Spinny

I don't understand why you ever erected your secondary fence ? If in response to complaints from the neighbour then it clearly hasn't resolved the situation. A lot probably depends on the neighbour and what sort of person they are. Anybody reasonable and you could have some open discussions about what he is actually trying to achieve. Does he just want to claim the land because because ? Perhaps he is concerned a future owner of your property might build on it making his a terraced house ? Perhaps he wants to get side access to his garden via some steps ? Perhaps he is planning to build a nice big rear extension onto it ? Perhaps he is concerned about losing the land to you by easement after (is it 12 years ?). It seems completely pointless to have a fenced off piece of land which will just become a weed trap. Perhaps you could buy some or all of it from him ? Is that his bin and stuff on his side of the alleyway ? Perhaps indicating he wants to prevent your gaining future possession by easement, or indicating how he wants to use the land ? If he ever took his fence down, then I think you could happily plant 4m high trees adjacent to the boundary. You might want to consider whether you could negotiate any covenants with him to put on the deeds e.g. to prevent him building on that land ? Side wall almost looks like it was built like a party wall with no windows, air vents, or weep holes in it ? You might perhaps have a case against the conveyancer when you bought the property ? Or the architect that drew that conveyancing plan ?

Yes, thanks G and J. I do appreciate that. Unfortunately though I think the issues only get especially hard when someone is trying to build at the boundary itself. If the building is away from the boundary as yours is and indeed as our own is, then there is no overhang and no trespass problem and there is no possibility a neighbour might build against the new wall. We live in a road of semi-detached houses. They have generous gardens of around 250+sqm at the back and similar size at the front. Clearly if people build side extensions right up to the boundary lines between each pair of semi's then all the properties become connected and become terraced, instantly devaluing them. In addition it looks horrendous aesthetically and completely changes the character of the road with gaps between the pair's of semi's being eliminated. In addition the ability to move anything between the front and back gardens without taking it through the house itself is lost. Council waste bins have to be kept in the front garden. It is very inconvenient and a key reason we didn't want to build to the boundary ourselves. Yet another factor is that the semi's in our road are not parallel, they are set out in an arc, each pair angled w.r.t. the next. So building out to the boundary creates another problem because the boundary lines are not parallel to the existing house's outer wall. (Would you believe our neighbours intend from their plans to build a non parallel wall along the boundary and to have rooms without 90 degree corners - that's is how mad their plan is). The more I think about it, the more I understand why the several side extensions in the road are as they are - short of the boundary with lean to roofs that don't trespass. It is the only sensible way, and I also believe the only approach the planning authority has ever previously given approval for. Planning authority incompetence now has created huge problems for us. While I am here, here are some of the 'features' of the neighbour's, no doubt design-it-yourself design - non-parallel walls, an internal window, a downstairs toilet moved to place it against the internal party wall with their conjoined neighbour (nice, how are you going to ventilate that with no windows), building over an existing manhole cover, building over a gas supply pipe, removing all windows from the south side of their house, removing all access between their front and back gardens except through the house (access through the house requires climbing and descending around 5 steps every time, whilst the side access is currently a gently sloping level walk). Half the new floor area is to be a fancy bicycle store (yes up and down the steps with the bike every time). A flat roof with three small rooflights(they will enjoy climbing on the roof to clean those), steps up built forward of the building line and across the existing front door and new front facing side door damaging the 1930's aesthetic. They are in their 70's and one has bad knees. You honestly couldn't make it up. All passed by planning in the best interests of the next 100 years of occupants - not. Yes they have the right to do as they wish as long as planning will pass it, but it is mad as mad Jack McMadman and that is a sorry fact.

Building is expensive and there are far too many people allowed to build truly awful constructions. Our own extension included demolishing a previous single skin extension with a low ceiling built on the cheap in the 1980's that we had to tolerate for 30 years of cold and damp. Unfortunately quite a few idiots fancy themselves as amateur architects, Dunning-Kruger applies.

