Good episode. Particularly enjoyed the holiday home discussion, as it mentioned Gwynedd. In recent years, almost half of all houses bought in the county have been as second homes, so you can imagine it's quite a big issue. I'm not sure how many of those already were second homes and how many were primary residences being turned into second homes, but either way, it's just not sustainable. I think the available stock of houses for people to actually live in had been decreasing year on year.
So while the council has increased council tax on second homes, like you mention, they've also recently introduced another policy, using powers recently given to Welsh local authorities by the Senedd: changing a house from a primary residence to a second home or short-term holiday let now requires planning permission (but not vice versa). And, let's face it, I think the idea is that this will never be granted.
I think this is very good policy, and perfectly in keeping with the Abundance agenda (as long as it's not used as an excuse not to build new homes; we still need some of those as well, please). But second home owners aren't happy, even though the policy doesn't affect any properties that were already used in this way before September 2024. I lurk in a Facebook group that campaigns against it and it really is a marvel to see how lacking in self-awareness a lot of them are. Often rather unsympathetic characters, honestly.
Anyway, I guess they're not supposed to be happy about it. You sometimes see them pointing at falling house prices and second home owners trying to sell up as evidence that the policies are failing, still, even now, oblivious to the fact that this is actually the exact desired effect.
That's a super clever idea on the council's part but... very depressing the policy is predicated on the assumption the planning system is so broken nothing will ever get approved!
Air conditioning doesn't magically vanish heat, it pumps it out of your flat - with some extra - into the environment, so that your neighbours have to also fight against it. This causes a positive feedback loop, and there is evidence that this is responsible for significant heating in cities. It's obviously less antisocial if there's a better heat barrier between the inside and outside, as we hope will be in newer builds, so that actually not much cooling is necessary, but when I see aircon in London it's almost always hopelessly fighting against terrible design and hugely inefficient. Also people don't know how it works and choose to keep windows open while running the aircon. This isn't about middle-class guilt, it's about physics.
There is no contradiction in duel-aspect windows being useful for both heating and cooling. You cover and close them when the weather's too hot, to prevent solar gain and incoming hot air, and open them once the air outside is cooler than inside to vent heat. Then in the winter, you use them to trap solar energy for as much of the day as it's available. There is nothing 'insane' about this and over the last few decades I have very successfully kept crap London rental flats at comfortable temperatures despite horrible outside conditions with knowledge of these principles. The one flat I couldn't do this with? A ten-year-old super-insulated flat with massive windows on one side only that didn't open properly, and a district heating system storing hot water in my pipes throughout the year. It was uninhabitable without aircon but had no means of efficiently removing aircon exhaust.
Good episode. Particularly enjoyed the holiday home discussion, as it mentioned Gwynedd. In recent years, almost half of all houses bought in the county have been as second homes, so you can imagine it's quite a big issue. I'm not sure how many of those already were second homes and how many were primary residences being turned into second homes, but either way, it's just not sustainable. I think the available stock of houses for people to actually live in had been decreasing year on year.
So while the council has increased council tax on second homes, like you mention, they've also recently introduced another policy, using powers recently given to Welsh local authorities by the Senedd: changing a house from a primary residence to a second home or short-term holiday let now requires planning permission (but not vice versa). And, let's face it, I think the idea is that this will never be granted.
I think this is very good policy, and perfectly in keeping with the Abundance agenda (as long as it's not used as an excuse not to build new homes; we still need some of those as well, please). But second home owners aren't happy, even though the policy doesn't affect any properties that were already used in this way before September 2024. I lurk in a Facebook group that campaigns against it and it really is a marvel to see how lacking in self-awareness a lot of them are. Often rather unsympathetic characters, honestly.
Anyway, I guess they're not supposed to be happy about it. You sometimes see them pointing at falling house prices and second home owners trying to sell up as evidence that the policies are failing, still, even now, oblivious to the fact that this is actually the exact desired effect.
That's a super clever idea on the council's part but... very depressing the policy is predicated on the assumption the planning system is so broken nothing will ever get approved!
Ha, I suppose. A rare sighting in the wild of blanket planning refusal as a sign of a system working quite well.
Air conditioning doesn't magically vanish heat, it pumps it out of your flat - with some extra - into the environment, so that your neighbours have to also fight against it. This causes a positive feedback loop, and there is evidence that this is responsible for significant heating in cities. It's obviously less antisocial if there's a better heat barrier between the inside and outside, as we hope will be in newer builds, so that actually not much cooling is necessary, but when I see aircon in London it's almost always hopelessly fighting against terrible design and hugely inefficient. Also people don't know how it works and choose to keep windows open while running the aircon. This isn't about middle-class guilt, it's about physics.
There is no contradiction in duel-aspect windows being useful for both heating and cooling. You cover and close them when the weather's too hot, to prevent solar gain and incoming hot air, and open them once the air outside is cooler than inside to vent heat. Then in the winter, you use them to trap solar energy for as much of the day as it's available. There is nothing 'insane' about this and over the last few decades I have very successfully kept crap London rental flats at comfortable temperatures despite horrible outside conditions with knowledge of these principles. The one flat I couldn't do this with? A ten-year-old super-insulated flat with massive windows on one side only that didn't open properly, and a district heating system storing hot water in my pipes throughout the year. It was uninhabitable without aircon but had no means of efficiently removing aircon exhaust.