Crawley resident criticises Crawley Borough Council garage rent increase as ‘WELL ABOVE inflation’

Local resident Andrew Gill said “the consequence of this, on a personal level, has been to increase my payments to the Council from around £31 per week to an eye-watering £53 per week.”

According to Crawley Borough Council’s website, it said “Garage rents are increasing from Monday 12 December. Tenants have been written to, giving them the option to renew their garage tenancy or hand the keys back. See the garage rental questions and answers for more information or to cancel your tenancy.”

Mr Gill continues: “Crawley Council has recently increased the garage rents WELL ABOVE inflation. In addition, the reduced rents that have been forever available for additional garages have been dropped, meaning those are now as expensive as the initial rented properties. Anything above the renting of two garages has an even dearer rent applied. These increases have, again forever, been applied annually and at the beginning of APRIL, except the latest increases have been applied at the beginning of DECEMBER, some 4 months earlier than usual.

“And this at a time when the whole local community is witnessing food, fuel and power costs at an all-time high. The letters sent to Garage renters DID NOT make clear that the concessions of past years were to be stopped immediately, and there was barely an adequate amount of notice provided of the increases (unexpected as they were in December anyway), thus allowing for financial decisions to be undertaken by said renters.

“The usual "pay up or leave" being the only options. I find this situation not only unfair, but is likely to have an impact on the whole local community, as vehicles normally housed in Council garages will now be parked in the already congested local side roads.

“When I have made enquiries about the reasons for this draconian measure, I was told that the Council had looked at other local authorities and private garage renting costs, and that Crawley was among the cheapest.

“This doesn't give the local council either the right to match anyone else's charges, nor a reason to do so if the income has (up to that point) been considered fair and reasonable.”

A spokesperson from Crawley Borough Council said: ““Increasing charges at a time when residents are incurring other price increases is understandably sensitive. However, our costs are also increasing so the additional income will minimise the need for future reductions in our services and help to pay for much-needed repairs to our garages.

“Renting our garages is still extremely good value, costing lower than the market rate, and the changes to multiple tenancies will enable more people on the waiting list to rent one of our garages.

See more: Crawley man served eviction notice after rent increase which left him ‘shocked, angry and anxious’: Here is what the landlord and estate agents had to say, WATCH: Crawley’s home-grown magician gives update on career for 2023 and performs for the camera, Family-run shop in Crawley moves premises after 25 years in Church Walk

“Even with these changes, we remain confident that we are one of the cheapest councils for garage rental, particularly after others have applied their increases this year. We have applied this increase during the financial year but the next rise won’t be until April 2024.”

Learn more here: https://crawley.gov.uk/housing/garages/garages-and-stores