deancatherine09

We've gone RAL 7016 Black Grey Wanted Jet black but 'Dark Grey' was specified on the planning app and so to avoid a delay in discharge of conditions we wanted something was called 'Grey' so the pen pushers at the council would OK it. It looks black in person.

Yes, £30k over their high performance range. 280sqm (340 incl cinema room in loft) house. We said we would rather get the fabric of the building the best we could, and scrimp on final fixtures and fittings (that can be more easily replaced at a later date). We will probably end up with an eBay kitchen for a few years though 😅 although are in early 30's and plan to live in the house for the majority (if not all) of our lives hopefully, so time isn't such a huge issue.

We are in a VERY similar situation to markharro - in fact I could write an identical post to his ref our situation and the only difference is our MBC slab is week after next! We chose the MBC package as it hugely de-risked the project for us having one company doing foundation slab and TF. We've gone passive, yes it was £30k more but just made sense to us. We both work full time and are PM'ing. It's time consuming and exhausting, coming home from work and doing hours of admin, but there are two distinct advantages in my book. One being the cost saving. The second (and potentially more significant one for us) is being able to set our own specifications, do our own quality control and select our own trades.

Go Timber frame. Our MBC timber frame is working out at about £765 per square metre including a passive raft. Yours is a simpler design than ours too! If you are abroad you will need to have a trusted main contractor working around and coordinating other trades.

We ended up with MBC. As we are project managing it hugely de-risked the process getting one supplier to do both the insulated slab and timber frame. We've gone for their passive standard one and they are starting on site next week. The only issue I've had with them is the PM seems to rub everyone up the wrong way but the technical designer we've had has been excellent so far. We did have Scotframe as a second choice, but we would have had to engage a second contractor to do the foundations. Then they blew it by accidently forwarding us an internal email complaining about how picky we were 😁

We never put our caravan on the PP. It's just the two of us and we are actively involved in the build so you don't need PP. If you have kids, you will do as they can't technically be classed as workers.

Would you be able to let me know how much, as a % of total house valuation, the value went up once the foundations were finished? Thanks in advance

Hi - we are going through very similar at the moment (probably with the same TF company!) and wondered if you ever got a resolution to this?

We had planned to do the groundworks ourselves and have a 3tn Kubota excavator in order to do so. We have done all the drainage but are struggling with time between our day jobs to fit in the site clearance and foundation prep before MBC come onto site in the new year. Is there a good place/website etc to find groundworker labour on a day rate? We are in Hampshire

We have got Velfac triple glazed windows. All of them are below 1 with some of the larger fixed windows achieving around 0.7. Not too expensive either! If you definitely want DG (I would urge you to reconsider) Velfac do that too, I am sure their U values will be decent as the frames are good.

Ecology were fine with Estimators Online quote from us for our build 🙂

Hi all, We are looking for opinions and advice on the systems we have currently specified for our build. It’s a near-passivhaus build, with MBC timber frame on an insulated raft foundation. Our predicted SAP rating is 102. The Primary fuel will be electric, there is no gas in the village, and we don’t intend to install LPG or Oil. We plan on having a large solar array (just waiting to DNO approval at the moment) and Tesla Powerwall – using the Octopus Tesla Electricity tariff, so power diverters and smart energy management are off the cards. We are looking at having a Sunamp Heat battery, in place of a hot water cylinder, and heating the house will be Ground floor UFH, and potentially using the MVHR air. We would like to run the ASHP in reverse in summer to cool the ground floor slab and the MVHR – but would still need to run it forwards to charge the heat battery. The Sunamp would be the HP version, which has primary input of (High Temperature) ASHP, and a backup option of mains electricity. This suggests 2 possibly options for Hot water in summer: 1) Run the ASHP in Heating mode when necessary to charge the Sunamp – and disconnect the UFH and MVHR art this point 2) Always run the ASHP in cooling mode when actively cooling, and charge the Sunamp from electricity (surplus from the solar in summer). Sunamp specify ASHPs to work with the heat battery, one being the Valiant aroTherm which is reversible. We wonder if anyone has done this sort of configuration and can offer advice on how they achieved it / information on how it has performed. Is there a valve / manifold product available that could handle isolating the output of the ASHP from the Sunamp or the Heating elements depending on which mode is being used on each? Our main concern at the moment is that we like a cool bedroom (17 – 18 degrees) and want to make sure we can achieve this year round with the systems we install. Here is a simple diagram of the system we are trying to describe with this post.

They all immediately got up and left 🙂 They had it all mixed. We were first there and sat on the front row, they came in and sat on the front row other side. I didn't glance over there once throughout the entire meeting - it was pretty awkward to say the least!

To be fair, I think our planning officer and the department have been pretty good. They have been hard to get hold of and did cause a frustrating delay after our nitrates information was approved by NE but their report was very thorough and they did multiple site visits (neighbours, our plot). They were very supportive last night. The house that were doing the complaining about the ridge height recently demolished the 5m tall chalet bungalow on their site and built a HUGE 9m tall house - and during the speakers and debate the planning officer left the slide up which showed the before and after for their house. The irony of him standing there with that in the background complaining about our ridge height going up was amusing. Not sure if that was the planner cleverly trying to undermine what he was saying or just a co-incidence. I do think our attendance and statements helped, whether they were crucial I will never know. One of the councillors in particular kept referring to what we had said in our speech in her supporting statements - especially around us making compromising amendments and the sustainability aspect, which the planning officer didn't touch on so she only knew that from what we said. The parish council and ward councillor both said that we should build the house as per previous permission, but then went on to say that the drainage / parking on the site wouldn't support any new dwelling. There were a lot of contradictions in their objections. Luckily the planning councillors picked them up on that. I do actually think the planning committee did a good job. Obviously I am biased on our proposal, but we did stay and listen to the other two application discussions and they made a good call, including overturning a officers recommendation of refusal on one of them.

