Hoping to self-build

[Justine]

Hi
New to the forum thanks to some great advice at the hoebuilding show this year. 
My partner and I are hoping to self-build, as many of you know, it's nigh on impossible to find a plot, so we are stuck. 

We are pretty much on the brink of giving up our hopes, but giving it a last ditch attempt at finding somewhere.
We are based in Birmingham and all we see is giant unaffordable plots or tiny pickets which seem terribly over priced. 
The reason for the build is for us to be able to do all our work from home.

Looking forward to being an active member of this forum. 
Good luck with your builds!

[Bitpipe]

Welcome, have you looked at a plot with a house already on it?

 

Quite often buying a dilapidated property that'e being marketed as renovation can be cost effective to demolish and rebuild as you still get the zero rated VAT and if the house / bungalow is very tired you'd be stripping it back to the bare bones anyway.

 

Plus services and access are already taken care of.

[joe90]

10 minutes ago, Bitpipe said:

have you looked at a plot with a house already on it?

Welcome to THE forum for self builders, +1 to the above, VAT reclaimable, services exist etc etc

[ToughButterCup]

Hello @Justine.

Persistence is the key.  SWMBO bought our plot in 1985. After decades of being told that planning permission was a pipe dream, we started building in 2016.  I know it's easy to say - be persistent - and harder to hold on to doing something about that persistence. It might be a really good idea then to plan in detail ;

• what's your ideal house?
• cost it
• re-plan
• how are you going to get PP for it?
• look at the Planning Authority website. Read the planning permissions and refusals for houses of the type you might build. Know the logic behind each decision.

There's so much more than anyone expects to do in preparation for a build: use this time a first class opportunity to do masses of research. Know the politics of it too: local and national.

 

Good luck.

Ian