'Moving Homes into Vehicles to Avoid RTB Sales Won't Work'

A social housing lawyer has warned councils that moving high-value homes into local authority-owned vehicles to protect against Right to Buy sales is unlikely to work.  Scott Dorling, partner at law firm Trowers & Hamlins, said: ‘People have been talking about setting up vehicles outside the local authority’s control to shelter high-value voids… but it goes back to the issue of why a local authority would be doing that. The only reason would appear to be to avoid a well-known government policy.’ He added that if councils were trying to protect high-value voids from disposal, those properties cannot be effectively transferred into a company wholly owned by the local authority, as local housing revenue account rules limit disposals to just five dwellings in a year. Read more on Inside Housing.