The activist group Acorn is lobbying a local council to deny people the right to buy a second home or let it out unless they have lived in the area for at least three years.
Acorn - which in the past has staged protests outside and inside letting agents’ offices in protest at rent levels and repairs in the rental sector - is making the move in Cornwall.
On social media it says: “Over the last few decades renting and home ownership has become increasingly unsustainable in Cornwall. High demand for second homes and holiday lets have priced locals out of their communities and decimated towns and villages.
“Acorn Falmouth and Penryn demands that Falmouth Town Council introduce a special order of planning permission to restrict and regulate the ownership and construction of second homes and holiday lets. Please sign our petition today so we can make sure Cornwall Council start putting Homes Before Holidays.”
Although Falmouth council has no power to do so, Acorn demands that it creates an added planning permission class order for second homes and holiday lets.
It wants the council to be the body that grants consent for new builds and existing residences which are requested to be used as second homes or holiday lets, with what Acorn calls “an added clause that requires evidence of a minimum of three years residence in Cornwall in order to build or convert a property into a second home or holiday let.”
One Acorn member addressed a town council meeting in Falmouth earlier this week saying: "As everyone here is aware, there is a dire housing crisis in Cornwall. Property prices have skyrocketed for renting and purchasing while wages have remained the same.
“With 661 per cent more short-term holiday listings as there were five years ago, the market has become all but completely inaccessible for most people.
"As a local to Falmouth, born-and-bred, I have seen our community change a lot throughout my life. I have seen it thrive, becoming an internationally renowned hub for culture, arts, and music. This has brought a lot of investment and interest into my hometown but it has also, because of the tourism these sectors bring, brought a lot of pressure on the housing market.
"I have seen my school friends, some with children, be made homeless or forced to leave their home and move up-country to find a stable living. This is unacceptable and change needs to happen. We must be welcoming to positive change, but it cannot be at the expense of the community of hard-working, normal people who already live here.”
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Isn't the whole point of a Holiday home that it is somewhere you don't usually live? The giveaway is in the name!
Yes you are right, but I don't think the main problem is people with second homes who also rent them out to visitors for part of the year. The main problem is former family home type rentals which are now either student HMO's in Falmouth or holiday lets / air BNB because the tax regime is more generous. All that needs to happen is for the Govt to make longer term lettings more financially attractive and some holiday lets would revert to family homes.
Activists want this, want that, want everything that doesn't belong to them and over which they have no rights to demand anything.
The way to get what you WANT is to WORK long and hard, SAVE even harder and BUY it.
Owners decide what is done in their own property, not "activists" which is a total misnomer for a mob of mainly inactive "entitled" scroungers.
Totally agree with you!
The area, outside London, with the most second homes is north Norfolk
The problem in Falmouth is that the powers that be decided to locate a university campus there without thinking about the massive impact on the local property market. Prices have sky rocketed and many former family homes are now student HMOs. Falmouth/Penryn was already a popular tourist area and so perhaps not really a very good place to locate a university as it's not a large town. Not really the fault of landlords and to be fair, students have to live somewhere!! If there were less students then some of the properties would probably revert to family homes. I'd agree holiday lets make the situation worse, but all the Government has to do is adjust the taxation regimes in favour of family homes and there would be a shift back in that direction.
sad, The System is already favouring Families by a mile.
For years no license required to let to a families or saddled with same requirements that’s a massive and unfair advantage.
It’s going to cost many LL’s roughly £5 / £6k to Apply & Comply with the Regulation’s, try it and see what they charge those days, this is equivalent to a tax. The other point you are making is already covered by Article 4, can be used at the Councils discretion.
Do you mean HMO's or holiday lets? I already had HMO's thanks.
This article is too close to April 1st for my liking.
It seems LL’s have the 1st of April every day.
sad my friend nothing personal. HMO’s not a problem but if they are licensable HMO’s its a massive problem and cost. Application fee alone in west London for a normal Terrace House 3 up & 2 down is £1300. Plus £50 per room if you ever heard anything so ridiculous = £250. + your £1300. = £1550 fee, (up £850 since introduction). That’s for max 5 persons but if you have more you’ll need more facilities like 2 kitchen Sinks and 2 Cookers + hobs often in same kitchen or Range Cooker but if your kitchen is not very large forget all that not allowed, for 2 persons to share a room has to be more than 10.2m2 with separate cooking facilities else where, no need to go into all the other stuff you’ll have all that already like fire doors, DIER, hardwired inter linked fire alarms, heat detector, md, EPC has to be served etc. very little of this required for last 16 years to let for a family, if in any way have a vaguely connection line. They are well favoured I know some won’t like me saying that but that’s the way it is but a lot left unsaid here. So if you have had Mandatory or Additional HMO’s since 2006 congratulations you now have redone & repaid 4 times over. thank you.
I think you have misunderstood what I was saying. The tax system currently favours holiday lets over family rentals in Devon and Cornwall. They even got a payout in the pandemic due to paying business rates not council tax. I was simply stating that there are a lot of student houses in Falmouth, I don't know the details of each one, but I would assume they are mainly more financially viable for the landlord than a family let, or they wouldn't be doing it. The student demand has also pushed up house prices in the area in recent years. I agree the costs of running HMOs are much higher and the hassle factor, which is why I got rid of mine.
Over 600% increase in holiday let's in the last 5 years. Obviously the balance needs to be addressed. Never mind people saying " go and earn money and buy it" the wages don't allow it. How would you like your home town to be decimated like this? I'm all for making a profit while providing quality accommodation but too much of one type becomes damaging to the social structure.
Martin there's the easy to go through life, 9 to 5 , 5 days a week and 4 weeks holiday a year, or their's getting out there, putting the hours in , working hard and making things happen and it really doesn't matter how well or badly educated you are, in fact it is often the one with the poor schooling that rally succeed.
Martin
I was born and brought up in a small mining village and had to move away, initially to London and then to Glasgow to earn my living.
Sometimes what we want is not available locally but I guess it's a question of priorities.
Martin, agree that’s shocking and shouldn’t have happened.
Of Course we all know why, its the Regulation’s, anti- Private Landlords clammer, injustice & persecution of Regular Landlords Lettings that has caused the switch. Congratulations to Shelter, Generation Rent etc, you should hang your heads in shame for loosing all this regular renting accommodation for locals and people who want to work and Live in the area. Certainly as said it does damage the Social Structure.
Acorn "demands"! The views of these activists are shallow and bias. They never take in the full picture. What about the wealth that these property owners and holiday makers bring to these communities? Former economies contributed by local fishing, farming and tin mining industries are no longer backbone contributors. Instead jobs and income are sourced by visitors to the area and they need accommodation!
There is not much hard work those days even if they think it’s hard, I remember when there was no PPE or CSCS etc and pay very small £17, for 6 day week. not like now many new rights
work conditions more harness than a horse and often £1’000.
pw for 5 days. I have no doubt they have a better chance of buying now than decades ago if they had the mind set to save but they haven’t, want it all now all the electric gadgets, 58”TV’s, Computers, latest iPhones, Sky etc and holiday all over the World. We didn’t have any of that, maybe get up on the back of a tipper lorry try and shelter in a portable flimsy open end Canvas Canopy if there was room for you to get in and be landed 30 / 40 miles away to god knows where, told to leave your jacket in the Canopy you won’t be needing that and handed a shovel, spare a thought.
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