chris p bacon

3 minutes ago, melmoth said:

AI is an acronym for two different things

In these parts one is artificial insemination...

5 hours ago, locoholic said:

Surely the solution to this sorry situation is for the Scottish Government to nationalise the WCRC West Highland operation?

Lorna Slater would be the ideal minister to take charge of it.... That's if you never want to see it again.. 

3 hours ago, JCL said:

if anyone has any advice, then I’d be happy to receive it!

Give up bricklaying....😀

How much ballast is HS2 going to consume ? could it be that future supplies of ballast from UK quarries have already been pre-purchased for HS2.

8 hours ago, wombatofludham said:

The principle of Compulsory Purchase at applicable market value is long established in public policy and law and when people moan about CPO values it is generally because they have an over inflated sense of value of the land rather than the system being wrong.

And yet our own family home had a CPO on the front garden for some road 'improvements' (a link road to a flyover the A1) It was a large detached Victorian house with a 25' deep front garden. The road proposal moved the road from 34' from the front door to 6' and the loss of a driveway entrance, the land was valued at £350. The CPO/authority also valued the house and noted that the road would devalue the property by £8000 but no recompense was offered.

That's not an over inflated sense  of value, but pointing out that CPO's are not flawless and should only be used in extreme circumstances.

Quote

However, I cannot agree that the land owner should be compensated at an enhanced level because the land has been allocated for housing, it is an unearned windfall generated because the State has decided that the land in question would be better used for housing - therefore any increased value should accrue to the state to be recycled into further land acquisition.

Are you the only one left reading The Morning Star.....🙄

1 hour ago, uax6 said:

Andy G

*daily driver, I have two options to get to the box, a 67 4 dr saloon, or a 67 GPO engineers van....

All that walking makes you very fit.....🤣

5 hours ago, wombatofludham said:

  The alternative is to have a National Housing Procurement organisation, who decides where housing will go, buys the land at agricultural cost, meaning the increased value of the land accrues to the public purse whilst the farmer gets the agricultural value for his land, ....................  It won't happen though, it smacks of Soviet style central planning, 

 

You make some interesting points but I've highlighted the above as it has to be the most unfair system you could think of.  

The state takes land from a farmer and gives the lowest possible value. He can't farm the land anymore and the state has cut the income from his farm which could make it unviable. 

I was friendly with a farmer/landowner that ran a very large farm in Bedfordshire, when we discussed the values of land he had a different value to that of the agricultural rate as the farm was in trust (so one generation couldn't sell it and gamble it away). The land value was measured in what it could produce in crops over decades, so he had areas of the farm which were worth more than others depending on the soil conditions.  

I went to an auction with him once where he purchased some acreage of land at £50,000 an acre, I thought him a bit bonkers but he'd tested the soil and knew the area well as it bordered the farm and was prepared to pay more for it.  

The average 'Agricultural land rate' at the time was around £10,000 an acre, but he had outbid 2 local developers for the land and was happy with the price paid. 

1 minute ago, Nearholmer said:

In the other direction Mid-Beds,

You must mean 'The peoples republic of Central Bedfordshire' (Mid Beds went some years ago)  They were one of the first to adopt CIL - Community infrastructure levy but didn't think the formula through. Now they are awash with money for play areas but nothing for cemeteries, if they haven't spent the money in 10 years they have to give it back to the developer. I sat next to a Leighton Buzzard councillor at a 'do' who had a brilliant idea to fiddle the spending of monies so they could use CIL for other purposes. I pointed out that would be illegal but she didn't see a problem as in her words "Developers are awash with money and the public don't care" ..needless to say I reported her comments and action was taken (it turned out the plan to spend the monies was already in place!)

Politics aside, Central Beds has gone from a majority Tory council to 28 independents at the last election. If there was inaction before it will only be worse with so many different ideas being voiced.

2 hours ago, spikey said:

So in order to make a, decent return on their investment, the big boys have to cram in as many small 3/4/5-bed houses with small gardens as the planning authority will allow

That's where most people get the formula wrong and presume that the developer gets to choose what they build. The reality is that the density of housing is legislated as part of planning. Yes, the developer might try and change to suit but essentially planning get the last word.

As an example, in Sandy (Bedfordshire) there are 2 estates to the North, Fallowfield & Ivel Park.  Fallowfield (Yellow) was built in the late 80's and is a open estate of 600 houses with semi detached and detached with a large open grassed leisure area in the centre. Ivel Park (Red) was from only 7 years later (90's) and is much more densely populated with terraced and a high proportion of 3 storey housing. 

Both of these developments densities and associated leisure space was as a result of planning, also note the school in the Fallowfield development which was built at developer cost

Also when you see large estates of housing, bear in mind that at least 30% are built as 'affordable' this might mean they're part rent part ownership , or they are handed over to a housing association at cost price+ (a difficult formula as it has to include a % of the cost of building as well as roadways, drainage and any other section 106 payments made)  The reason I never built more than 3 at a time was due to this policy, I just couldn't afford it.

