A COUNCIL boss has said York could lose ‘hundreds more family homes’ to short-term holiday lets, despite government moves to try to control the growth of the market.

The department for levelling up, housing and communities announced on Monday (February 19) that planning permission would be required for future short-term lets, saying this would give councils greater power to control the growth of this type of accommodation.

But City of York Council’s executive member for planning Councillor Michael Pavlovic was critical of the government’s new ‘permitted development rights’. The rights will allow for a property to be changed from a short-term let to a standard residential dwelling, and allow a property to be changed to a short-term let.

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The government said local authorities would be able to remove these permissions and require full planning permission if they deem it necessary.

Cllr Pavlovic said: “Overall these changes make it far from easy for local councils to gain control over the concentration of short-term lets.

“The Government’s creation of permitted development rights is exactly what we were hoping they would control, rather than facilitate.

“The process to remove these rights and have councils decide based on local factors will be arduous and long. 

“By that time York could have lost hundreds more family homes to the short term let market.”

 York Central MP Rachael Maskell earlier this week said that more than 2,000 properties in York are short-term holiday lets. In the city centre, one in 10 dwellings are short-term holiday lets, she added.

Ms Maskell said there are hundreds of families on the housing waiting list and local workers find themselves priced out of the city.

The Government said short-term lets play an important role in the UK tourism economy and provide easily-accessible accommodation and its announcement will strike the balance between protecting the visitor economy and ensuring local people get the homes they need.

Included in the announcement was that homeowners will still be able to let out their main or sole home for up to 90 nights throughout the year without planning permission.

Cllr Pavlovic said: “We also have concerns about enforcement capacity in challenging landlords who exceed the 90-day maximum letting period where they have no short-term let planning permission.

“Uncontrolled short term holiday lets, as the Government recognises, leads to the hollowing out of local communities.

“There is now likely to be a flurry of homes being flipped before these changes are made, further exacerbating the problem.

“This highlights the urgency needed from the Government to enable councils to get to work on applying and embedding these changes at the local level.”