New Instruction on Victoria Gate, Leeds

Nick Bevan Consulting Ltd are pleased to confirm that they have been instructed as Access Consultants for the new Hammerson plc development at Victoria Gate, Leeds, a key retail development in the City centre. This Instruction coincides with the positive news from commercialnewsmedia.com that the Leeds Office Agents’ Forum has advised that the Leeds office market, for the first three months of 2013, shows a healthy improvement in activity compared with the same period last year. Total take-up of offices transacted in Leeds city centre reached 235,001 sq ft across 35 deals which is a 51% increase compared with the same period last year (155,847 sq ft).

 

Nick Bevan said “the instruction to provide Access Consultancy services to this significant development, that includes retail arcades, a multi storey car park and a new department store, is very gratifying.  We have worked with Hammerson for several years on a number of shopping centres and this new instruction shows faith in our services which we really appreciate”.

 

Stamp duty avoidance

The Sunday Times reports that HMRC is investigating cases of homeowners suspected of using stamp duty mitigation schemes which take advantage of loopholes to reduce the amount of tax due. Earlier this month a City banker, Edward Allchin, lost a case with HMRC over a scheme that used sub-sale relief to cut stamp duty on the purchase of a £2.5m town house. A tribunal ruled that banker's technical tax arrangement did not qualify for the relief making him liable for nearly £90,000. A further 190 homeowners have been investigated for using similar schemes and will now have to pay a total of £7m. HMRC can review purchases made up to six years ago and is sending "discovery letters" to households it suspects may have underpaid. Accountants have warned that some homeowners, who believe they have paid the correct tax, get caught out as in some reported cases, solicitors have entered a lower value for the house in the stamp duty return, resulting in a reduced payment. Richard Turner, corporate tax manager from Menzies, the accountant, said: "While the majority of property transactions are relatively simple, the more complex the case, the higher the risk of error being made."

The Sunday Times, Money, Page: 6

Empty offices ripe for conversion

According to research of 32 regional markets by Lambert Smith Hampton, Birmingham has the most buildings in the right location with suitable layouts and residential demand to be turned into homes. Ian Leather, regional director of office agency at LSH, said: "In the last 20 years, the amount of allocated space per person in an average UK office has halved. Put simply, obsolete office space is a drag on our market and offering investors and developers little or no value. However, the return from converting to residential accommodation is far greater and is an obvious step for any investor or developer."

The Birmingham Post, Page: 30

Peers back revised home extension plan

Peers back revised home extension plan

The House of Lords has backed government plans to allow people to build bigger home extensions, after ministers made concessions. The government amended its proposals to ease planning rules in England by giving neighbours the right to be consulted on building work. Lord True, who had opposed the original plan, called it a "significant change". Despite backing the new approach, peers raised concerns about the plan's details and urged further consultation.

BBC News    The Daily Mail, Page: 17

FLS to be expanded

FLS to be expanded

George Osborne will announce an expansion of the £80bn funding for lending scheme (FLS) ahead of a visit to Britain by the IMF next month, as he seeks to head off calls for a softening of government austerity plans. High-street banks are to be given added incentives to extend credit to SME's. The FT reports that the scheme is yet to prove itself but that it is seen by policy makers as more important than ever to economic recovery efforts, but the expected announcement of an extension to the scheme will increase scrutiny of how well it is working. Net lending contracted by £2.4bn in the fourth quarter of 2012 according to BoE figures published last month, the first period where any meaningful improvement owing to FLS would have been seen. The next set of quarterly lending data, to be unveiled on June 3, will be vital in determining the scheme's success or failure.

The Guardian, Page: 21   Financial Times, Page: 2

The Jackson Reforms

The Jackson reforms came into force on 1 April 2013. Though aimed primarily at personal injury litigation, the reforms will affect commercial litigation.

The technique of concurrent expert evidence (known as “hot-tubbing”) has also been introduced as an optional procedure to be adopted at the direction of the judge, i.e. whether or not the parties agree. The technique involves hearing evidence concurrently from the experts in a particular discipline, rather than having each expert give evidence and be cross-examined separately.

Clarity demanded over extensions

Clarity demanded over extensions

Campaigners have demanded clarity from the Communities Secretary Eric Pickles after his department refused to give details of how far he was prepared to backtrack over planning reforms for extensions. Critics have argued that the plans will blight communities and could set neighbour against neighbour. They said yesterday that any change should allow neighbours to object if they believed a planned extension was too big. The Liberal Democrat MP Paul Burstow, who voted against the plans, said: "The cardinal principle is the right for neighbours to have their views taken into account. Without that, there could be poisonous consequences. The Government won't get this through the Lords unless he reinstates that principle." A DCLG spokesman said no details of the compromise will be announced before next week. Meanwhile, an editorial in the FT says that the UK has to address public hostility to development. It says that the housing shortage and resulting high prices are making home ownership seem a pipe dream for an entire generation and that the Government cannot just be on the side of those who own property.

Financial Times, Page: 12    Daily Mail, Page: 27

For more information contact Nick Bevan Consulting Limited

Chartered Building Surveyors delivering property and construction advice with innovation and experience

Chartered Surveyors | Landlord And Tenant | Development Consultancy

Commercial Property Agents | Disability Access Consultants

www.nickbevan.co.uk

Property asking prices up in April

Property asking prices up in April

Rightmove's latest property survey reports that average asking prices of homes advertised on the site rose for the fourth month in a row in April, up 2.1% so far to £244,706. The number of properties on the market in April was 28,179, down 4% on the same month last year. Rightmove also reported that the gap between the sums that sellers were asking and buyers were willing to pay had narrowed and that properties were now spending an average of 73 days on the market, about 10 days less than in April last year. Comparing its asking price figures with the price houses are selling for, recorded by the Land Registry, Rightmove said the gap had narrowed from 3.39% in December to 2.95%.

For more information contact Nick Bevan Consulting Limited

Chartered Building Surveyors delivering property and construction advice with innovation and experience

Chartered Surveyors | Landlord And Tenant | Development Consultancy

Commercial Property Agents | Disability Access Consultants

www.nickbevan.co.uk

Construction Market Contracts in March

Construction contracted in March

The Markit/CIPS Construction PMI has shown that construction output contracted in March for the third month in a row. The index inched up to 47.2 from 46.8 in February, holding below the 50 level that separates expansion from contraction and slightly undershooting forecasts for 47.5. Markit said that unusually cold weather combined with sluggish underlying demand kept a lid on construction work in March. "The negative print for construction output mirrors that seen for manufacturing, and now leaves the service sector as the last great hope for avoiding another slide in UK GDP," said Tim Moore, senior economist at Markit.

Source The Guardian, Page: 30    The Independent, Page: 54