Replace Dwelling

[Mania]

Morning 

 

To introduce ourselves, we have just received planning permission to demolish our residential bungalow and replace with a house, we hope to do this in around 2 years time. 

 

At this stage its all about discharging our conditions, research and planning. I have picked up lots of helpful information from this forum already - thank you. 

 

 

[Bored Shopper]

Congratulations!

That's exactly what we've done.

Please post pics as go progress, we here love pics Good luck.

[joe90]

Well done, it’s what we did (and had to fight planners all the way) looking forward to your plans and questions.

[Mania]

Thank you.

 

Joe90

We won our appeal last week...so hopefully no more fighting for us - although my friend tells me that the planners will watch our project like hawks now! ?

[dnb]

They will indeed watch closely. I have the same burden but am a little further through.

Well done on winning the appeal and good luck with the conditions. Hope they aren't too onerous!

[Bitpipe]

Another knockdown and replacer here. We got through planning on second go but were prepared for the long haul.

 

Take your time with the pre-construction stage, work done now can speed up the build itself.

 

Careful thought on services disconnection / re-establishment can save you a few ££

[SeaSocks]

Congratulations! We'll hopefully hear this week whether we get our bungalow... nails are taking a hammering...

We'd just assumed we'd remodel, build upwards and not demolish, so would be very interested to hear about reasons for knockdown and replace and why the struggle with planning??

Cheers!

 

[ToughButterCup]

14 hours ago, Mania said:

....although my friend tells me that the planners will watch our project like hawks now! 

Highly UNlikely.

They haven't the time or resource. But neighbours, axe grinders, bored local weasels, curtain twitchers might. And they could rattle the bush telegraph that wakes a somnolent planner. Who has to react.

 

[PeterW]

Somewhat depends on the council and also who has a vested local interest. 
 

If you’re not in a conservation area or got any TPOs on any trees, I would be doing all the tree work you need plus the nice to have stuff now as that becomes your number one issue if you’re not careful.. 

[joe90]

@Mania glad you won your appeal, I have not seen “hide nor hare “ of the planners since we won our appeal and the neighbour who objected to everything (unreasonably according to the appeal officer) has moved away ? but then again we have no restrictions and only plan to build what we applied fir (apart from some fences that may take years fir me to get round too ?)

[Temp]

20 hours ago, Mania said:

Thank you.

 

Joe90

We won our appeal last week...so hopefully no more fighting for us - although my friend tells me that the planners will watch our project like hawks now! ?

 

In my experience the planners will only take an interest if the neighbours complain about a breech. 

[Mania]

6 hours ago, SeaSocks said:

Congratulations! We'll hopefully hear this week whether we get our bungalow... nails are taking a hammering...

We'd just assumed we'd remodel, build upwards and not demolish, so would be very interested to hear about reasons for knockdown and replace and why the struggle with planning??

Cheers!

 

Thank you SeaSocks.

 

Our poorly built 2 bed bungalow came with its problems accumulated over the years with poor extensions, narrow entrance via stairs, narrow doorways and corridors, split level flooring, damp, mould and flooding to name a few! We did a major renovation to make it habitable. A structural engineer's inspection and report confirmed that it is not feasible to extend upwards due to the poor foundations / construction. It made sense to start again. Plus we will benefit from VAT relief. 

 

Everything went really well throughout the pre-application meetings and feedback was positive from the PO and the team which advised to change the materials etc throughout each stage of design. Unfortunately the PO left just before he was due to make a recommendation for approval - the new officer recommended refusal on the basis of loss of bungalow and street scene. I am convinced that he didn't visit the site and see that every single house is set back and different in terms of style and materials and that our property is dwarfed by two large houses either side. In fact this is the only single storey bungalow left on this street amongst large 2-2.5 storey houses. Interestingly, the council acknowledge that the design is of high quality in terms of design and materials and that the street is full of large houses. 

 

We have no TPOs and not in a protected area, so hopefully the rest will be straight forward.

 

We got there in the end! 

 

Good luck with everything. 

[Mania]

22 minutes ago, Temp said:

 

In my experience the planners will only take an interest if the neighbours complain about a breech. 

Thank you Temp. 

 

I'll embrace myself.

 

I expect my neighbour to do that she seems to be that way inclined. Her objection reasons were dismissed by the council when we applied for planning permission. When it came to the appeal on receipt of the letter she went running round to wind up our other lovely neighbour (who actually recommended the planning consultant to fight our appeal ?) to write an objection too! 

