Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Paul Simon and Hane now stick permanent ads on houses.
I've complained to them, but still up weeks later. Plus they're double posting now. You can expect the area to get more and more busy with estate agents boards from these guys, people!
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Unless the Council's website page is out-of-date they are breaking the law.
While it's polite and helpful to begin by requesting the Estate Agents to cease, I strongly urge you to notify the Council's Enforcement staff. If you speak to them directly you might also ask whether or not they have been cut or face a staff cut. This may impact on Haringey's capacity to take action on such complaints.
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"If you want to report an Estate Agent board you feel may be breaching the law, you can contact the Neighbourhood Action Team on 020 8489 1335 or send an email to frontline@haringey.gov.uk"
Planning Enforcement Team
Level 6, River Park House
225 High Road
Wood Green N22 7HQTel 020 8489 1000
Email planning.enforcement@haringey.gov.uk
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Permalink Reply by Noots on
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This really does my head in and completely ruins streetscapes. I can just about understand the justification for “For sale/To rent” boards (even though most buyers would surely look online these days), but I can’t for the life of me understand how they justify “sold/let by” boards going up at all, never mind for months on end. I would love to see the law changed on this.
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Permalink Reply by SarahC on
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Yes, it must indirectly reduce the value of properties in the area, which is a bit of an own goal...
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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Alan, thanks for posting this, it's helpful.
There have recently been staffing problems at planning enforcement. At last week's regulatory committee meeting, an officer described these as "issues about the continuity of resource".
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"... issues about the continuity of resource".
Thanks for that new gem, Clive. Doubleplusgood. Perhaps even Duckspeak?
"For the purposes of everyday life it was no doubt necessary, or sometimes necessary, to reflect before speaking, but a Party member called upon to make a political or ethical judgement should be able to spray forth the correct opinions as automatically as a machine gun spraying forth bullets ..."
"Ultimately it was hoped to make articulate speech issue from the larynx without involving the higher brain centres at all. This aim was frankly admitted in the Newspeak word duckspeak, meaning ‘to quack like a duck’. Like various other words in the B vocabulary, duckspeak was ambivalent in meaning. Provided that the opinions which were quacked out were orthodox ones, it implied nothing but praise, and when the Times referred to one of the orators of the Party as a doubleplusgood duckspeaker it was paying a warm and valued compliment."
- From George Orwell, "1984". Appendix: "The Principles of Newspeak"
Deeply scary in Koberville isn't it? It's like Sean of the Dead but without the slightest trace of humour.
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Permalink Reply by Philip on
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Reenforcing what Alan says. When I lived in Langham last year, I got fed up with the boards, but persevered with Haringey. There is a link on their website to report boards, tho you may need to phone in reality. For Sale and To Let can stay up until actioned. Sold and Let may stay for, I think two weeks. Haringey got some taken down quickly, but the dodgy companies just ignore them, tho they were eventually taken down when the exteriors were redecorated. It was such a pleasure to see a board free street! Please everyone take the time and trouble to keep being 'the squeaky wheel'. Haringey were quite good about it, and one of the officers gave me her direct line, so it is not a question of not caring.
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Thank you, indeed. Hope it doesn't end up becoming Canute and the tide in these 'ere destitute times.
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Gordon, I like your King Canute/Knut analogy. Not least because the story (fable?) of a king who sits on his throne by the shore and commands the incoming tide to cease has been given conflicting meanings.
One is hubris: arrogant rulers who imagine that their limited power enables them to control much larger events.
Another is humility: that Canute staged the event to expose and mock the empty flattery of his courtiers.
A third is piety. In one version of the story Canute is said to have taken off his gold crown and hung it on a crucifix; to show who is really the boss round here.
But of course, human beings do "hold back the tide". The Dutch have been doing this very successfully for centuries. And so has the UK with sea and river defences. Which still work - up to a point of course - provided enough resources are dedicated to the task. And also provided the science is understood well enough. (George Monbiot gives examples where he thinks the Government gets it wrong.)
Applying your analogy to estate agents, there's no humility and certainly no piety with the firms that break the law. But, it seems there's a lot of hubris. The few firms which do it will - I assume - get away with what they think they can.
But estate agents are not a force of nature. And neither are they above the law. They are businesses which can be taken to court and fined. provided of course that the laws and regulations exist to restrict them. And haven't been removed in a "bonfire of red tape" - or whatever soundbite the Coalition is now using. And, crucially, providing local councils are willing to take action and have sufficient resources to do so.
As other people have suggested on this thread, estate agents who break the rules may also be susceptible to public opinion. Naming and shaming works. Even the most shameless will consider reputational damage and its potential impact on their firm's bottom line.
Although I strongly suggest that praise may also work. Reward the good guys. Which estate agent businesses will sign-up publicly to following the rules? We've read from Steve Hatch on this website that Castles do. Any others?
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Permalink Reply by Protheroe O'Shea on
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See if they have a Facebook page and submit the photographs. Also a few bad reviews on trust pilot might help. And then of course you could set up an online petition and share it here.
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Because that's easy......
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Someone in Islington has taken direct action.
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