Garages enquiry
Case reference FOI2026/00554
Received 12 March 2026
Published 14 April 2026
Request
Please treat this as a request for information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
I’d be grateful for anything you can share on the following:
1. Garage stock
• How many garages does the council own or manage
• How many are currently let, vacant, or decommissioned/awaiting redevelopment
2. Who uses them (rough percentages)
• Council tenants
• Other local residents
• Businesses
3. Which service or team is responsible for managing garage assets?
4. When was the last stock survey carried out?
5. Is day to day management and maintenance handled in house?
6. Typical monthly rent for a garage.
7. Approximate annual income from garage lettings.
8. Any common issues or complaints about garage sites over the past five years. (e.g. condition, security, anti social behaviour)
9. Any recent or planned reviews or redevelopment of garage sites
10. Any documents, if easily available, showing community engagement or wider impacts considered in these projects.
Response
Please find the answers to your queries below:
1. Garage stock:
• How many garages does the council own or manage.
1,853 garages and 4 hardstandings.
• How many are currently let, vacant, or decommissioned/awaiting redevelopment.
Let = 1,392.
Vacant/Void = 465.
Awaiting redevelopment = 18 garages are planned for redevelopment. We have planning permission to demolish and replace these with 8 affordable homes. This is the only garage redevelopment plan in our current development pipeline.
2. Who uses them (rough percentages):
• Council tenants – 564 (approximately 40% of the total let) are let by Council Tenants.
• Other local residents – 828 (approximately 59% of the total let) are let by leaseholders and private renters.
• Businesses – we do not record this information and therefore this information is not held.
3. Which service or team is responsible for managing garage assets?
Housing Services.
4. When was the last stock survey carried out?
Information not held.
5. Is day to day management and maintenance handled in house?
Yes.
6. Typical monthly rent for a garage.
Garages cost an average of £11.61 per week (excluding VAT) / £14.63 per week (including VAT) to rent, which is equal to £760.76 per year or £63.40 per month (when including VAT).
7. Approximate annual income from garage lettings.
Approximately £840,000, after accounting for a small number of charity rentals and uncollected rent arrears. However, in the past twelve months (April 2025 to March 2026) we have only been able to collect approximately £637,750 (approximately 68%) of the total charges.
8. Any common issues or complaints about garage sites over the past five years. (e.g. condition, security, anti social behaviour)
We have received 32 complaints relating to garages since July 2024 and the majority of these related to repair and maintenance issues. The next most common area of complaint related to garage rent account issues.
9. Any recent or planned reviews or redevelopment of garage sites.
Please see the response to Question 1 above.
10. Any documents, if easily available, showing community engagement or wider impacts considered in these projects.
An application for planning permission was made in relation to the garage redevelopment plan mentioned above and comments could be made on this application in the usual way. Details of the planning application and associated comments are publicly available on our planning portal and can be found here:
Yours sincerely,
FOI Team
Guildford Borough Council
Documents
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