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Couple's £400,000 Dream Home Is Torn Down After They Flout Planning Laws


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HOLA441

A good example of how artificial controls are placed on the housing market in the UK to inflate prices. Reminds me of how DeBeers business policy included putting many diamonds into "storage" and even crushing perfectly useful diamonds into smaller ones for industrial use. By doing this diamonds would appear less abundant and they would command a higher price for them.

Contrary to popular belief, the UK is not overcrowded at all. We have plenty of land, though much of it wasted in agriculture (a sector that requires billions of pounds of subsidies every year to keep afloat)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11...ning-laws.html#

Couple's £400,000 dream home is torn down after they flout planning laws

By Paul Sims

Last updated at 4:25 PM on 15th June 2009

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It cost Peter Howell £400,000 to build and was everything he and his wife had ever dreamed of.

It was here, nestled in the rural tranquility of North Yorkshire, that they planned to retire.

But their dream was reduced to a dusty pile of rubble.

At the end of a bitter five-year legal battle with local planning officers - costing hundreds of thousands - the bulldozers went in and demolished their five-bedroom home.

Peter Howell's £400,000 dream home in the village of Ingleby Arncliffe, North Yorkshire, which is being demolished

Destroyed: Peter and Kay Howell's £400,000 dream home has been torn down after falling foul of a council's planning department

Peter Howell's £400,000 dream home in the village of Ingleby Arncliffe, North Yorkshire, which is being demolished Demolition order: Hambleton Council said the house was 'not in keeping with the general character' of Ingleby Arncliffe

Mr Howell, 63, began building the home in Ingleby Arncliffe in 2004 after he was granted outline planning permission by his local council.

Expecting his application to simply be 'rubber stamped' work began almost immediately.

He submitted plans to Hambleton Council, but no major objections were made.

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Then, after a letter was sent to every villager claiming building had begun without proper consent, a flood of objections arrived on the desks of planning officials.

Eventually, Mr Howell lost his bid for retrospective planning permission.

He tried a further four times to convince planning officials but lost each time.

Yesterday morning, his five year legal fight ended in a haze of dust and bricks.

Taking the body blow to his house in some might say a pragmatic light, Mr Howell said: 'It's a terrible shame that a perfectly good house is being torn down just so the council proves it can be.

Peter and Kay Howell's £350,000 dream home has been torn down

The demolition brings to a close a long-running legal wrangle between the couple and the council over the three bedroom house in Yorkshire

'There's no other reason for it than they wanted to teach one man a lesson.'

He went on: 'It's a dreadful shame as it is a perfectly nice house.'

The complex saga has involved repeated wrangles, a police investigation into a violent planning meeting, several public inquiries and cost both sides a total of well into six figures.

During his legal battle with the council Mr Howell tried a further four times to win planning permission. But each time he was denied.

He even went to the High Court.

But in October last year it was concluded that the property 'harmed the character and appearance of the surrounding area'.

It was 'dominant and visually intrusive by virtue of its height, bulk and colour', they said, and was 'not in keeping with the general character of this part of Ingleby Arncliffe'.

Mr Howell, a property developer with 30 years experience, said he had lost hundreds of thousands in the collapse of his dream.

His business is in liquidation, with the Royal Bank of Scotland now owning the property.

Mr Howell, who is married to Kay and has one son, Simon, 22, and lives in Elton, near Stockton-on-Tees, branded the demolition 'madness, sheer madness'.

He now believes another house will be built later on the site, similar to the one knocked down yesterday.

'I'm extremely upset by allegations that we have flouted the law, we would never do that,' he added.

'The land had outline planning consent for the construction of a house. The principle for development had therefore been established, this is unequivocal and irreversible.

'The site had outline permission and the original scheme had the support of planning officers.

'Without these two factors, I would never, ever have started building.

'I have put a house where a house should be.'

Michael Knowles, contracts manager for A1 Environmental Services, demolition experts for Hambleton Council, said: 'No one wants to see a house like this demolished, but it was built without planning permission.

'All the windows, internal walls, doors, and ceilings and floors were removed and now an excavator has been brought to rip down the shell of the building.

'Even the foundations will be taken out and it will be a greenfield site as though it's never been here.'

Last night, Hambleton Council's head of development, Maurice Cann, said: 'This is all about somebody who built a house that was too big and in the wrong place.