Thank you for all comments so far - still seem to be missing anyone that has actually been through the full PWA process. To my mind this case is an excellent illustration of the problems. And the cause of these problems - well I'd say it is the planning authorities and the party wall act. When the first extension was built in that photo something went wrong - planning permission to build on the boundary with overflying eaves should never have been permitted - it is against the law and a trespass. What are the planning authorities playing at ! Also what were the planning authorities playing at when the second extension was built. It looks as though the two eaves actually overlap and clash. Lord knows how you maintain that. Planning should never have been approved for those plans either. Part of the problem, as with my neighbour, is that planning applications don't require any drawings of the proposed build which includes its relationship to the neighbouring property. Therefore you can submit plans which in isolation look ok, especially if, by accident or deliberate subterfuge, the architects planning drawings are inaccurate and ambiguous and include deliberate omissions. My neighbour got planning permission using drawings that show the slope of the land in the opposite direction to reality - quite possibly done to obfuscate the height difference with our property, and completely omit existing features like the fence. Yet apparently I cannot challenge - except by hugely costly court challenge - a decision made by a youngster with little experience and probably no experience of property ownership, at a pay rate of peanuts, put under enormous political pressure to get applications processed post haste, and based on likely deliberately false and manipulated plan drawings. It is broken - every time you hear a politician moaning and scapegoating planning red tape and delays - remember what destroying planning ''red tape'' leads to, and that once stuff is built it is generally going to stand for 100's of years.

Thanks Mike - can I ask have you ever been through the party wall process with party wall surveyors(PWS) ? I ask because as explained to me there is no horse trading by owners, the process is like a court judgement made by the two appointed PWS and issued to the two owners as a judgement called an 'award'. The two PWS decide between themselves what to put in the award and you don't get to see any prior draft to comment on or make suggestions like yours. It is handed down. Unfortunately the PWS I had to hurriedly appoint appears to be a lot younger and less experienced than the neighbours (which they obviously chose at their leisure) and it turns out you can't change your mind or sack them. IMO the whole thing seems very odd given the aim is supposed to be to achieve what is somewhat euphemistically called a PW 'agreement'. Is there anyone here with direct experience that has been through the full process ?

Sounds like this was part of someone's garden that they sold off and your parents bought - perhaps to extend their own land/garden - or perhaps as a speculative investment ? Think maybe you need to come clean, presumably your parents know the back story here ?

This may be the case, but presumably a PWA which includes a projection, however small, is breaking the law. So should never be 'awarded'. Would be good to hear from anyone that has been through the PWA process ? Anyone ?

Got some advice today of: Foundations can project under a neighbours land if that is the only way of building the wall. However it is pretty much never technically necessary to have a projecting foundation so should almost never be included in a PWA. A minor roof projection can be proposed such as the edge of a capping stone etc, but never a significant eaves projection. This capping could be removed if the property owner ever wanted to build against the wall themselves. However when challenged that this must be illegal, agreed that even a small projecting capping is trespass and therefore not legal. So only setting back the wall from the boundary by the depth of the projection can resolve this. After 20 years any projection over neighbours land would give rights through easement (not clear but potentially the neighbour might possibly end up owning the land underneath the projection I guess ?).

There is no discussion like this. Their PWS said I have no right to know anything about what they are doing. They are dictating to me, that's it. Railroad and mushroom. Apparently my PWS is 'junior' and 'inexperienced' and currently seems unable to stand up or assert anything.

