Landshare scheme

Evening all.

Much of my land is not being put to good use. I have plans at some stage to make a commercial operation of it, but not for a few years yet.

This got me to thinking, maybe someone could use some of it, which brings me onto the Landshare scheme.

I have major reservations though. Anyone got any thoughts on this:

What if someone hurts themselves up there? My land is fairly remote. If someone had an accident on there and they were on their own, and I'd given them permission to be there, would I not be liable both legally and morally?

What if I get a 'problem tenant'? E.g. someone who insists on knackering the place, or breaks national park rules (which could result in a compulsory purchase order on my whole site under national park rules)?

What if I decide I want the land back? I'm a fair chap, I wouldn't kick someone off when their crops are just coming up to harvest time, I'd give them a full year's notice, but what if they decided not give up when given notice to do so? How would I enforce it and how costly would that be?

What if I get some total weirdos on there? Obviously I'd 'screen' everyone before making a decision, but people can be convincingly nice for days, weeks or even months before they show their true colours.

 

Depending on how much land you have, the safest course may be to split it into multiple plots. This means there is less chance of anyone being alone there and also an injured person has more chance of being found and treated. As to it being your responsibility, that would only apply if you left it unsafe.
If someone wanted to do damage they wouldn't need to be a plot holder. I'd have thought having a stake in the place would make it less likely they would do damage.
If you give fair notice to quit your land then there would be nothing to stop you going in and doing what you like once the notice has been served.

 

It's 3 acres, with roughly 1 acre being woodland. I reckon if I do this, I'll be looking at releasing 1 acre to the scheme. You can get 8 good sized allotments to an acre, or 16 'half plots'. Funny national park rules mean I need planning permission to partition it though, so it would have to be open plan. Access is also a potential problem. Being remote, people would really need to take their cars, but the only place to park where you can be reasonably sure of not getting stuck is on the side of the road. In summer you can take a car into the site without too much risk of it sinking down to its axles, and I'd be happy to lay down some rubble near the gate to make it safer to get cars in and out, but again I'd have to be very careful what I did in order to not have the national park authority on my back, so I can't make a proper car park area. Other practical considerations include toilet and hand wash facilities. The national park aren't going to let me build anything like that, even if I could afford to. People would have to be willing to pee in a bush and make sure they go for the other before they leave the house (or cross a very busy road to get to the pub if they were desperate).

 

Just out of curiosity. How did you get hold of that land? I would love to get my grubby mitts on a bit of woodland.

 

I found my Apiary site on Landshare , never really thought of the points you have made but I do have insurance for the bees and the hive if anything happened, which also cover 3 party ie if they get badly stung !!!!

I had thought if he sold up what I would do but luckily the house at the end of the lane with a 5 acre site have asked me I can keep a couple of hives on there land as well , which is more secure, I did explain to his wife I had insurance if anything happened to any one , she looked at the husband and laughed !!! , he didnt !!!

I think the landshare site would give you option's @clueless1 and help and guidance but all very valid points with what could go wrong , and to be honest if I didnt know them it would put me off having all and sundry wandering around. I did have a informal meeting when I went to see the site and the owner and we both got on really well which is the main thing and I keep a low profile and dont pester anyone, which I think is best in the longrun

Spruce

 

I bought it off my dad. he bought it off the farmer who owns the farm next door, which my land used to be part of. The shape of my land (all steep bank sides and ravines apart from a few small areas of flat bits) makes it less than ideal for large scale commercial use, as larger tractors can not manoeuvre in it. My dad was renting land to keep horse on prior to that, and just put word out that he was looking for land to buy. Every farmer knows every other farmer, so word got round until this other farmer struck a deal. It took him a couple of years of searching and waiting. There are quicker ways. There are a few websites that specialise in selling land. Other options would be a long term lease, or just the usual renting.

I intend to put it to use, but its a case of balancing time and priorities. Right now, I haven't got the time that the land needs, so it seems to make sense to get some other people to make some use of some of it. I want to do this, but I'm one of those meticulous planners when it comes to things like this. I always think several steps ahead, so I just need to work out how I would deal with every foreseeable scenario.

 

Have you had change of use, as it still could be agi only

 

Half is agricultural, the other half is leisure.

 

be carefull that some one may complain if you use the agri bit for anything not agri, down here they is a number of people tell the councils

 

We have more than our fair share of nosey parkers up here too. As far as I'm concerned though, growing things is agriculture, so provided that people don't start trying to build things or making crazy golf courses etc, then I can't see how I'd fall foul of the rules.

 

Not when it come's to the councils, some rules have changed

 

As far as Planners are concerned, growing stuff for your own and family's, friends' needs is domestic gardening, and agricultural use is growing it for sale. That's why when somebody buys some adjacent farmland as a garden extension and thinks they'll get away with it because they're growing fruit & veg on it, the Planners call it 'extending the residential curtilage' and will take Enforcement Action unless you can submit evidence (such as accounts) to demonstrate you're running that fruit & veg production as a commercially viable enterprise. They require that information to prove you're not just using that piece of agricultural land as a personal vegetable patch, and selling the odd bit of veg to try and get around the planning regulations.