'It was not done to teach anyone a lesson. Every other option was explored.'

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HOLA442
A good example of how artificial controls are placed on the housing market in the UK to inflate prices. Reminds me of how DeBeers business policy included putting many diamonds into "storage" and even crushing perfectly useful diamonds into smaller ones for industrial use. By doing this diamonds would appear less abundant and they would command a higher price for them.

Contrary to popular belief, the UK is not overcrowded at all. We have plenty of land, though much of it wasted in agriculture (a sector that requires billions of pounds of subsidies every year to keep afloat)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11...ning-laws.html#

Actually no, its a very bad example since OUTLINE planning had been agreed. That is, the council was quite happy for them to build on the plot of land. These idiots probably just built an unsightly pile of shit that was completely inappropriate to the surroundings and offensive to the eye and the neighbours. Tough titties I say in this case-if you can't be arsed to get a decent architect and design to fit the place you want to build and plough ahead anyway regardless without completing the planning process first then you get everything you deserve Im afraid...

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Guest sillybear2

They don't get it, the only thing that gives a depreciating material asset like a house real value is the plot of artificially scarce land it sits upon, if that plot is 'fake' then you don't have a £400k house, you have a pile of unsaleable rubble that has a negative value (demolition costs, legal costs)

Why do these idiots assume it's the house itself that is actually worth anything?

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HOLA445

They don't show you what the other houses around looked like. However that one looked not much different from what you'd expect to see in a housing estate at the edge of a city and next to a motorway, so I can't imagine they would be much like that.

I have a little sympathy from an "It's unfortunate he was stupid enough to think that you could build a house without detailed planning permission" point of view (while half suspecting he just thought he could chance it and get off with it), but no more.

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HOLA446

Having had a chance to look at the pics, they have got somebody to puke up some godawful blockwork and render effort and in the background you can see that a neighbouring building is in fact stonebuilt by the looks. It doesnt take a great deal of common sense to realise that planning are going to want the building to at least look something like the others in that situation even if its only a cladding rather than stonebuilt-prat got everything he deserved tbh..

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HOLA447
Actually no, its a very bad example since OUTLINE planning had been agreed. That is, the council was quite happy for them to build on the plot of land. These idiots probably just built an unsightly pile of shit that was completely inappropriate to the surroundings and offensive to the eye and the neighbours. Tough titties I say in this case-if you can't be arsed to get a decent architect and design to fit the place you want to build and plough ahead anyway regardless without completing the planning process first then you get everything you deserve Im afraid...

It was a truly ugly house, and from the pictures I cannot understand how it cost £400k. £100k plus £300k legal fees perhaps...

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Actually no, its a very bad example since OUTLINE planning had been agreed. That is, the council was quite happy for them to build on the plot of land. These idiots probably just built an unsightly pile of shit that was completely inappropriate to the surroundings and offensive to the eye and the neighbours. Tough titties I say in this case-if you can't be arsed to get a decent architect and design to fit the place you want to build and plough ahead anyway regardless without completing the planning process first then you get everything you deserve Im afraid...

+1

Yes this is a bad example.

I also think that they lie like cheap chinese watch. There's no way such a crappy build cost £350k.

I'm not a fan of planning regs, but as you say, tough titty on them for being so stupid.

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HOLA4410

They really should have set aside £10,000 in a brown envelope or got in contact with the Mason inside the council, if you know what I mean. It's all about knowing the right people and pressing the right buttons.

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HOLA4411

I think this is wonderful. I know this village and I've been through the planning and building process with Hambleton myself. Hambleton are helpful and reasonable in both planning and building control.

The guy deserves no sympathy, he is a developer. He ought to know the rules. The value at £400k is rubbish. A house that size in block and render, no more than £110k assuming a decent kitchen. The plot still retains value, at least it would once a successful application for reserved matters is in place. Typical of the Daily Mail, they seem to inhabit another planet.

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HOLA4412
I think this is wonderful. I know this village and I've been through the planning and building process with Hambleton myself. Hambleton are helpful and reasonable in both planning and building control.

The guy deserves no sympathy, he is a developer. He ought to know the rules. The value at £400k is rubbish. A house that size in block and render, no more than £110k assuming a decent kitchen. The plot still retains value, at least it would once a successful application for reserved matters is in place. Typical of the Daily Mail, they seem to inhabit another planet.

