CityCyclingEdinburgh was launched on the 27th of October 2009 as "an experiment".
IT’S TRUE!
CCE is 15years old!
Well done to ALL posters
It soon became useful and entertaining. There are regular posters, people who add useful info occasionally and plenty more who drop by to watch. That's fine. If you want to add news/comments it's easy to register and become a member.
RULES No personal insults. No swearing.
http://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/mine-subsidence-land-to-be-new-housing-plot-1-3386857
"
the 20-hectare plot could now be brought back into use, after developers vowed to invest up to £8.5 million filling vast underground tunnels with concrete.
"
That's all right then.
Yeees, great idea Mr Developer.
I grew up in Gilmerton and used to play up at Hyvots. I had long moved away by the time the massive holes appeared there, but anyone who remembers the size of these things (enough to take a car? house maybe?) would think twice about buying anywhere there are old workings.
Really bonkers idea.
Good luck to anyone trying to get a bank to mortgage one of these properties or an insurer to cover for buildings insurance...
Sounds like an innovative way to tackle not one but two pressing issues, the need for housing land and the need to make the site safe. Sadly, too late to save Colinton's much loved Polo Fields but perhaps will reduce pressure to build on greenbelt at Balerno.
It IS a shame about the Polo Fields, but this is the way the housing "market" is 'allowed' to operate.
This proposal is also on what most people regard as greenbelt - as is the next bit which has planning permission.
There is plenty of land at the Waterfront with planning permission - but not as 'desirable'.
I think kaputnik is right about mortgages and insurance - so another set of 'market forces' will come into play.
think kaputnik is right about mortgages and insurance
Having just filled out extensive paperworks for both, I can attest they are loaded with questions to weedle out anyone in this particular set of circumstances.
Loaded with questions to which the developer fully expects to provide satisfactory answers. Not a problem.
I once worked on a building site in the middle of a river putting in footings for a small housing development.
In spite of dewatering, it was impossible to dig neat trenches in the gravel.
The contractor poured so much more concrete than they had priced for, they went bust.
No doubt this site has been fully surveyed and quantified and the concrete will flow into every air pocket.
1949 Abercrombie report
Curious that a forum that is so dismissive of the risks of independence should be so risk averse when it comes to building a few houses.
Are you a shareholder of the interested developer?
We might all be if owned/funded by certain banks!
@Pintail it's not the risk of building the houses, it's the risk that a far removed lender or insurer will take any risk in stumping up the money (or protection) at an affordable rate (given I think these houses are meant to be affordable) when there's the remotest chance of some sort of subsidence.
The buildings I'm sure won't fall down (probably, if they're better footed than those up at Moredun were), but I'm sure banks and insurers will charge handsomely for the trouble of mortgaging and insuring them. If at all.
Scotland won't fall down or float off if it were to proceed with independence. The insurance and loans may or may not be more expensive though, depending on which side of the economic argument you believe.
Kaputnik, do you really think that a bank would risk 100's of thousands, perhaps millions ?, to fund the development in the first place if it didn't think that the potential buyers would be able to get the necessary mortgages and insurance to do so ?
"do you really think that a bank would risk 100's of thousands, perhaps millions"
Good question.
20, 10, maybe 5 years ago banks lent money to 'trusted' developers.
If things went badly, the bank got the 'asset' and sold it again - sometimes to people who were involved in the project previously.
Then there was the crash/recession.
Maybe things are different now(?)
As I understand it the banks create money at the point of sale of the mortgage. They can take the full value and the full risk over the full term of the mortgage or sell it on to reduce the risk and the profit. If these mortgages are for poor properties, sub-prime, they won't pay back the cost to whoever ends up with them. The banks work hard to disguise these sub-prime packages. But the original lender will probably not be involved by then. And won't care.
Cyclingmollie, the original lender is the one financing the development in the first place. They will very much care if the developer is unable to sell the properties.
You must log in to post.
Cycling in Edinburgh Flickr group
Video embedded using Easy Video Embed plugin
posts