New charge on new homes
It is not that it will be a small sum levied on each building. In Brede, listed as part of the Battle area for this exercise, the proposed rate will be £240 per square metre. The average semi-detached family house is about 150 sq m thus imposing an additional cost to the purchaser of £36,000 included in the purchase price, with Stamp Duty paid on the whole amount therefore a £200,000 house would cost £238,360 of which over £38,000 is tax.
Not all of the RDC area would be charged at the same rate, in Bexhill it would be as little as £100 per sq m, still a hefty additional charge but considerably less than elsewhere, Rye area is £160 per sq m.
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Hide AdRDC estimates that it will have a shortfall of expenditure over income of £133 million. I am not surprised. RDC has included the cost of several road improvements in, you’ve guessed it, Bexhill, and grandiose schemes such as £15 million for a Bexhill Leisure Centre, not forgetting the £500,000 plus inflation donated each year to that white elephant, the De La Warr Pavilion.
In an area of the country where there is an acknowledged housing shortage and an unemployment problem it does seem unreasonable to increase the cost of new housing by such enormous amounts. It makes the aspirations of young people with families who wish to own their own homes much more difficult to achieve, consequently placing additional problems on the provision of social housing, which RDC seems unable to address.
Rod Came
Brede Rye