Lord Bracknell
On fire
If an owner of a property in Brunswick Square refused to comply with the repainting obligations, the Council would take legal action that could extend as far as obtaining possession of the property. They can "make it stick" because the law says they can.To have a local council "reposess" a place by redecorating and installing people in need of housing, before charging the owner, is completely different and I would be suprised if even Brighton Council could make that stick in Brunswick Square.....
Even if the property is in the middle of a historic conservation area? Like Ship Street?Whilst a landlord would "create" a slum to then regenerate and then take profit, the best money a council could spend is to ignore the area and focus on regenerating another, leave him or her to their own stupid game...
The reason the two issues are connected is that they both take us into a realm where the community - acting through an elected council - can, IN EXTREME CIRCUMSTANCES, quite reasonably take action against an individual property owner. The fact that such action is very rare doesn't mean that it can't happen or that it is always unreasonable.I'm not sure why we've mixed these two issues in this thread - the cost of repainting periodically is spelt out on purchase - you like it you buy, you don't then you walk away...people wouldn't look at those places if they didn't like the colour, me I don't like the colour but I appreciate the restriciton...
In my view, Councils only step in and take repossession in circumstances where this has genuine community support and the property owner is without scruples.
Incidentally ... I never got the impression that Hoogstraten was creating slums "with a view to regenerating an area".