Category: The Buzz

In response to questions from supporters and fellow sufferers we have updated and expanded our slideshow to try to cover all of the aspects of the private estate scam in the UK. Everything we know has been gathered through our network.

One of the reasons for updating the presentation is that we are going to use it as the basis for a talk (via Zoom) to new build residents groups brought together by their prospective councillor. The aim is to inform them of their situation and help them organise appropriately to protect themselves from exploitation as far as is possible at the moment.

If this event is successful, we may be able to run it with other groups.

Entitled FAR FROM PRIVATOPIA: PRIVATE RESIDENTIAL ESTATES IN ENGLAND AND WALES this paper brings together research by Professor Susan Bright, Professor of Land Law, New College, Oxford and was published in January 2022.

The issues HorNet have learned and shared over the past 5 years or so are all mentioned, particularly the lack of transparency and redress and the fact that most buyers have not been aware of what they were getting into.

Very significantly the lack of sustainability and threat to community cohesion of this model are mentioned We are particularly keen to get this across to policy makers and are currently working on this.

You can read the paper on this link:- https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4007198

If you wish you may read and/or download a copy pdf from here.

We strongly recommend that you read this before you lobby your MP or write to the CMA.

It is a wonderful piece of evidence and should be very helpful to our campaign and we are grateful to the author for allowing, and indeed encouraging, us to share its contents widely.

We have been contacted by a Residents’ Group who have successfully taken over management of their estate. They thought their experience would help others, and so do we! We are very grateful for the sharing.

We would like to say again that there is huge variation in how the developers set up each estate, so not all will have the advantages in company structure that this example benefits from. In spite of having the required company structure the builder and their appointed managing agent strongly resisted the residents’ taking over. We have heard similar stories from others.

Also remember that it is developers who drive this model, whilst councils may have reduced landscaping and road mending costs, the community loose out when estates are retained privately because other potential section 106 benefits are lost. The estate in this example is not built up to adoption standards and we believe this also is a prime cost saver for the builders.

That said, if you want to know what worked for one group of residents, read on ….

Continue reading “How To take Over”