[newhome]

7 hours ago, SeaSocks said:

so would be very interested to hear about reasons for knockdown and replace

 
Lots of people do this for a variety of reasons, including 

 

Demolish and new build is zero rated for VAT;

Can’t get the layout they want from a remodel without significant compromise;

When a remodel is started the walls / foundations are found to be in too poor condition to add a storey;
It’s always easier to get to a better level of insulation and air tightness when you start from scratch. 
 

Those are a few reasons and I can see that some of them are why @Mania is choosing a new build over a remodel. 
 

 

[Mania]

18 hours ago, Bitpipe said:

Another knockdown and replacer here. We got through planning on second go but were prepared for the long haul.

 

Take your time with the pre-construction stage, work done now can speed up the build itself.

 

Careful thought on services disconnection / re-establishment can save you a few ££

Thank you 

 

My checklist is growing fast.

 

Good luck. 

[Bitpipe]

4 hours ago, Mania said:

Thank you 

 

My checklist is growing fast.

 

Good luck. 

 

Are you staying on site during the works or living elsewhere?

 

Electric

Your electric will need disconnected from the house and relocated to a temp site supply for the workers to use. You need to pay the local DNO for this, much cheaper if you expose the cable and dig the jointing pit, dig the trench & lay duct for the new route. You will need to prepare the temp kiosk and have your sparky prepare the DB board, sockets etc.. as the DNO only moves the meter and company fuse. If it's genuinely temp, you need to pay again to move it all back into your finished house.

 

Now, many of us have only done the move once by putting in a more substantial kiosk and making that the final home for the meter. You then run armoured cable from there to your new build. In our case, we did the meter move early on, and ran temps to the old house (so we could stay in it for a bit longer), to the caravan (that we subsequently moved into) and to a site office. Plan was to try and reuse a lot of that cable but most of it got damaged and needed to be replaced, shame but only a few £100 in the grand scheme.

 

Water

This one is easiest - just chop the supply after the meter or stopcock into your site and put in a standpipe. If you're living onsite during the build then you'll need to run a supply to your caravan. As soon as required, groundworkers can run the new feed to the house - I was surprised that practically the last thing that happened - I.e. days before moving in, was the live water being connected to the plumbing system (there were pressure tests etc during first fix). 

 

Fouls

If you're living on site then you'll need to connect your accommodation to the mains sewage (assuming this is what's present today). Otherwise you let your GW grub up all the old sewage, typically back to the IC before the main connection and build out the new set of ICs and ducts etc.. Any fouls and other ducts for power, telecom, ASHP etc need to be in situ before the slab is completed. Some GWs don't like putting in too much foul too early as it often gets damaged (i.e. driven over) by other site activity. Rainwater normally goes in later too as it sits relatively close to the surface and does not touch the main sewer but will go to a RWH tank or straight to soakaway.

 

Gas

Gas needs capped off by the network at the site boundary ahead of demolition. After this the meter can be disconnected and collected (or stored safely on site) by your provider. There is a fixed fee for this and it's not cheap. Some GWs will 'arrange' it to happen for cash in hand but this is at your own risk. It took the team who did mine about 20 mins. Located pipe, dug hole, capped it off, filled hole. Re-instating gas is cheaper as the new connection is subsidises and it was a much more involved process - proper days work for a 4 person team. Your GW will have installed the yellow perforated pipe that they will expect to be there.

 

Telco

If you're staying on site then you'll probably want to keep DSL and phone services. Not as easy as it sounds as you need to facilitate a 'move' which can mean loosing service for a week. A more common approach is to just get one of your crew to disconnect the cable from the house pre demo and if possible, run it near the new location. Then you call BT, and get them to 'fix it'. You then reverse this or ask for a new connection when you move back in. We ducted the telecoms into the house to avoid an overhead wire, we bought and pulled the BT cable ourselves and left one end at the bottom of the pole and the other inside the house where the master socket was required.

 

I think this is it. Remember, ducts are easy to put in during the build, hard after. Think about external power (garden, garage or shed), lighting, gate controls, access systems etc. Put in a duct and one or two poly rope drawstrings and you'll be grateful later.

 

[Mania]

17 hours ago, Bitpipe said:

 

Are you staying on site during the works or living elsewhere?

 

Electric...

 

Thank you SO much for being so generous and sharing this information. 

 

My husband has this idea of living in a purpose built cabin at the bottom of the garden after seeing one at his friend's house. An architect advised it would be possible with permitted development and to get the company to apply. This is another bit of homework for me to follow through. Did you live on site?

 

 

Edited October 27, 2020 by Mania

[Bitpipe]

8 minutes ago, Mania said:

Thank you SO much for being so generous and sharing this information. 

