j_com

Thanks all for your comments - it has given me reassurance that having a plant room at the far end of the house is not worth it. This also helps with simplifying the layout at that end of the house! I think there should be a reasonable amount of space under the stairs for DHW & UFH equipment and maybe MVHR too - that also means it is not adjacent to any bedrooms. I suppose we could also form a riser somewhere between the stairs and kitchen to run services upstairs. This leaves me with the question of where to locate the ASHP itself. It is presumably preferable to locate the unit itself as close as possible to the cylinder to minimise heat losses. If the cylinder is under the stairs then the ideal location would be immediately outside, problem is right next to the front door of the house. Any thoughts on this?

Hi all, Our initial house sketches include a plant room located on the ground floor at the eastern end of the house. Initially this seemed fine as I it was as far as possible from the bedrooms (to minimise risk of ASHP/MVHR noise). However, the bathrooms (1 downstairs, 3 upstairs) are all at the western end, ~20 m away. Thinking about it more, it will mean the hot taps will need to run for ages to get any hot water, some of the UFH loops on the ground floor will also have very long runs. What are people's thoughts on plant room location? Would it be preferable to scrap the plant room and have the hot water cylinder, UFH manifold etc. more centrally (e.g. under the stairs)? The MVHR could possibly go in the roof space above the single storey utility room? Cheers!

That's the plan, new house within the original site boundary and overlapping with the current house footprint. The extra bits are "nice to have" but it also makes everyone's lives easier having a four sided plot, rather than one with 8.

ProDave, while the landowner has indicated they may sell some land, it is far from certain. We would not want to go through the planning process only for them to change their mind or ask for more money. Jilly, this is our thinking too. The council surely cannot stop us buying or owning the land - just whether it is part of the garden curtilage. I guess the question is: can the agricultural land be added to the title deeds for the house once bought, but before the council has approved change of use? If the council then say no to the change in use, we could presumably still use it as a vegetable plot or something?

Hi all – first post so be nice We own a plot (~1500 m^2) in central Scotland which is surrounded by agricultural land and looking to replace the dwelling on it. The plot is an unusual shape, like two offset rectangles, which makes siting the new house more difficult and leaves two areas of fairly useless agricultural land in the surrounding fields. The landowner may be open to an offer for these areas (~400 m^2 total) to “square-off” the plot. Assuming we can come to an agreement with them, what order do things need to happen? If we can reach an agreement, do we just need to amend the deeds in the first instance? Then we can include change of use in the planning application for a replacement dwelling? What happens if the council say no for some reason? We will still own the additional land, but it is not part of the garden? Thanks in advance.