Homes From Empty Homes

This week sees the introduction of a radical overhaul of the way council tax is charged on empty homes in England. Previously there was a series of discounts and exemptions that meant that the council tax charged on most empty homes was less than for occupied homes. The situation has now reversed meaning that council tax on most empty homes will be the same or even more than on occupied homes.

The purpose of these changes is two-fold, firstly they are intended to give a financial incentive for owners to get empty homes back into use, but they are also intended [...]

Just a fortnight ago Communities minister Andrew Stunnell was welcoming the largest ever drop in the number of empty homes and yet a survey by Halifax bank due tomorrow is reporting a big rise. What do we make of this?

If you will forgive the rather technical answer, there are two sets of empty homes statistics (the one Stunnell is talking about), which is a sum of council tax returns from across the country and HSSA (the one Halifax is talking about) which is a sum of the numbers councils themselves have found to be empty. The former shows a drop [...]