[edited in the following quote from your previous post and deleted that post - mods] Yes I have my own build unfortunately still ongoing which I hope to complete this year on our property next door to the neighbour. I had a woeful experience with a builder and now having to complete by bringing in trades myself. Just a rear extension with a partial side element all stopping well short of the boundary to provide a side walkway between front and back gardens. Architect design, planning permission, structural engineer, quantity surveyor. We had different neighbours when our work started and very good relations. New neighbours bought and moved in about 9 months after our work started. Also good relations with the new neighbours chatting over the fence, giving them local info, they gave us beans, we gave them stuff. No complaints from the neighbours at any point, no complaints from us as they did their own refurbishment work. After a while they mentioned they might decide to do something at the side. Asked us at one point whether we spoke to neighbours when planning ours - said yes we did, even adjusted our design in response to their comments - told them planning and architects always recommend talking to neighbours. Some months later we get a planning notification in the post. Neighbours have submitted plans to build right out to the boundary and 1 and a bit storey high, flat roof. They submitted their application just before Xmas tricky-dicky style so we didn't even get any notification until half the response period was over. No attempt to discuss with us at all. We hurriedly put in a letter of objection given their plans broke all previous planning precedents. Unexpectedly their plans got approval. Invited them round to show them the impact on us and try to discuss aspects - amicable but oddly dismissive. Then receive full set of party wall notices from a PWS they have appointed. It is pretty obvious - work at a boundary unavoidably needs some communication and discussion - it is a shared boundary in the deeds. I and a previous neighbour put the current fence up together 20 years ago amicably sharing the work and costs. They certainly appear to be railroading us and mushrooming us, so no trust on our side anymore. Perfectly obvious and reasonable questions are just going unanswered and avoided.

I am not the one building, my neighbour is. There are two party wall surveyors involved to help establish a PWA. There are planning drawings only which are factually incorrect in certain regards and ambiguous in other respects. I have asked for construction or building regs drawings but none are being offered, so I have the impression the neighbour intends to build without drawings and without using a structural engineer. From what I have seen in online forums it seems that building something over or above someone's land is trespass, and can be taken to court for redress, and should not be done. There are numerous side extensions in my locality which have all been built slightly away from the boundary so the eaves do not overhang. However the neighbour's appointed PWS said when visiting the site - ''the outer wall will be at the boundary and have a capping at the top but you can knock it off if you want to'' This makes no sense to me given that PWS are supposed to be independent, surely he should be telling the neighbour they have no right to trespass on my property in any way and need to allow some room on their side for whatever style of eaves/fascia/capping they may end up building - on the planning drawings it appears to be a fascia board - now being illustrated on a drawing by the PWS as a thin capping - but there is no specification or definition. The build is to be done by the neighbours family member and it seems I am to have no real idea of what roof edging will be used. Obviously once the wall has been built the builder might decide to create any type of roof edge they choose projecting out and claim this is 'the only way to build it' or whatever. I might presumably take legal action at that point but my expectations are that a PWA should be definitively resolving such questions at the outset for everyone's obvious benefit. My own PWA's boss has said 'a capping stone is allowed to project over your land'. So what nonsense is going on here, and what are PWS doing in not adhering to the law ?!

Seem to be getting different answers from different party wall surveyors which surprises me. One says no, no projections however small are allowed, one says you cannot object to a small projection e.g. from a capping stone, one says a neighbour can install projecting flashing but 'you can knock it off if you want to'.

I happen to believe in treating others as you would have them treat you. If people want to build without insurance, then if they cause a gas explosion, or undermine the neighbours house which collapses, or burn the neighbours house down, they are going to find themselves personally liable for life destroying sums. If you are going to answer mutually beneficial dialogue with 'you have no rights to know' it probably means you are a criminal or an idiot. I guess this idiot wishes he had thought about insurance beforehand not afterwards...

