newhome

I know! That pees me off every time I think about it!!

Here’s mine.

How far along are you? If you haven’t started and aren’t committed I would probably put the foundations in as then there isn’t much to worry about as far as security is concerned plus it starts the build from a PP perspective. It will also then allow you to pause and take stock of where you are financially if money it tight. If you have CIL ensure that you follow the rules to the letter or you could lose the exemption. Then ... consider adjusting the asking price potentially vs weighing up the cost of seeking more finance. How far away from getting the state pension are you? I assume you won’t need a mortgage once the house sells? Borrowing from relatives an option? Taking in a lodger or 2 for a bit? How much are you planning to do / could learn to do yourself? Plenty on here have got stuck in and have been nothing short of amazing in the ‘DIY through adversity’ scenario.

I don’t think looking at moving lender in the circumstances you describe will make you sleep easier ?. Continue down the road of sticking with your current lender. Getting out of a 5 year fix and applying for what is a likely to be a significant renovation or even a self build mortgage will be £££ IMO. If the house is all but gone you should have looked at demolishing it and doing a new build so that you could reclaim the VAT.

Given the circumstances I wouldn’t bother to cross that bridge just now as you don’t really have a house to lend against per se. Wait until you know what your mortgage lender wants and try to work with them.

QQ. Why would you want to do something ‘temporary’ for the test as surely if you remove said lubricant etc afterwards it’s not giving a realistic measure of how airtight the house is in normal use?

I don’t think it’s at all clear TBH so expect HMRC to make the rules up as they go along. It seems to be down to intent. If they identify that your intent was to move into the house, stay a short while and then sell up to make a profit then they may do something about it. My personal thoughts (and they are not based on anything) are that you should potentially look to stay for 2 - 3 years. CIL exemption is much clearer and you have to stay for 3 years post completion or you lose the exemption.

The great north / south divide ?. The scheme only covers the north of Scotland. Unfortunate for those in the south with huge connection costs.

They will probably want a fee (ain’t that always the case!) to assess the work you are doing and ensure that the end value still covers their loan. Please report back what they say to help others who find themselves in a similar position.

I wouldn't worry too much TBH. I'm bemused about how they found out but I don't think they will do much. They will not want you to do something that might devalue the property, for example turning a 4 bed home into a 2 bed but if you are adding value I don't think they will do a lot. They probably just want to know what you are doing and how you are financing it as they won't want another secured loan on the property (you're not doing that anyway). Out of interest I picked a lender at random and looked for information that would explain that you needed to tell the lender if you were renovating the property. I simply couldn't find it on the website. If it is there it's not obvious. So firstly I would have a look at your lender's website and try to find that info. If it's not on the website use that in your defence. It may well be in the very small print in your mortgage pack but TBH not that many people read the small print. I also stumbled across this 'guide' from Barclays Barclays Home Improvement Guide Rather amusingly under section 5 'get permissions' it doesn't mention getting permission from the mortgage lender They will absolutely not repossess your property if you are paying the mortgage. When you buy a property you own the property, not the lender, however the lender will have a financial claim on it until you pay off the debt. If you are paying the mortgage they will not repossess the property, and indeed they cannot decide to do that anyway, only a court can decide that and there is zero chance that a court will issue a repossession order if you are paying the mortgage. So apologise, explain that you are adding value to a house in very poor condition, and I reckon you will be ok, especially if your LTV is only 60%. Do check out your insurance however as not many 'normal' insurance policies will cover extensive renovation work so you may be uninsured at present.

Try to get him to confirm in writing so you have some hard evidence if HMRC ask for something noting why it’s not signed off already. Even if you email him your understanding and ask him to agree your email.

It’s £1 for the first month but remember to cancel if you don’t want to continue.

I’d probably start off asking for the whole lot and then asking for the labour elements to be zero rated if they won’t zero rate the whole lot.

You’re not eligible according to the letter of the law but nothing to stop you taking a punt, saying that it’s a new build and can you have it zero rated in line with VAT Notice 708. Nothing ventured ?

TBH if it was just for visitors there are other places you could meet visitors, doesn't have to be in a tiny house.

There are all sorts of ridiculous things that every house has to comply with currently. The ramp is one. The other is that every new home must have a wheelchair accessible WC on the ground floor and preferably room for a shower too. The result of that is that 1 bed starter homes have downstairs loos that are almost larger than their kitchens. IMO building regs should not be a one size fits all, there should be exceptions for certain types of homes that are aimed at a market where it is pretty unlikely that someone would be or become disabled. Not completely impossible, but if we want to tackle the housing crisis there should also be focus on that rather than mandating every accessible clause going. Hardly any of the small flat pack homes often held up as a solution to tackle building small, cost effective homes comply with British building regs either because they are too small, or not able to meet the accessible bathroom criteria. Yet they are acceptable elsewhere in Europe. I'm not saying do away with the need to have these things entirely, just don't mandate them for houses under a certain size targeted at first time buyers.

I believe @ProDave is looking at getting a temp habitation certificate here in Scotland to allow him to claim the VAT back. Not sure if the ramp needs to be in for that? Actually getting a temp habitation certificate isn’t a bad strategy to reclaim the VAT IMO as HMRC can hardly claim that the house was complete eons ago if there are still things preventing full sign off, and that would mean more than decorative things. You could presumably deliberately leave a couple of things pending for full sign off to be achieved.

Kevin's a busy boy ?

Great blog post. Your architect was very wise! Always collect stuff paid for and run if you can, unless covered by Section 75. How fortuitous that you had a. collected the windows paid for and b. were covered by Section 75 for those not yet manufactured. There are many 'fear of disappearing window suppliers after paying large amounts of money' posts on this forum. In future we can just direct everyone to your blog to demonstrate what can (and sometimes does) go wrong! Love your writing style - keep blogging

Building control are really fussy up here about it for a new build. I imagine most of the council buildings are retrofits that like renovations don’t have to comply with the current domestic regs.

Because Scotland has different regs and a wooden ramp wouldn’t be allowed.

The whole thing is nonsense anyway. Based on a valuation from a few decades ago.

@Christine Walker is in Scotland. We have different regs here so wouldn't get away with something like that. Congrats on the award scheme though!

Cos no one will come and go on the roof to swap the AAV for a new one (it's suspected that this is the issue with it anyway).

I don't think they are any of those things TBH, they are simply opportunist. They charge that amount because they can. When I said to the Energy Saving Trust woman that 14.5k was way more than I would expect to be charged for what looked like a couple of days work and 5k of kit she said the quote looked to be in the right ballpark. And they are SOOO busy up here you can't get one to do an install anyway. I must have contacted about a dozen and only ever got one callback / quote. Then I was advised to look 'much further afield' which seems just great when there is an issue and no one will come back to service it. Someone told me that the non domestic installations are where the big money is so I guess many concentrate on those and can't be arsed with installing a small ASHP or whatever.