Update from Parwich Parish Council Clerk.
A Housing Needs Survey for Parwich is currently underway.
It is about halfway through and will run until the 22nd of March.
Several questions have been raised by residents which I will try to answer for you.
Q. Will this result in new homes being built in the village?
A. Not necessarily. If there is a demonstrated local need then a housing association could apply for planning permission to build. If they did they would be subject to all the normal planning application processes. Without a demonstrated local need though a planning application would not succeed.
Q. How many homes might be built?
A. Developments are typically sized to address a third of the demonstrated local need.
Q. Will these homes be for those who identified their need in the survey?
A. This is actually quite unlikely. Because of the time needed to develop new homes many people’s current needs may have been met some other way by the time they are built. Or unfortunately they may have found that they had to move elsewhere. The assumption is that if there is a need now, then there will still be a need when any homes are built. But it may not be the same people.
Q. Might these homes just end up becoming holiday lets?
A. Current legislation places restrictions on ownership and rental to prevent this. This restiction passess with the propoerty even if it is sold on. This was not the case in the past where ‘Right to Buy” legislation allowed some properties to end up in the rented holiday or second home sector.
Q. Would these just be starter homes for young people?
A. No. They could be available to anyone will a suitable connection to the village who could not find housing here which was affordable. For example a relative who wanted to move to the village either to care for, or be cared for by, someone living here.
If you have any further questions please contact
clerk@parwichparishcouncil.org.uk
Please encourage anyone who might have, or has had, a housing need which they could not meet in the Parish to complete the survey.
PARWICH.ORG 
Leave a Reply