Precisely, though this article just goes to prove that any witless wonder can claim this title these days-tell me, what REAL property developer would not have known that this was going to be a likely outcome? The clown has probably been telling himself that a bit of decorating, minor repair and dumb luck making profits in a rising market makes him a developer. Hilarious indeed :rolleyes::lol:

Edit: The council statement on the issue said that the building was too big and in the wrong place. Now any developer/builder with an ounce of common sense would have known that if they couldnt squeeze plans through quite as big as they'd like that provided they got the thing built with full consent then they'd have 'permitted development' after a while to make a bit of an addition to it if really needed.

Back to the build 'quality', as you lot say that has no way on god's green earth cost that amount to build unless he's been done over like a kipper by his tradesmen and don't even get me started on those NASTY, TACKY faux parapet thingos-arghhh, my eyes...what a pretentious, thickass dickwad indeed!!!

Edited by stonethecrows
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Guest sillybear2
"Harmless people attacked by evil thugs."

Is Injin trying to imply he knows what occurred during that troubled planning meeting? :lol:

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Guest happy?
A good example of how artificial controls are placed on the housing market in the UK to inflate prices.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11...ning-laws.html#

Start off with a false assumption based on inadequate information and go on to prove anything you like.

Some of us round here remember the internet before Daily Mail readers knew how to boot a computer.

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HOLA4418
Guest sillybear2
"Planning" itself is a threat and is followed by an attack.

What else could it possibly be?

You mean local planners wear brown kitsch/camp uniforms and push little model houses around on giant maps?

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HOLA4421

What I find sad is, if I read it correctly, that no-one complained till the council sent out letters to everyone telling them that Mr Property developer had been a cheeky naughty boy and broken a few rules - then people start to complain.

Many years ago I lived a few doors away from an Irish bricklayer and his family, a very friendly and kind chap. He once commented that one problem of the English is they spend more time nosing and worrying about on whats going on in their neighbours house rather than in their own. Even then I knew exectly what he meant. Shame on those locals.

Also, so long as a property isnt genuinely excessively large (so as to be intrusive to neighbours) or overly garish (e.g luminous pink) WHY are we so obsessed with this concept that all houses have got to look the bl**dy same???!!! SO what if in a village there are a handful that are markedly different in style and character.

Finally, whilst I agree to an extent that there appears to be an element of a professional property developer (who should know better than most the way the system works) taking some liberties - the most galling petty minded beaureucratic thing in this whole affair is that permission to build on the site had been given. IF there was no permission at all, for anything, then tearing it down is fully justified - the law is the law. If you dont like it, change the law - but the law is the law.

BUT, to tear down a perfectly good usable house in this manner is morally criminal - and exactly the sort of thing the jumped up little local town hall nazis do best. The world will be so much better a place without people like this in it.

Edited by anonguest
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Guest happy?
"Planning" itself is a threat and is followed by an attack.

What else could it possibly be?

A means by which 'smaller' people prevent thugs with cash from intimidating them out of their own interests. You falsely assume in all your postings that the state's interests and individual interest never co-incide.

It's the one fatal flaw in your seemingly infallible logic - it also renders most of what you post into simplistic nonsense.

The planning laws help me as they protect me from unwanted development from those with more cash than I can muster. Unlike the libel laws, the planning laws offer a degree of protection to those without the biggest guns. I like the planning laws.

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Guest sillybear2
The planning laws help me as they protect me from unwanted development from those with more cash than I can muster. Unlike the libel laws, the planning laws offer a degree of protection to those without the biggest guns. I like the planning laws.

Do you like the compulsory purchase laws too?

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HOLA4424

What an ugly unimaginative pile of crap

Eventually, Mr Howell, from Elton, near Darlington, lost his bid for retrospective planning permission, after the High Court agreed that the property was 'dominant and visually intrusive by virtue of its height, bulk and colour' and 'harmed the character and appearance of the surrounding area'.

article-1193155-055A3D02000005DC-898_468x356.jpg

i can just imagine him drawing the plans on the back of a cigarette packet.

few places like that round my way. totally look like builders had a go themselves, totally in denial that an architect is really the person that builds a house. straight, flat featureless boxes WITH LOADS OF BIG ROOMS!!!!!

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