 

My husband has this idea of living in a purpose built cabin at the bottom of the garden after seeing one at his friend's house. An architect advised it would be possible with permitted development and to get the company to apply. This is another bit of homework for me to follow through. Did you live on site?

 

 

 

Yes, a 40x12ft two bed caravan for us, two kids (then junior school age) and the cat. Bought and sold it on when done.

 

Does the cabin exist yet or is it being built for the build and retained? If it is a separate habitable dwelling, it will attract council tax when your main is demolished and will continue to do so after the main dwelling is completed. We only got off that hook by proving that the van had left site once sold.

 

PP and building regs are a separate issue, depends if the dwelling is considered temporary or permanent. The main challenge you may have with a cabin is getting it onto the main sewage, power, water & telecoms are easy. Sewage needs the necessary fall (1:80 is adequate, 1:40 better to prevent problems) so you need to see if you can get the necessary run between where the cabin will be and where you attach to main sewer.

 

I would not consider living onsite and relying on a portaloo or showering at the gym, friends etc, especially with variable COVID restrictions etc.

[Mania]

4 minutes ago, Bitpipe said:

Does the cabin exist yet or is it being built for the build and retained? If it is a separate habitable dwelling, it will attract council tax when your main is demolished and will continue to do so after the main dwelling is completed. We only got off that hook by proving that the van had left site once sold.

 

The cabin doesn't exist yet. if we could go down that road I wonder if we could remove the bathroom and bedroom and convert it back to a standard storage cabin when we are done or even pull down the whole thing as it will still be substantially cheaper than local rents ?

 

Wow, in a caravan I bet that was fun (and intense). How long were you in there for? How were your neighbours about it / weren't you affected if you are you rural?

 

I will check our land registry document, I recall a mention of a caravan, I'm not sure in which context though.

[joe90]

Generally councils allow caravans as on site accommodation whilst a build is going on (council tax band a) as it’s classed as temporary like a shipping container .

[Ferdinand]

Remember that caravan usually means a 12 x 40 static rather than a towable one. It is bearable (I am told ?) for a time.

 

Winter, multiple years, lack of careful planning, mud and the bracing weather of the Highlands are the challenges.

 

F

 

[Weebles]

We are another family who survived a caravan for 20 months in our case (one very hard winter and we are down south).  37 ft x 12 ft, 3 bedroom, us and 2 teenagers.  Tight but do-able.  Installed an insulated summerhouse the year before (garden building, no PP needed) where we stored our stuff (and now use as a summerhouse).  Also had an old wooden playhouse where we installed a toilet (for anyone on site, and a second toilet for us), washing machine, tumble drier, kettle etc.  Was brilliant to be on site and helped us fit the build around our jobs.  Not sure whether we would have coped in a Covid lockdown situation though.  The caravan was fine provided at least 2 people were out during the day!  Not a lot of room for 4 people to "work from home" particularly if wet.

We are in the house now, thank goodness, and closer to the end than the beginning.  But still not finished.

Use your time wisely now to plan / source things.  I found that moving into the caravan was a mini project in itself.

 

We had the caravan on the planning permission.  Neighbours were pretty good.  Caravan was the least of their issues.  And it is now gone.  Though selling it wasn't as straightforward as we had hoped.  However, it was significantly cheaper than renting locally.  And meant we were on site.

[Mania]

2 hours ago, joe90 said:

Generally councils allow caravans as on site accommodation whilst a build is going on (council tax band a) as it’s classed as temporary like a shipping container .

Thank you

[Mania]

44 minutes ago, Weebles said:

We are in the house now, thank goodness, and closer to the end than the beginning.  But still not finished.

Use your time wisely now to plan / source things.  I found that moving into the caravan was a mini project in itself.

 

We had the caravan on the planning permission.  Neighbours were pretty good.  Caravan was the least of their issues.  And it is now gone.  Though selling it wasn't as straightforward as we had hoped.  However, it was significantly cheaper than renting locally.  And meant we were on site.

 

Thank you - great advice and what a position for you to be in! Congratulations. 

I understand what you mean about the mini project.

I am not sure "Mrs. Bouquet" next door would approve of a caravan, but I will definitely look into this and it would be great if we can. Hoardings would be up anyway. It would be great if we can avoid paying rent. 

[joe90]

40 minutes ago, Mania said:

I am not sure "Mrs. Bouquet" next door would approve of a caravan

it’s not up to neighbours to approve what you do, it’s up to the law. It would be nice of you to inform her once the council have confirmed it.