uh oh. Just looked at what is built to post a photo. Now I discover the whole bl***y wall and frame is not even true on one side of the opening. One side the tapered edge of a piece of plasterboard is flush with the edge of the pocket door metal edge, exactly as per the installation diagram. However that vertical edge is not perfectly vertical, it lays slightly backward at an angle as you go up from floor to top by a few mm, the adjacent plasterboard fixed to the metal studs of the pocket also runs the same way. So I guess the whole of the pocket side of the frame is slightly layed back from true vertical. Meanwhile on the other side of the opening, as in the last photo an untapered edge of the plasterboard is recessed w.r.t. the edge of the vertical metal frame. The metal frame on this side, the closing side, is fixed at a true vertical, and the wall also runs at a true vertical on this side of the opening. The other side of the wall is currently not boarded, but if it were the plasterboard would clearly show discrepencies on that side too. So the carpenter has installed the metal stud pocket and the surrounding timber studwork too presumably - on the wonk and out of true. And seemingly displaced in some way from the other side of the door opening. It is only 'a few mm' out - dunno 3-4mm out, but it is out. He must have known this when it was done. Presumably he has frigged it in some way, rather than adjust surrounding timber studs, to make it look ok to casual observation. Presumably didn't want to tell the builder there was a discrepency, or told the builder who told him to botch it. More dishonesty. P**** o** again. What do I do now ? Pay another carpenter to rip it all out and presumably botch it again ? Would they do it in their own houses ?

We have an a Elisse pocket door opening installed for our utility room. This was chosen in order to create an opening in the wall without any architrave but with a pocket door - a clean contemporary look. The pocket door metal framework from Eclisse has a plastering bead built in at the corner of the opening to support this look with plastered corners to the opening. It also has suitable roughened areas in the reveal inside the opening to allow plastering right around the corners and up to the slot where the pocket door runs. . However I now discover that this is positioned by Eclisse to support jointing and taping the plasterboard to a finish ! However we want and need to skim plaster onto our plasterboard and hence up to the corner of the pocket door opening. Hence it seems the built in metal plaster bead is not in the correct position to support this as it is level with the plasterboard rather than slighty proud of it by 3mm to support the skim coat. So, how do I solve this ? How much plaster can cover a corner bead when skimming a wall - can the plaster bead be 3mm deep beneath the plaster at the corner ? Or will it just chip and flake off ? Could some special reinforced plaster be used in the corner area and blended into the rest of the wall skim ? Could some small 2-3mm corner bead be fixed/glued onto the eclisse metal frame at the corner ? Anybody with experience of installing pocket doors without architrave ?

Another approach might be to lower the ground level but only in the area of the air vents, such as along a strip adjacent to the building, such as a strip of gravel or planting at a level below the paved area/ramp which then keeps the air bricks above ground. There is some discussion of this approach, albeit in the context of dealing with the requirement for 150mm between ground level and DPC level and drainage, on paving expert here... https://www.pavingexpert.com/dpc01 In the 1930's when our place was built they didn't have telescopic air bricks and our DPC and airbricks are pretty low in the original house, so may have to take this approach for part of our patio.

Just been 'rendered' this week. Here is a photo. Renderer cut off the ends to be flush with the render and stuck screw or something in the ends to stop them clogging up. Fortunately the buff colour close enough to our render anyway. Using clear ones is a very good tip though. (With our builder you only got whatever was in stock at the local merchant unless you searched it out and bought it yourself.) I don't imagine anything is ever going to come out of them. Weird things really and must compromise any small insulation benefit from the outer concrete block leaf.

PS Are the joists 'at the top' on your sketch done the same way with a span of 9.6m ? I guess the 2.9 wide section top-right could perhaps be joisted at right angles, instead of all joists being 9.6m long. Also maybe consider what apertures/fixings will be going into the ceiling and consider whether the joist positions will be compatible with these e.g. loft hatch/ladder, downlights etc. (My carpenter was good enough to adjust a couple of joists above a kitchen to make room for specific feature downlights). It is only something you learn too late - that the structural drawing should be overlayed with the lighting plan and the room layout to resolve any clashes.

When you have fitted the first joist in situ and confirmed that it is the correct length and fits well, one possibility might be: - move that joist across the area as a tester to help establish whether the walls are square i.e. all joists can be made to the same length - take it apart and remove it. Then take it outside and use it as a template to cut and drill the remaining lengths of wood to make up the other joists to the same length (if it is square) (However I am not sure whether it is best to have all joists with identical overlaps and identical bolt positions. It might be arguable that different length/position of overlaps and bolts on different joists would give a more robust structure less likely to fail in the same place across all joists. But I guess your SE would say it is designed so that any one joist will never fail anyway.) PS I am not a carpenter and probably don't know what I am talking about.

