Big Jimbo

I would like to keep 1, and sell the other one. I doubt i would make more money if i sold both, or sold one big house. I just think it would be a better thing to do.

If that is true, than it is a great shame. This country is full of newly built, crap, leaky, houses. We should be doing better, and it should be taken into account. If i was a planning inspectorate looking at an appeal, i would certainly be looking more positively at the planning policies, and twisting them to enable me to pass it on appeal.

I have thought about that. certainly possible to build one large house and sub-divide into Two. Just seems a real shame as both houses could have 2mts each side to boundary, and 8 mts in between them.

Promise i will keep this short. I own a nice plot. 90ft wide x 200ft deep. On it sits an old bungalow of aprox 650ish sq ft. It's in the green belt. After a lot of effort i have obtained planning permission to extend the bungalow to aprox 3000 sq ft. Now the extension i got passed is not the best looking thing you will ever have seen, but atleast i now have that as my fallback. In truth i dont need a 3000 sq ft house, and in the next couple of months i am going to become a double grandad. I have also had to help my 3 daughters onto the property ladder which has cost me about £300,000 pounds. This has involved me in paying deposits to buy dumps, gutting and re-newing everything in the properties, and turning them into desirable places for them to live, where they should have a good place to live for atleast the next 10 years or so without having to spend too much money on the places. My background is basically in designing and building high end furniture fixtures for posh new build houses. Stunning Kitchens, Wardrobes, Vanity units, Studies, Cinema rooms etc. Now i have had a fair bit of fun doing it for about 25 years, but at 57 i have got a bit grumpy, and just can't be asked to chase the work, or put up with the site work anymore. It's always been a small afair with me doing the work, and my wife doing all the accounts, and buying the stuff in. We have never earned a fortune, but have had a great life together, and we both enjoyed the time we have spent on our 3 daughters houses. we have also done 5 houses over the years. Bought dumps, maxed out extensions, re-furbed to a high standard and sold them on. (If my daughters were asked what was it like where they grew up, they would always say. "We lived in a series of dumps. When Mum and Dad made them nice we moved Now my one brain cell has been ticking over, and the result is that i think it would be better to build 2 houses for future generations that would be more affordable than 1 large house, which will only end up being sold to some overpaid footballer, or banker from London. I'm about 15mins drive outside the M25, and within 10 mins drive to 2 underground stations in Herfordshire. that , and the fact that i would quite like my Grandchildren to be able to drive past in years to come, and be able to say, "My Gran and Grandad built those 2 houses" To that end i drew up 2 houses that fitted inside the footprint of the 1 large house, and the bulk of the 2 houses was slightly smaller than the bulk of the large 1 house. I stuck this into my local planning dept, and this was refused because they viewed the proposal against the existing bungalow, and not the extended house that they had already given permission for. GRRRRR Short sighted tossers. Anyway, i have now approached a local planning consultant, who is gamekeeper, turned poacher, (X head of planning) who thinks that he could provide a good arguement for 2 houses in place of the single large house. I have gone back to my pencil, and designed 2 houses that have a considerably smaller footprint that the large house, and has a reduced bulk therefore making the greenbelt more open that the 1 large house would. I know that sustainability, is not just about the house, but when i asked him if i should try and build the houses to as high a standard as possible (possible Passive) he said it would help but didn't think it would be a deal breaker ! Now i fundamentally believe that 2 houses would be better than 1, and i would like to prepare for the possibility of going to appeal, if the council don't see sense. Although, i can work out "u" values, and design out thermal bridging, is there any software available that i might be able to use to show, on a more official basis, how well the houses would be built in relation to energy efficiency above and beyond the current Building control levels, and do any of you think that doing so might be worth my while in relation to the planning process or posible appeal ?? Thanks for reading, told you i ramble. Regards to all. Jim

looks good. your tiling when you are not on the beer, must be fantastic.

The old planning dept won't welcome me back any time soon, but that's another story.

What about a bit of quality DPM. the rubber squishy stuff. I would have thought that the rubber would re-seal itself around the nail.

Has anybody heard if the Government is intending to extend the neighbourhood consultation scheme ? ie, the old 4mt to 8mt depth for detached properties. I can't find any info on it anywhere, and if i have to go down that route, i'm defo going to run out of time.

Sounds a bit like you are thinking along the lines of the Walter Segal ??? principal ? Internal walls that you can move around as required. ie, Three smaller bedrooms that you can turn into Two larger rooms when you can finally get rid of one of the kids ??? Or am i missing the point? I've only been on the site for a couple of days, but welcome. The site makes great reading, and is much more interesting than the telly.

I would defo go for as wide as i could. Getting cars in and out of garages is a pain. if you have things stored down each side, it might enable you to get these out, without having to get the car out first.

I would second the wall board panels. They look great in my opinion, and no grout to either go Black, or leak. Used them on my Daughters last year.

Welcome. If you would prefer timber, than i dont see it as a problem. Use the reinforcing mesh that you normally put in the concrete around the inside of say your 4x2 structure. Cheap. Then a batton, then line with 18mm Osb. The only weak point will be the door. I like a thick door frame, double door. One opens out, and the other opens in. Cheap alarm, Solar if no power. Contact breaker on outside door. Keypad on inner door. Scum gets through your outside door. Beep, beep, beep, and sign on second door says. Hi scum. You now have 15 seconds to enter the correct code before my shed starts screaming at you... P.s Please smile for the hidden cameras.

