Planning/property law

[rydercup]

We live in a private 6 house gated development. One of the properties has a tenant and the tenant (through a third party company) is applying for change of use on the property to a childrens home. The landlord hasn’t given consent for this and we have a convenant in a leasehold that is managed by a management committee to say that the houses should not be used for commercial development. From a planning perspective…neither of these 2 things count or would be considered. This seems utterly insane to me. That a third party company that neither rents or owns a house can apply for planning permission to change the use of the house. Any planning or property experts that can explain this to me?

You do not need the owner's consent to apply for plannin permission. You just need to serve an appropriate notice on them. This allows, for example, a prospective purchaser to see if they can get planning permission before they buy a property.

Planning permission does not override a restrictive covenant. Even if this company succeeds in getting planning permission for a change of use, the restrictive covenant can still be enforced by whoever has the benefit of the covenant.