Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Another Illegal Conversion. Information and Help Required.
All
I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed but no.69 Effingham Road is being gutted at the moment. It was bought very cheaply (for 270k) earlier this year by a company registered in Cyprus (suspicious already). The address given is care of a financial services company in Enfield that has no web presence whatsoever.
I wandered past the other day to quiz the builders. Peaking inside, I could see that they were almost certainly preparing the carcass for a separate downstairs and upstairs. There were 2 builders on site. The first initially said they were keeping it as a house but when I quizzed him about the dividing frames, he said that they were 'partitioning' it. The second builder then started to get a bit more heated and defensive, initially saying they were keeping it as a house but when I pointed out that they were clearly dividing it up, changing tack to say that was what it had always been like. The more I questioned, the more defensive and aggressive he got, saying things like, "what difference to you anyway?" etc.
While I can't be 100% sure, this seems pretty much a guaranteed dodgy conversion. I'm also sure it was a single house before.
Have you seen the works? Do you know if it was a house or bed/sits or separate flats before?
I will be lodging a complaint with planning first thing Tuesday and would please urge everyone to do the same. The more complaints planning get, the harder it will be for them not to action swiftly.
I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed but no.69 Effingham Road is being gutted at the moment. It was bought very cheaply (for 270k) earlier this year by a company registered in Cyprus (suspicious already). The address given is care of a financial services company in Enfield that has no web presence whatsoever.
I wandered past the other day to quiz the builders. Peaking inside, I could see that they were almost certainly preparing the carcass for a separate downstairs and upstairs. There were 2 builders on site. The first initially said they were keeping it as a house but when I quizzed him about the dividing frames, he said that they were 'partitioning' it. The second builder then started to get a bit more heated and defensive, initially saying they were keeping it as a house but when I pointed out that they were clearly dividing it up, changing tack to say that was what it had always been like. The more I questioned, the more defensive and aggressive he got, saying things like, "what difference to you anyway?" etc.
While I can't be 100% sure, this seems pretty much a guaranteed dodgy conversion. I'm also sure it was a single house before.
Have you seen the works? Do you know if it was a house or bed/sits or separate flats before?
I will be lodging a complaint with planning first thing Tuesday and would please urge everyone to do the same. The more complaints planning get, the harder it will be for them not to action swiftly.
Tags for Forum Posts: casework, effingham road, illegal conversion
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alison P on
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Certainly worth talking to Winkworths. A similar situation earlier in the year with Keatons (more here) resulted in them taking the property off the market...
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Permalink Reply by VIX on
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Alison, just read you post about the one Keatons had on their books. Do you know what the person who called them told them? Did anyone get a viewing of the property?
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It doesn't look from the posts as though anyone did view it, but it strikes me as a really obvious thing to do in terms of getting a clearer idea of what the property looks like inside. Ben's post about Keatons withdrawing it follows - might be worth contacting him on the site to find out more.
"I have just vistied Keatons with regards to viewing the property. They explained that the property has now been taken off the market due to some discrepancies with planning. They did not tell me what these were, but I am aware that The Office of David Lammay have been in contact with Keatons, raising concerns that there may be some sort of breaching of planning rules concerning the property. I can only assume that Keatons conducted further research and took the house off the market. However, we should all remain vigilant and whenever we pass other estste agents see if the property is being advertised. I think David Lammay's team have been really helpfull on this matter. They have clearly listened to our concerns on HMO's and illegal conversions and to my mind are clearly making an effort in working with the residents of Harringay and Haringey on bringing the dodgy landlors back into line."
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Permalink Reply by Steve Hatch on
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In terms of finding out what the properties look like inside. It is a pretty safe bet that most agents now prepare floorplans.
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Permalink Reply by Stuart on
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I'm not sure it's really relevant anyway. They have applied for a COL and put the plans online. Plus Patrick Sullivan is going to make a site visit.
The one interesting thing is that if they get their COL, they are in breach of planning permission by installing a loft conversion without permission (which would not be granted under the UDP).
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Well if a breach is flagged up on any property, it should also be flagged up in the LA searches...
Unless the searches were carried out prior to the discovery of a planning breach etc.