Our extension slab was about 7.6m by 5.5m and about 120mm thick with a single layer of reinforcing mesh held on concrete mesh men at about 50mmm up. So only half the size of yours and we had no expansion joint. Specified by our structural engineer. It has been down 2.5 years, still not floored over, with the heating pipes operational for 1.5 years. Looks fine with no cracks. Plumber clipped the pipes to the mesh with zip ties. I went around after he had gone cutting off all the zip tie ends he left sticking up.

We had the suppliers come and measure up the openings for our doors and windows. They tend to allow 4-6mm tolerance all around the perimeter - doubtless reduces their risk. Beware the laser level. One supplier measured at survey, then measured at fitting and declared our floor level to be 12mm higher than it should be. Wouldn't accept it when I explained that was impossible as the only change was they measured from top of joist the first time, and from top of floor boarding the second, and that was fully allowed for. I bought an old world water level - ultimately showed their measurements were wrong - used over a 9m distance, and comes in handy for finding levels between the inside and outside of a building.

Intention is to seed the new lawn rather than turf it. I did this once before about 30 years ago with good results using some good seed. We have a clay soil type, which does show some cracking in very dry conditions but seems quite fertile. There is a big variation in top soil pricing (£50 to £150 per 500L), but I also suspect there is a big variation in 'quality' too. We have the additional difficulty that access to the back garden which needs to be levelled is via a side passage only 800mm wide, and the side passage wall is just now being newly k-rendered and cedral cladded, so we need to avoid damaging this. (The thought of some landscaper's teen labour crashing into stuff with wheelbarrows doesn't bear thinking about). We are also in a suburban road and a lorry load would have to be tipped on the public road and/or else block any use of our driveway. I have bought a few 25L sealed bags of topsoil on offer from Wickes and these are easy to hand carry down the side passage. 20 off 500l bulk bags equivalent would need 400 bags though. Any views on whether this is good stuff or crap ? Honestly not sure how to assess the quality of new topsoil, and if you don't like it after it is delivered you are going to be screwed ?

Do you know how level the concrete will be ? Our builders said the slab for our extension would be level to within 6mm, but only had a man hand tamping and floating it. It was only level to within 24mm and the level was 11mm higher than it was supposed to be. We had to change the floor make up in the connecting part of the main house, and the flooring contractor will be using levelling compound across the top of the slab to correct the 24mm variation. You probably have some very good pro's doing yours, but you will still want to check the actual level variation once it is poured and floated, just in case any parts need levelling compound, or different door apertures vary somewhat in level. Just a thought.

I have about 200 sqm of our garden to level out for a new lawn. I will need to get some top soil in but am a bit annoyed as we had a landscaper do a bit of work last year and they insisted the old lawn should be scraped off, when I could have just killed it with weedkiller. The result seems to be that they effectively skipped a couple of inches of the existing topsoil with the lawn - effectively costing me £1000's just to replace what they skipped. Doesn't seem right to me. Anyway I am wondering how level is a level garden lawn - we want to achieve something that looks flat and contemporary. Should I be aiming for completely flat, or should it have a slight drainage slope, and will it be noticeable if I put a small slope on it to save on topsoil. It is about 23m long and 8.5m wide. So even a 5mm per metre or 1 in 200 slope would save me 4 inches of topsoil at the far end and about 20 bulk bags of topsoil it seems.

Still waiting on a quote for an oak strip wood soffit for an overhang. Still in two minds about the problem of oak and timber ageing to a grey colour from UV light after a year or two. Therefore also wanting to look at manmade wood effect alternatives that will not change colour and be low maintenance. Any suggestions/suppliers ? Has anyone on here done something similar ? (Slightly wonder if LVT click style planks could be used ?)