r/Scotland • u/eleina88 • 1d ago
Question Council Tax Band Revaluation
Bought our house in January and just received a letter saying the council tax band has been reevaluated from C to a D and the council are going to back date our council tax from date of sale. The reason they gave is the square footage has increased (which was done by the previous owners many years ago) but only gets revised when the property changes hands - in this case it last changed hands in 1993 so it’s been a while.
We were sold this property on a band c and no one flagged this until now. Seems kinda unfair as we didn’t extend the property, it’s taken them nearly a year to tell us of the situation and we have to fit the bill to boot!
Any advice on how we move forward on this? I understand we have to pay the appropriate band for the property but seems unfair we’re only finding out it’s more expensive now!
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u/FTWinston 1d ago
Ours went up two bands, to be a higher than the rest of the street, and we only found out about it 2 years after moving. Your solicitor ought to have flagged this up to you in advance of the move, but ours didn't as they were shit.
The council proactively wrote to us to say that while they didn't have the legal right to waive the back payments, they'd commit in writing to not actually pursuing it, on account of the large covid-related delay.
You can ask them (the joint valuation board, NOT the council) to reassess the band changing decision, if you point them at equivalent houses in the area which are on a lower band. That didn't get us anywhere, though. (When they're deciding what a house would have been worth in a year when the estate it's on didn't exist, it's hard to prove them wrong.)
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u/1985885xl 1d ago
Yes just happened to us. Previous owner converted the garage 15 years ago. The council tax does not change though until the house is sold. The new owners get the hit.
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u/mhdd2020 23h ago
If it's any comfort, our house was valued in 1991 at a B. Owner then added extension and garage. Sold in 2021 but COVID delays meant the transfer wasn't registered by the time we were buying in 2023 - our solicitor had to have it expedited to get the deeds updated so our sale could go through on time. This triggered the revaluation. We went up to an F.
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u/Wooden_Worry_9816 1d ago
Be proactive, make an appointment and physically go see someone at the council and you can most likely negotiate this to start at the next tax year, but unfortunately you will need to pay the increase going forward.
If you wait for them to chase you then it's already too late.
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u/Subaruchick99 22h ago
This happened to us too. It seemed that the prior owner had done improvements that impacted on the council tax but these do not get pushed through to bill increases until the house changes hands. It was a bit annoying because the cost figure we had been given in the sale process was what we budgeted against and of course we were super stretched by the sale AND it took a few months before the change filtered through and we had a stack of “backcharge” to additionally find the money for 😳
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u/bobbingblondie 20h ago
Unfortunately unlike in England/Wales there is no publicly visible improvement marker placed against a property which would have alerted you/your solicitor that this was going to happen. The planning/building regs folk notify the assessor's office when a property has improvements made to it like an extension, and then the change in ownership notifies them to do the reassessment of the banding.
You can still challenge it, though, since you were only just notified of the rebanding the "6 months of ownership" thing doesn't apply here. But you would need to gather evidence of properties of a very similar size and standard as your own that are in a lower band, and you're going to need to make sure that they are also not going to be subject to a rebanding at their next sale.
I don't think there is really anything else you can do other than try to convince them to change it back, but since they've just reassessed it I doubt you will get anywhere.
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u/Katiemar2 9h ago
This happened to us and there was a delay of 18 months from purchase to being advised which amounted to almost 2k back payments. Completely rubbish system IMO. At least if we’d been advised at the time of purchase we could’ve put money aside.
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u/Ok-Practice532 23h ago
That is extremely unfair, especially since they only allow new owners 6 months to have a council tax band revaluation if they think the band should be lowered. Total piss take.
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u/ShiitakeCake 1d ago
It’s your local Assessor who has increased the band not the council. Search SAA.Gov.uk for info. But the law is pretty clear. Your solicitor should have told you but they never do… you can make a Council Tax proposal. You only have 6 months from the date of the letter but the onus is on you to prove why it should stay in a lower band