals’ rule, according to reports.
Businessman, Sean Taylor, who set up the £100 million Zip World company, was told that his home could “only be sold to a person working within two miles of the property”.
Planners in the Snowdonia region of North Wales imposed the restriction, but the owner claimed that locals could not afford to purchase the £350,000 price tag in the countryside.
Mr Taylor transformed Zip World after it was granted permission to be turned into a house in 2008. According to Daily Mail, he now wants to move on, but planners refused to lift the sale restriction two years ago after he was told he could only sell to someone employed nearby.
His argument was that the home’s £350,000 worth was far more than the region’s average household income of £28,850, only allowing for a £161,000 mortgage.
Planning inspector Iwan Lloyd, who upheld the appeal, told Daily Mail:
“There is a significant shortfall between the lower valuation figure considering the restriction and the maximum mortgage eligibility of a qualifying person in the area.
If an obligation would continue to serve a useful purpose it must be necessary, relevant, directly related to the development, fairly and reasonably related in scale and kind to the development, and reasonable in all other respects.”
2 responses
For me this case could have real implications for the Welsh government and its aim to get rid of second home owners, with an unintended consequence of also driving holiday lets out of business!
From 1 April 2023, all second home owners and holiday let businesses had to reach a 182 day letting target or face going back onto council tax with up to a 300% uplift; new planning rules are also proposed so that properties can only be sold to local first time buyers, however the likelihood of one of these buyers being able to afford a £200,000+ property is non-existent, as this case has shown.
So will the Welsh government now need to review its unworkable plans or face a stream of appeals based on the facts in this case?
Only time will tell, but with 38% of holiday let businesses looking to sell up as a consequence of the new tax regime, it needs to be sooner rather than later or whole local tourist economies could be destroyed!
The English government is also looking at implementing the Wales regime, so again it will be interesting to see what impact this case could have on this.
The drive to get first time buyers on the property ladder is all very laudable, but governments need to fully consider the unintended consequences that could arise from this; it will be too late after the horse has bolted!
Maybe holiday let’s need to be driven out of business.