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https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/private-residence-relief-hs283-self-assessment-helpsheet/hs283-private-residence-relief-2019 Only or main residence If you live in, as your home, 2 or more houses, you can only have one main residence at a time for Private Residence Relief. You can nominate which residence is to be treated as your main residence for any period. Your nomination must be made within 2 years of the date you first have a particular combination of residences. If there’s a change in your combination of residences, a new 2-year period begins. If you do not make a nomination, the question of which is your main residence will be determined on the facts.

Apparently its 36 months rather than 18 if you are disabled.

I would also avoid putting pipe where the WC pan will screw down :-) We have two rooms each with their own loop. You can feel the floor screed is cold at the doorway between the two where we have no UFH pipes. I would just make the unheated area a bit bigger than the footprint of the fridge - say 8" to 10" " around it.

I've mentioned this before but one possibility is to find out where the planning department publishes the weekly list of planning applications received. Look out for applications for Outline Planning Permission as these might be from a land owner preparing a plot for sale.

I recommend "How to find and buy a Building Plot" by Roy Speer and others. Try for the latest edition (2010?) and beware planning rules may have changed since your copy was printed The normal advice is to find a plot first then see what sort of house suits the plot. Planners like uniformity of design...except when they don't. In other words if all the houses around your plot are stone clad houses of identical design they are unlikely to allow something radically different in shape and use of materials. However if the plot is already surrounded by a variety of different contemporary/modern designs then one more might be looked on favourably. Ideally you want the plot to be at least twice the foot print of the house because later additions (sheds, garages etc) can be built without planning permission (using Permitted Development Rights) if the total built area would remain less than half the plot. Yes and no. That might be the way to get a plot for the lowest price but it's also the highest risk. No land owner sells land without considering its development potential. When you find land for sale without planning permission you have to ask yourself why on earth hasn't the seller tried to get planning permission themselves. Why sell a field for £50K when it might be worth £500,000 when it has planning permission? Perhaps they have tried and failed. You also need to beware the land banking scam - people buy a field, divide it into 20 plots and get plans for the whole site drawn up showing roads ets. Plots are sole off at a price that makes them look cheap for a plot with a promise that they will get planning permission for you. Many people have lost money and some are stuck with land they cant even get access to in order to maintain. There are safe ways to buy a plot that doesn't have permission (eg Option to purchase contracts). There are different precautions you need to take depending on the plot and what's around it.

Book them for the same day and you might be able to use the digger to fill the hole in after. The percolation test can take up to 24 hours if the soil isn't free draining and may need three holes. Plenty of sites with guidance.. http://suds-solutions.co.uk/percolation-tests/?gclid=Cj0KCQjww7HsBRDkARIsAARsIT7lTZKG8g7kZufjkhGDqfYBQ3ynNmExhNGbkmxnfjtaX7PqvZjMVW8aAjaCEALw_wcB

£350 -£550 (plus VAT) https://powerpipehr.co.uk/price-and-size/

Currently 18 months but soon reducing to 9 according to... https://www.which.co.uk/money/tax/capital-gains-tax/capital-gains-tax-on-property-avuq96u1500f#private letting relief You may have moved out but do you still use the old house (for storage?) because... So at least 9 months and up to 2 years. You only pay it on the gain in value after deducting your annual allowance.

That's just because the pipe used for a WC is 110mm. Its easier to fit a 110mm AAV to the top of the stub stack than to fit a reducer and smaller AAV.

As I recall on a new housing estate not every house needs to have an open vented stack to dissipate sewer gas. I've seen guidance that says only thing one in four must have one. I think most houses have one to prevent water being dragged out of traps as others have said. But even this isn't always a problem. It's common to find downstairs WC just go straight into the floor with no stack. @Robin Banks Do you have a mini stack like the diagram posted above? If so is the top capped off?

Tool station have a range of boots. £35.

When we purchased a house in Belgium we discovered it had a solid first floor. No creaking when someone walks about. No problem with tiles in any room you like. Cool floors in summer. Liked it so much we built a beam and block first floor when we came back to the UK. In the end its a personal preference thing. Just as some people prefer brick and block walls while others are happy with stud walls. The self build show in Brussels (called "Batibouw) had several companies promoting different ways to build solid floors.

If I understand correctly your image shows the old corner of the house. Typically that end of the beam is carrying a lot of weight and is bearing onto quite a small footprint. Sometimes a pier or post is required in addition to a pad stone. It should be possible but certainly discuss with your SE. It might depend on the condition of the existing wall/bricks. The SE may also be concerned about racking or "disproportionate collapse" issues.

I've seen similar systems used by self builders in Belgium and thought they were interesting. Was it as easy to move the beams as it appears? I've seen photos showing a man lifting one end by hand but a lot of Belgian building sites seem to have mini cranes. How did it work out for you?

Looks a bit like tannin staining? I wonder if there is a timber "rafter" fixed to the wall? If there was an issue with the flashing between canopy and wall that allow water in contact with that rafter perhaps tannin or mould is being washed out onto the wall.

Don't think so. We have arched windows that use steel lintels several courses high covered with brick slips. They were cut from ordinary bricks used to make the rest of the house. Aside: I notice the top of the window isn't horizontal (not parallel to the mortar line) so a lot of very thin wedge shape bricks are required. Bet they were fun to cut ?

The screen shot above appears to say the thermal conductivity is 0.5 W/mk. If I remember correctly then to convert that to an approx u-value you divide by the thickness in metres. So if its 250mm thick the u-value is 0.5/0.25 = 2. So unless I've made a mistake, which is quite possible, you definitely need insulation on the floors.

What's the u value for the ground floor? If the blocks are 0.16 and you have concrete beams bridging the blocks that layer will average worse than 0.16.

That's the sort of tower we used. They seem fine for indoors but outside I prefer the Boss type with bigger tubes.

I have some of those Draper Trestles for wood working. They are quite strong but personally I wouldn't use trestles and planks. Depending on the height I'd either go for something like an indoor grade tower or "scaffolding ladder platform" perhaps this sort of thing.. https://www.midlandladders.com/folding-work-platforms/ladder-scaffold-system

Yes. Typically it would be on the top of a short stub stack. At about chest height.

Is that existing stack open vented?

Typically you are allowed to use AAV on all stacks except the one furthest from the main sewer. Sometimes this rule gets bent a bit so there are houses where the one open vented stack isn't the one furthest from the sewer. So perhaps the AAV are just well hidden? Also worth looking to see if its in the loft? It must be above the height of the washbasin.

I think the cant rails mentioned earlier are worth considering. Few years ago timber merchant near me (Huntingdon) said they could get timber pressure treated for you after cutting but I don't know what the costs are like.

Think they have 10 years to enforce a breach of a planning condition.