Party Wall - Southwark Council

[littlep]

Hi,

We are looking to do some amendments to our property that involve a party wall agreement and one adjacent property is owned by Southwark Council.

We are trying to speak to the right person at the council but struggling to find them. If someone has gone through this process, can you advise who the best department/person would be to speak to.

Just to note that planning permission is not required.

Thanks,

Robert

[Gloves1980]

Hi,

We are also doing something similar! If you do find out, please can you PM me.......

Best,

James.

[James Barber]

The council have a team for this. They have a 6 month backlog and no plans to clear it. So do apply well in advance.

Weird as any delays postpiones extra business for builders which boosts the local economy.

[littlep]

James,

Thank you for your response. Do you have the name for this department? Any contact details would be appreciated.

Under the PW Act the works can commence 1 month after the notice is expired (14 days after issue) so I am less concerned by their 6 month process time. It might be 6 months for planning applications which is different to a PW agreement.

Kind regards.

[littlep]

-- moved topic --

[adamc79]

Hi.

I went through this exact process with my neighbour's house, and found that I needed to go through a property management company called Amicus Horizon. They're a huge housing organisation that manage Southwark's property. Whether they manage ALL Southwark's houses I couldn't tell you, but certainly worth getting in touch with them to see if your neighbour's house is one of theirs too.

Failing that, go through Land Registry to get the official title deeds, which will tell you who owns it. This was how I came across Amicus Horizon, after wasting weeks trying to get the council to respond. Turns out I didn't need to go through Southwark at all, even though it was a council property. (Another important reason to get the official title deeds - for both adjacent houses, assuming you're getting party wall agreements from both sides - is that you have to make sure the agreement has the exact correct name on otherwise some tricksy lawyer will tell you it's invalid if you do ever have a dispute.)

It's such a fiddly, boring, time-consuming and expensive piece of bullsh*t legalese, so I don't envy you going through this, but stick at it and you'll get it sorted!

Adam

[adamc79]

To clarify, Amicus Horizon actually own the property (outsourced by the council), and have their own legal team who look after Party Wall Awards.

Good luck!

[littlep]

Thanks Adam.

Just checked the deeds and it is indeed Southwark who own it. Worth doing because we could have wasted weeks down the council route so thanks for the headsup.

Robert

[DadOf4]

We had to do this a couple of years ago.

On the left hand side, we went round spoke to our neighbours, made some amendments and got it signed in 7 days

On the right hand side - it took us 9 months to get it agreed (Southwark council)

sorry- cant remember the dept or names,etc

[goosey-goosey]

We experienced exactly the same frustrations as DadOf4. Southwark contract out all party-wall work to a large, commercial surveyors. Or at least they used to. Be prepared for some hefty professional fees from them.

[redpost]

talk to your party wall surveyor

perhaps serve them a notice, 6 months delay or not, if they don't respond then they agree by default... job done

[AyngeG1]

Hi There,

we are currently going through the party wall process and with Southwark council and served the notices to them ourselves. Southwark have appointed an independent surveyor which is pretty standard and we are using them too.

Once you have served the notice they have two weeks to come back to say whether they agree or not, its after that when it can take time. But the experience we have had so far has been good and the independent surveyor sounds competent and efficient. We of course pay his fees but we are building the wall so thats only fair in my opinion.

there is a government guideline book that is very useful.

At Southwark contact details are:

FAO Patrick Skyers

Southwark Property

PO Box 64529

London

SE1 5LX

hope this helps! good luck!

[littlep]

So an update on this for those going through the process as we have just done.

The contact details AyngeG1 is the same one I ended up getting. We served the notice to him (saved us a little money) and he passed it on to his contact (Sau Phong Nhin). To be fair they were pretty prompt at responding etc. If you want his email address then I can pm' you this.

Their default position is to dissent to the works so be aware, which basically means they want their own surveyor to do a schedule of condition (basically photos of the property) and draw up the award. Sometimes they may agree to use an agreed surveyor or may ask them to be independent. The latter option will cost you a lot more money to already an expensive process.

Southwark appoint their own surveyor (William Martin Property and Construction Consultants) and thankfully Southwark agreed for us to him too.

They work on a time basis and the estimate for the work was about 13 hours and typically charge ?195+vat for the senior surveyor and ?125+vat for the junior. The total cost is unknown but I estimated it to be about ?2000 for just dealing with Southwark.

One thing to note/watch out for, is that if the council tennants have lived their longer than 1 year then you need to get their consent. By rights they could also ask for an independent surveyor (more cost) so you need to make sure you speak to them get consent. We had great council neighbours and both consented and thankfully it didn't add any cost - just more paperwork.

Our non-council neighbours have been great and consented to the works, but we took the decision to get a schedule of condition (i.e. photos) for their property to cover us both in case anything goes wrong. I would seriously recommend this as it protects you both from issues down the line - consider it an insurance policy. It costs about ?450+vat for this and I think it is worth it.

In total, I would say this process has taken just over a month from the point of the notice being served to an award being drawn up. Not long really and to be fair it has been pretty straightforward.

Hope that helps anyone in the future and if you need any help then don't hesitate to PM us.

[goosey-goosey]

Nice summary, littlep. The bit about having Southwark's own party wall surveyor handle your side too is key - no possibility of misunderstandings, mis-communications, and disagreements between surveyors, so overall a smoother ride and probably slightly lower costs too.

An earlier post recommends a Southwark-supplied document that guides you through the party wall legal process (and the associated 6-metre process, I think it's called). A word of caution for anyone considering that. If it's the same doc we used, created by John Prescott when he headed the Office of the Prime Minister about 10 years ago, beware that some of the details in it are incorrect. We relied on that doc for a legal matter in the small claims court. The case turned on one of those details, and we lost because the doc was wrong - well, insufficiently precise compared with the Party Wall Act 1996 might be kinder... A small point, but one that's always riled so I thought I'd mention in case it helps.