Yes. I can't find anything in the council's policies that says there should be no more dwellings in the greenbelt. They based the decision on overdevelopement, as they viewed the proposal for Two against the existing bungalow of about 650sq ft, and not the extended house that they have recently passed of 3000sq ft. I expect they are entitled to do that, but it is madness. There was a bungalow near me, (same council) that got permission for extending into a large two storey. They then got an LDC for a six car garage, workshop, etc, and went back in for another house instead. Got refused, but passed on appeal. To be fair, I wrote my own planning statement, and don't think i made enough of what i could do re 3000sq ft, and the council made a veiled comment about the designs of the Two houses. I'm going to get an architect to check over the designs, and tweek them, and get a professional to write the planning statement. My intention is to then re-submit using my free go, and then if refused again, will consider going straight to appeal. The road, is ruralish, and very scruffy, with a fir bit of mixed use. Car Repairs, Haulage Yard, Scrap Yard. It's not full of fantastic large detatched houses. It's a mix of large detached, smaller detached, scruffy old bungalows. A row of terraced houses, and looks a bit of a mess. I do understand the council taking the stance they have, and all the neighbour objections. However i can provide Two nice new houses, for Two families, instead of One large house, and having had to help (A lot) to get my Three daughters £££££ on to the property ladder, I do feel it is fundamentaly better to provide Two houses for future generations. Especially in the South East where housing prices are madness. I might not win at the end of the day, but i do think it's worth the fight. We should be making the best use of any previously developed land we have available. I'm not asking to carve up a piece of virgin Green belt. I could cover half of my half acre in scruffy outbuildings etc, or a large 3000sq ft. Would it not be better to put Two reasonable sized houses on the previously developed land instead ?????

yep. Over devel in the Greenbelt. Compared my two houses against the existing Bungalow, and not the 3000sq ft that they passed.

To extend the existing bungalow........... worst case, i will go back for permission to knock and build, and end up with exactly the house i have permission to extend to. I don't see how they could refuse that.

Get that, however, i can fit both of the new houses inside the one extended house. 8mins walk to bus stop. 16mins walk to high st, and nearer to the village green, tennis club, football club, than most of the houses within the village boundary. Two houses at aprox 1500sq ft each have to be better than one large house.

Well done Russell. I think i could ProDave, but they did make a veiled comment about the designs, so it may be best to have a pro re-visit them. I don't think i made enough of the special circumstances, so again i think it would be worth having a pro look at the planning statement. So far i have done everything myself, so might be best to spend a few bob and get a pro application in, that would be strong enough to go to appeal if ness

Good morning. I'm Jim from Bovingdon, in Hertfordshire. My wife and i purchased a 1942 built bungalow on a half acre plot about 20 months ago. Although it is in the Green belt, i didn't really give it a great deal of thought. I did check that the was no artical 4. Once i started looking into it i realised that i might have a bit of an issue re Green belt. I spoke to the planning dept at Dacorum council and decided to adopt the following route. Rear 8 mt deep full width extension under the neighbourhood consultation scheme. No probs. Obtained an LDC for extensions to either side of the property , gable ends to the roof, and a dormer. Using this i then drew up the ugliest property i could sticking within what i could do re the above. I then drew up a modernish, flat roof, slate hung house that used the existing bungalow of about 650 sq ft, and extended it to about 2850 sq ft. I sent this in for permission, together with the ugly one, and waited to see how i got on. The delegated planning officer had to be just about the most uncommunicative, no personality, person i had ever spoken to. I think i got 4 supports, and one objection from the nearest neighbour. The planning officer never contacted me once, so after about Six weeks i started trying to ring him. I must have left him atleast 20 telephone messages, but he never returned any of them. Once the 8 weeks had passed i wrote to the head of planning, and said i thought that the service, for which i was paying was a joke. Finally, my delegated officer contacted me. He said he could'nt pass my modern design, "No way" and so i asked him what might get passed. He would'nt really commit to anything, so i did about 5 different designs and emailed them to him. I rang him a week later and said i needed him to look at them, and give me some feedback. I basically got, Number 1, No, 2No 3No 4no 5Looks okish. I seized on that and said to him. Right my current proposal is now about 3 weeks overdue, If i withdraw it, and re-apply with design 5, will you look after that application for me, and get it sorted. Basically, this, after a couple of extensions of time, and some gentle nudging from me got passed. So i now have Planning to extend a 650ish sq ft bungalow in the Greenbelt into about 3000sq ft. Although no the best design in the world. However as far as i'm concerned RESULT. This got me thinking, so i got my pencil out again. I then designed 2 four bedroom detached houses side by side, but made sure that i kept them within the footprint of the large extended house, and that the front view of the Two houses (bulk) fitted inside the front view of the front view of the extended house for which i obtained permission. I emailed this off to the planning officer, and asked what he thought. "Would it not be better for me to provide Two houses for future generations, than One large house. " No response was all i got from him. Anyway, I thought about it for a while, and to be honest. I don't need a 3000sq ft house, and i do fundamentally believe that it would be much better to provide Two houses for Two family's. So i sent in my application for Two houses. ...... Refused, however they took no account of what they had already given planning permission for, and compared the new Two houses to the existing Bungalow, saying that they didn't consider that the planning permission that was obtained, would be implemented. So as of now, i'm looking for an architect, and a professional planning statement writer. I will have the architect re-visit, and re-fine my designs. Have a professional planning statement written, and re-submit using my free go, making it clear that i will go straight to appeal after 8 weeks. Sorry to ramble, but so much to tell, and what a great site this is.