Morningside Community Council

Do you live in a tenement property? Morningside Community Council would like to alert you to a possible pitfall when your neighbours carry out alterations in a jointly owned part of the property. Even if they have planning permission there are still potential consequences for other owners in the property.

Planning permission takes no heed of the ownership of a property. Therefore planning permission may be granted even though the applicant does not have the permission of the owner or part-owners of the property. If the work is carried out\without this permission, then it may require the title of the building to be changed.

A recent example is a tenement in Morningside where a planning application for an alteration in the roof space was granted by the Council’s Planning Department, but the other nine co-owners did not give their permission. The result is that the title has materially changed and residents have had to seek legal recourse at their own expense to have their title deeds changed.

The clear lesson is that henever there is a proposal for an alteration to any of the jointly owned parts of a tenement building, residents should always speak to their
solicitor at the earliest possible stage, about any impact this may have on the title of the building.

Morningside Community Council meets on the third Wednesday of every month. We meet in The Open Door, 420 Morningside Road, at 7.30 (refreshments from 7.10). All local residents and traders are welcome to ttend.

You can contact us on 445 5415 or by emailing chair@morningside.org.uk.

Or log on to our website www.morningside.org.uk.

We recently published a Newsletter, and you can pick up a copy at many outlets throughout the area, or by contacting the secretary on 446 4124 or secretary@morningside.org.uk