Agenda item
Purchase of land at Eaton Road, Margate from Southern Housing in the Housing Revenue Account
Minutes:
Ashley Jackson, Head of Housing and Planning introduced the report and made the following comments:
· The subject of the report is the purchase of the land from Southern Housing at Eaton Place, on Eaton Road in Margate;
· This land was currently owned by Southern Housing and the Council had been in negotiations for the past 18 months to acquire the land in order to keep the homes that were delivered on that site as affordable housing;
· It is important to note that the site currently had 78 units split in 2 blocks; 36 were for social rent and 42 were market rent;
· Southern Housing had been working hard to decant both blocks. However, they only had to offer alternative accommodation to the social housing tenants. They had rehoused these tenants in other Southern Housing units as well as in other Housing Association units. TDC had rehoused 2 households;
· The Council would not exchange contracts with residents in-situ and the contract would ensure that the land was unencumbered. There were currently seven households still there, who Southern were working closely with;
· The Council had negotiated an offer of £600,000 for the land and this represented excellent value (at £10,000 per plot) for potentially 60 properties it would likely seek to build on the footprint. This was a very important deal;
· Southern could have chosen to sell on the open market which meant that there the Council could have lost the opportunity to add to the affordable homes numbers;
· This was a good example of partnership working between the Council and Housing Associations in the local area;
· The report also proposed that the Council contributed towards 50% of the demolition costs, up to a maximum of £300,000. This would ensure joint management of the demolition process;
· The proposed purchase did not come without risk. For example, the site did not have planning permission for replacement units. However as the site was already residential units, it was not envisaged to be an issue. It was also subject to grant funding from Homes England but this was expected to be within the 26-29 bidding round. Officers were not anticipating any problems;
· This paper also proposed to appoint a design team to progress redevelopment designs to RIBA Stage 3/4.
Members asked questions and made comments as follows:
· One member said that initially it was reported that it was the land that was the problem on this site;
· They further asked who had signed off the buildings as meeting the acceptable standards;
· Another member asked why the Council wanted 60 properties out of the 78 properties available;
· One member said that this was a real success story as all these properties could have gone to the private sector;
· Another member asked how long the project would take to complete.
Ashley Jackson responded as follows:
· The problem was never about the land, but the properties that had been built;
· The buildings were not signed off by the Council’s Building Control team;
· TDC elected to purchase 60 properties after considering what it wanted to put up on this site;
· The project would be completed in 18 months from March 2025, after the properties become empty.
Members noted the report.
Supporting documents:
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OSP October 24 - Purchase of land at Eaton Road, Margate - Google Docs, item 46.
PDF 245 KB
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EQI Purchase of land at Eaton Road, Margate - Google Docs, item 46.
PDF 197 KB