I am sure that a mortgage lender would need to know this stuff, especially if there is a risk of enforcement action by the LA.
It would be interesting to get a planning officials perspective on this, or even speak to someone in the search dep't!
Better still are any HOL members licensed conveyancers?
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Permalink Reply by Anette on
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This sounds like a clear case of fraud to me. I checked the council tax too, and it's a band E - which is a house. Has been for a long time.
Surely that must count as evidence against them getting a certificate of lawfulness? Why is a possibly forged electricity bill sufficient evidence for them to grant the COL, and why can't we see it? Who's palms has been greased, and who's got something to hide? This whole case stinks! Bushy, how many gas meters are outside? I bet there's only one. If it's been two flats for a while they will have two.
To not be shown the electricity bills or given the ref number is really suspicious, and it sounds like something fishy is going on here. Can we get Nora and David Lammy's office on to this one too? The more of these dodgy certificates we can clamp down on, the less attractive this area will be to these people, as they know there's a good chance they'll get caught.
We need to do something - and Bushy certainly is - but it seems a wall's been hit. Who can help smash that wall down and uncover the fraud underneath? Alan, is that something you think you can do, or David Lammy's office perhaps?
This is so infuriating, the planning office should be working with us, not against us! They're public servants for &^^&'s sake!
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I'll let Alan post in due course on this but I know that he was going to raise both with other councillors and also with David's office.
I am waiting to hear back from Planning about whether or not I can see the evidence filed (including the electricity bill) so until I have a definitive answer either way, I can't say they've definitely forbidden me from seeing it. I will chase them this week. Though Alan's view is that there is no reason why all such evidence should not be put online with the application.
The problem seems to stem from the fact that, for a COL, there is no statutory requirement on a council to do anything except look at the evidence in front of them and only the evidence supplied by the applicant. We shouldn't necessarily blame the Planning officers for the rubbish legislative framework they are supposed to uphold.
Re Gas Meters - there are none outside. They must be inside. The key will be when they were installed and, even if there were 2, were they both being used? It may be that one was inactive after the reconversion to a house in 1993. Until we can establish whether this 2001 bill supplied as evidence is genuine, we won't have the answer to whether this a fraudulent application or not.
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annette why dont both of us call the council, i know which officer it is holding this information back, he cannot do this, as its public knowledge...
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Why on earth would someone "hold this information back"?
I know we have a socialist council keen to house the multitudes of good honest workers but as has been pointed out before, they're not allowed to turn a blind eye to planning legislation to do it, they're just supposed to build more social housing.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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I'm not a planner and it's many decades since I stopped being a lawyer. But as far as I am aware, the documents on a public planning file are available to the public.
Having said that, planning officers (and members of the Planning Commmittee) are not there to do what the owners, or landlords, or neighbours, or 'the community' wants - but to follow the rules of planning law.
In this type of case it puzzles me that, if an owner has hard evidence to support an application, why would anyone object to that evidence being open to public view?
Conversely, if other people - including neighbours - have hard evidence which contradicts the documents provided by an owner, I can't understand why planning officers would want that excluded from the process. Making a decision "on the balance of probabilities" cannot mean considering only evidence which supports one side.
I've contacted Nora Mulready at David Lammy's office. I've also left a message for Planning Officers. I hope they can remove at least some of the blockages.
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They are keeping the reference number from Bushy because this will expose the fraud and the officer will not get their 'bung'. Simple.
The corrupt officers have probably by now realised that this is not a safe way to get the COL pushed through anymore-its how our ilegal conversion was finally exposed; the council had to look at the hard evidence once i found it in the file at the planning office, instead of giving us the run around for almost a year, claiming that the COL was lawfull; the Gas bill was a fake among other documents]
They are trying to block public access to those kind of files, hoping to shut us out another way.
As Alan has said the documents are public knowledge, and they are simply giving you the runaround.
Under the freedom of information act you have the right to view those documents.
Just ask for the reference number on the bill, just that, there will not be 'bank account details' on a bill so the officer is talking rubbish and stalling you when he says he is protecting the owners rights.
They are protecting the person who provided a fake bill , the dodgy developer/and his own arse.
[isnt it a tad worrying that these officers still don't know their own laws!]
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