On 12/07/2023 at 12:35, The Johnster said:

Good to see the return of the tradition of painting eyes on ships so that they can see where they are going… not sure about the lipstick, though!

Standing on the Quay in Antigua a few years ago there was an Aida Cruises ship with the lips painted on the bow. As I stood and took a picture  an American couple couple stood next to me and the lady said "oh look it's blowing me a kiss" I said "it might be, but I wouldn't walk to the stern in case they've painted both ends".....the husband burst out laughing and she stood there with no idea ..🤣

8 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

The land in this case may well have been free

Only in someones dreams..🙄

As a developer (small time) I can say that all anyone is interested in is how much money you make. I have said to people they could do the same as me, but they would have to risk up to £500,000 at a time with no guarantee you can sell when it's built, and that planning isn't too onerous with what they expect you to pay for in the locality.

As an example of where we moved from 2 years ago, the last site was a 2 bed house, the plot cost 75,000, this was incredibly cheap but it came with problems. The build cost was just over £100,000 and it sold for £250,000. This might sound a lot of money but there is also Community Infrastructure Levy to pay to the local authority, this was calculated at £7,500 (+ the local authority legal fees) and has to be paid before planning permission is issued.  This still leaves a large sum of money, but bear in mind that in the time it took to build the equivalent plot cost went to £120,000 with no increase in the final sale price.

I decided to move a couple of years ago as prices for simple plots for 1-2 houses  had reached £350,000+ which is plain bonkers.

As for the big developers, if people think they make too much money, buy shares in them. They're generally public companies and make money for shareholders.

30 minutes ago, Human8984 said:

Is it worth going for a couple of those wagon kits as there are a couple on that im intrested in.

If you've never built a Falcon kit (or one of the ranges that ended up as Falcon) I'd say 'No' ....unless you want a lifetime on prozac (other drugs are available)

9 hours ago, Roy Langridge said:

Little solace I know, but at least you can be assured that several of his potential customers on here will not touch him with the proverbial barge pole. 
 

Roy

Although he's a 'poor pensioner' he also has several identities for selling, I often wonder if the point of the multiple identities is to bid an item up...

Anyway hopefully we'll get back to Mikes builds now 👍

30 minutes ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

that bottom batten should be an integral part of the board/hinge/flap assembly, not an afterthought IMHO,  as sure as eggs is eggs it will start to head south, de-laminating the bit of un-battened plywood.

I agree with Mike, the hinge side needs to be a bit more 'robust' to avoid future problems.

Just now, steve1 said:

Philomena who?

 

steve

Cunk. 

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

My local could have easily furnished CMOT Dibbler, Detritus, The Librarian, Nanny Ogg, Cohen the Barbarian, Susan, and, serving behind the bar, DEATH.  I identify as Rincewind, failed useless wizard and abject coward…

Who rode in, not on a horse, but driving a small yellow locomotive........ Oh, if only..

33 minutes ago, Steamport Southport said:

So maybe ones of those characters is based on me!

 you don't have a supply of sausages made from lips and tails by chance...CMOTD

36 minutes ago, polybear said:

doing house refurb jobs that've needed doing for years; when I was doing the kitchen refit (a seriously big project) I remember thinking "I'm glad I'm doing this now and not in ten year's time....).

I saw the photo's....I think you can buy polyfila by the ton. 🤣

3 hours ago, bécasse said:

A gentleman by the name of W.Fawcett 

Bill lives in the adjacent village (although I haven’t seen him for a few weeks) next time I see him I will enquire. 

29 minutes ago, AndrueC said:

I agree. I don't think have to understand the technical details when you're young. All you have to understand is that if you want a decent retirement you need to be putting money toward it out of every pay packet and the more money you can put in and the earlier it goes in the better.

Unless you worked for a company owned by Robert Maxwell and found your pension was stolen.

Or Gordon Browns 1997 Pension raid.

Or you had Equitable life...

24 minutes ago, Cokebreeze said:

I wonder if he meant to upload the 3rd picture

to his auction?

He's obviously selling a sleeper.

5 hours ago, Porcy Mane said:

Mr Tiff should be a bit more choosy of his residents.

You should see his neighbours 😀

3 hours ago, Mike_Walker said:

If you thought the transport minister's comment on the C4 programme last night about the DfT not "being the Department for Trains" was bad you should have heard what I was told about a comment from the most senior civil servant at the DfT recently by a senior manager today.

Go on...tell us...😉

1 hour ago, ColinK said:

I’ve enough now to fill the time when banjos are retuning.

The best noise a banjo makes, is when you hear it bouncing off an accordion after being thrown in a skip 😀

How do you know if there's a drummer at the door ? ...The knocking gets faster..

What do you call a drummer that's left his girlfriend ?....Homeless.