Just wanted to extend my profound thanks for all the replies and useful info. Both my partner and I spoke at committee last night - jointly. We spoke about our motivations, how we had made efforts to integrate the proposal into the neighbourhood and the compromises we had made. We also included some brief information about the sustainability of the house we are proposing. Neighbours, parish council and local ward councillor all rallied together and spoke against the proposal. At times their behaviour felt like playground bullies ganging up on us - the 'newbies' to the village, not helped by the fact we are a good 10-20 years younger than them and trying to do something a bit different. They told lies and waffled on about drainage for a while which isn't even a planning matter. The local councillor, which I assume does this a lot, was actually very poor at speaking and did talk about a lot of non planning matters, which was a surprise. Even said the only reason the original planning permission was granted was because the old owner was disabled. That was quickly shot down by the officer. The most obvious and upsetting lie they told was that we hadn't even consulted them about the proposal, when we took round the plans, stood in their kitchen and went through them - with no adverse comments received. I guess they must have developed selective amnesia 🙄 One of the committee members was very negative about the proposal, but luckily the rest of them all spoke up in support and on the vote we had 1 abstain and the rest support for permission. All in all, a incredibly stressful process that I do not ever wish to repeat. I think I read a little nugget on here a while back 'you only find out how unhinged your neighbours are when you apply for planning permission'. i can sure say I 100% agree with that now! Onwards and upwards with our project now!

After a nearly 5 month wait for Natural England to agree our nitrate mitigation solution the planning officer has finally concluded his report. Although we have known since October he intended to recommend permission. Despite showing the immediate neighbors all our plans and them raising no issues, several of them of course, vehemently objected. Even had some objections from people who live the other end of the village. Therefore due to number of objections (6 initial and then 3 re-objections post adjustments) we are headed to committee with a planning officer recommendation for approval. Our architect has suggested that there would be little benefit in us speaking at the meeting as the planning officer is supporting our application, but we are really not sure whether having that personal touch would help? The architect suggested if we opted to speak it might open us up to questions, but we are not really sure what type of questions they might ask (the build / relationship with neighbours / intentions, etc)? Any recommendations for those who have been involved in committee meetings? What should we expect, and what can/ should we do to give ourselves the best chance of this being voted through for permission?

We got a mortgage offer with Ecology in January, made the first drawdown in April and permission expired in October. (We have since locked it in). So, not all of them stick to 12m

Hi We are looking for a company to carry out a soil survey in the Hampshire area in preparation for an insulated raft foundation. Has anyone got any recommendations?

Just want to express my thanks for the recommendations. I have contacted a couple of companies and also, started looking into whether it's feasible for us to do the work ourselves, then just get a company in to pour and power float the concrete. @BotusBuild how long would you say it took you start to finish, and did you strip the site and lay the drainage pipes too?

I am really struggling so far to get anywhere in my search for a contractor who can supply + install an insulated raft foundation for our project in Hampshire. I had a contact from Isoquick for a groundworker who uses their product but after a couple of promises for a quote he has now stopped responding to me. Any recommendations?

I already have a quote from Scotframe, but am looking to get a few more SIPS quotes for comparison. I thought they had it in the bag but they have shocked us with a recent huge price increase so we are casting the net wider now. Companies who do the engineering, supply and installation preferably. We are based in Hampshire. 280m2 build Thanks in advance

V2 back from the architects. Much better and we are pretty much there. We are still debating the vaulted ceiling / triangular windows at the back (I personally don't love them) so I think they might go, plus we may tinker with a couple of the other windows too. Balcony is a non negotiable point - the views are stunning and it's one aspect of the house I am really looking forward to.

Thanks all for your input - lots of valuable points and very much appreciated. We had a meeting with the Architects yesterday and lots of points raised were discussed. The twin roof design I do like, and with planning constraints I am not sure there's much else that would fit the bill, but I take on board the points re gulley. We already had on the list to add a couple of Velux windows in that gulley, to let in light to the roof space and allow access for inspection and maintenance. I don't think anyone will be able to see them from the ground so they shouldn't cause an issue for planning. Other points discussed were, reduce balcony size, move en suite to right of bedroom, change larder access along with add plant room with space taken from downstairs shower (not needed). We are also removing the chimney (never in our brief and they guessed we wanted one). I also have asked them to move the stairs more centrally and move the coat / shoe storage to next to the front door. So we are hoping the second draft will remove some of the design issues in the above. I imagine it won't be final but much closer! The solar gain on that stairwell window is a valid point, but we aim to mitigate that by having deep set windows (internal opening) and external shading. The top will be opening so we can use it to vent the house in summer.

Below are the first draft back from the architects. Background - there is already PP for a detached house on the plot. This design follows the same footprint but has been amended and modified internally and externally. It's a 0.4 acre site with good views over the South side. Overall, we are really happy with what they have done. And instead of Zinc/ Timber I am leaning towards charred larch / brick with slate roof. There are a few adjustments internally we are pondering on but I guess the question is to the more experienced folk out there, what would you suggest as improvements?

Thanks all. You've confirmed my concerns. To further complicate matters, the old owner of the site (who got the PP) has already done the self build exemption for the site, so now I need to work out how to transfer it over to me. I can't do the transfer form as it needs signing by him, so will have to try and assume liability from scratch myself and then re-apply for the exemption - hopefully that will work.