MAKING AN APPLICATION OF COURSE

The way to determine the value of land is to locate a suitable plot and frame a suitable application for planning permission. You do not need to be the owner of the land.

Ask the council if they will consider waiving application fees upfront, deferring them until the houses are built and sold or rented. 

On the assumption that you are a self-build or other social housing group or are just building one affordable unit for yourself - and do not own the land that you are interested in developing, you will need to serve a Notice on the owner of the Land.

If you cannot find out who the owner of the land is, you will need to place an advertisement in a local newspaper.

ENERGY HARVESTING - The application should be for genuinely affordable homes with sustainable energy harvesting features such as photovoltaic or solar water heaters and a wind turbine, or ground heat pump. But passive heating from a large glass area is also a major consideration in striving for a zero carbon dwelling.

THE PRICE - The houses should be no more expensive than 3-4 times the average wage in your area. That way the proposal will be held to be genuinely affordable. Price ranges will therefore be from £70,000 pounds to £100,000 pound but no more.

THE APPLICANT - The applicant should be a Community Company or other Social Housing entity, or if you are applying for one house, make sure that the application is in the name of a Limited Liability Company. It might be an idea to consider making an Outline application to establish the principle and then negotiate the details later.

8 WEEK LIMIT - If the local authority fail to determine the application within the allotted eight week period - and that is likely - even where a council may be of assistance in helping with fees. This is because they might prefer that the Secretary of State determines the application, rather than the council upsetting any local landowner and where there may be a conflict of interests if members of the council know the landowner, or maybe the landowner has relations on Parish or District council committees. if that is the case expect to see declarations in the Register. If you know that there are such conflicts and no declarations have been registered, that is a whole different ball game and the impropriety should be brought to the attention of the scrutiny committee or the Standards Board of England.

APPEAL - Assuming that any conflict has been dealt with and the council fail to determine in the statutory eight week period, appeal the proposal to the Planning Inspectorate (Secretary of State).

WHAT NEXT ?

Dealing with the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) 

BACK ... NEXT ...

Map of the Wealden District

LINKS

https://www.fwi.co.uk/business/UK-farmland-will-be-cheaper-in-2020-than-now-says-savills.htm

http://www.rics.org/uk/knowledge/glossary/agricultural-land-prices/

https://www.farminguk.com/news/UK-farmland-values-fall-by-an-average-of-10-in-12-months_47618.html

http://www.uklandandfarms.co.uk/agricultural-land-prices-news/land-accounts-for-over-half-of-UK-net-worth/

FARMING - The backbone of any society is the production of food to feed the population, though these days much of what we eat is imported from other producers, such as fish farmed in Asia. We can no longer find enough fish locally having exhausted our fisheries. Agriculture is also changing where we have drained the soil for so long with artificial fertilizers that yields will fall, meaning a shift to obtaining protein from the sea - but unfortunately we are disposing of around 8 millions tons of plastic in our seas - poisoning marine life that we need to keep us nourished. Food security is therefore high on the United Nations agenda via the Food and Agriculture Organization.