Councillors have given three brothers permission to use their Perth family home as a short-term let, despite a plea from one of the city’s leading churches to block it.
Kinnoull Church said it was concerned about the impact of the enterprise in Mount Tabor Avenue on its manse next door.
But Perth and Kinross Council’s licensing committee approved the bid after assurances that the brothers will be good neighbours.
The application for a short-let licence centred on a four-bedroom property at 3 Mount Tabor Avenue.
Brothers Iain, Keith and Scott Alexander were seeking approval to let it out to a maximum of nine paying visitors at a time when they and their family are not using it.
Perth and Kinross Council received five objections from neighbours, including one from Kinnoull Parish Church.
Session clerk Douglas Whitelaw said the church only found out about the application from a note pinned to a tree.
He said he was objecting on behalf of the General Trustees of the Church of Scotland, as well as the Kirk Session of Kinnoull Parish Church.
Mr Whitelaw said they were concerned that opening up the property to short-stay guests would change the residential nature of the area.
He also raised concerns that the potential managers would not be on site to respond quickly to any issues.
He wrote: “As a Kirk Session charged with pastoral responsibility for the congregation, and this includes the occupants of the Manse, we therefore also object on the grounds of noise and nuisance which could well affect the Manse family.”
Perth brothers move to allay Kinnoull Church concerns
Iain Alexander attended the meeting with his brothers
He told the committee the move was their way of holding onto their childhood home.
“This has been our family home for 50 years,” he said.
“We want to keep this house in our family. We have a lot of memories there. And the only way we can afford to do that, now our parents have sadly passed, is to let it out.”
Mr Alexander said the brothers and their families still planned to use the house themselves.
And he said they would not permit it to be used as “a party house” for stags and hens and other rowdy groups.
“We are not out to make every single penny that we can out of the property,” he added.
“We are the longest residents in the whole street. So we are not out to annoy our neighbours. We want to take their feelings into account.”
The committee unanimously agreed to grant the licence for three years, on the condition that any issues which do arise are dealt with as quickly as possible, and that no gatherings are permitted in the garden after 10pm.
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