Charles Ebden Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 Hi all, I would be interested in your views of large scale custom build sites such as Graven Hill in Bicester. Here's a good piece on the site from the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/money/2018/feb/10/custom-self-build-housing-graven-hill I'm assuming (perhaps incorrectly) most of you have built a single property perhaps away from the crowd. How would you feel living on a site, where everyone builds their own home? Would thins detract from your original reasons for building your own home? I personally feel its a significant step forward, in terms of building homes in sufficient numbers that meet our own individual needs and have a unique (debatable possibly) character. Anyway I thought it would be an interesting debate and I look forward to hearing your views. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 I believe we have at least one member here who is building at Graven Hill, plus another that did a LOT of research into it. Might be worth doing a search here, as there have been some lengthy discussions on the pros and cons of the way Graven Hill has been set up. Here are a few threads to get you started: 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ferdinand Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 35 minutes ago, Charles Ebden said: Hi all, I would be interested in your views of large scale custom build sites such as Graven Hill in Bicester. Here's a good piece on the site from the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/money/2018/feb/10/custom-self-build-housing-graven-hill I'm assuming (perhaps incorrectly) most of you have built a single property perhaps away from the crowd. How would you feel living on a site, where everyone builds their own home? Would thins detract from your original reasons for building your own home? I personally feel its a significant step forward, in terms of building homes in sufficient numbers that meet our own individual needs and have a unique (debatable possibly) character. Anyway I thought it would be an interesting debate and I look forward to hearing your views. WElcome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visti Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 Welcome to the forum! I'm one of the the GH builders (that's my post that @JSHarris linked too at the end) and I'm a massive supporter of the whole scheme. Mainly for the fact it gives me an opportunity to build in an area where otherwise I'd never have a chance. It also has an added benefit for us of putting together a community of like minded neighbours. Short term everyone is in the same boat, so you won't have neighbours complaining but rather they'd be joining in! Plus long term I think the area will be much more interesting with the diversity of houses and people than anywhere else! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Russell griffiths Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 Is there the potential to bulk order, @Visti has commented that he has to have a beam and block floor, whats the chances of contacting a supplier for this with the understanding that there will be lots of future orders. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visti Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 On everything but the foundation yes; I'm hoping to setup some tool and welfare sharing groups to save on costs. There are numerous types of plots at GH, but the closest to a true self build are the Golden Brick plots. That is to say you design the home, but they will build you the foundation based on your specifications, then you do the rest. When you reserve, you agree to a number of conditions, the principle one being a suspended foundation due to the clay heave on site. The reason for them undertaking the foundation for you is two fold I've been told. First is to ensure no builder compromises a neighbours foundation, and to spread out the risk amongst everyone (it is an MoD site!). It isn't ideal, but is clearly stipulated up front and it doesn't have to just be beam & block. I know some are using a Tetris system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Ebden Posted February 24, 2018 Author Share Posted February 24, 2018 Out of interest do you know whether there is much provision for affordable (social) housing? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProDave Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 I thought one of the reasons given for the "golden brick" thing is it was the only way to supply services to the plot VAT free. Personally I would rather have a bit more freedom and pay the VAT on the services. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visti Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 There's a lot of affordable housing being built. I can upload some maps later when I get home showing the layout and provisioning of them. That is true too @ProDave, but that is more for the council than the builders. We have to pay stamp duty on the golden brick, so the lack of VAT doesn't help us much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visti Posted February 24, 2018 Share Posted February 24, 2018 Here's a good map showing the different type of plots for the first phase of Graven Hill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandAbuild Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 When you buy the plot with Golden Brick (foundations to dpc + one course of brickwork) you are buying it in the course of construction. This means it is zero rated for VAT. Without this, you would have to pay VAT on everything. It also gives control to the site owners over what is built, as they in effect govern the footprint and hence the size and position of the house. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeterW Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 35 minutes ago, RandAbuild said: When you buy the plot with Golden Brick (foundations to dpc + one course of brickwork) you are buying it in the course of construction. This means it is zero rated for VAT. Without this, you would have to pay VAT on everything. It also gives control to the site owners over what is built, as they in effect govern the footprint and hence the size and position of the house. That’s what worries me though ..!! So for warranty purposes, who is inspecting and who is saying it is ok..? And if you choose say an ICF or timber frame build route, do you get to say what the founds look like or the tolerances that are required ..?? I may be wrong and doing them a disservice but I can’t see the contractors putting the founds in for the golden brick sites doing it to a specification, more likely to the lowest price bid ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandAbuild Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 @PeterW I think the inspector for the self-builder's warranty provider would need to sign off the golden brick works. The structural engineer for the foundations must also provide a collateral warranty to the main warranty provider, which would in effect transfer their PI liability. The sale contract should include provisions for this. Buying a site which includes works to golden brick must protect the buyer that these works or carried out properly and with a warranty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeterW Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 This is where I think this may start to creak as there are plenty of parties who will be looking to offload their liability ..! I would be interested to see what options are available for the founds / slab such as passive, underfloor heating, ICF or other systems or if it’s just beam and block to minimum BRegs and a standard trenchfill foundation. Do you know @RandAbuild if the specs are published as I couldn’t find them ..? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charles Ebden Posted February 25, 2018 Author Share Posted February 25, 2018 (edited) @Vistigreat news re the affordable housing, I'm glad to see self build hopefully is becoming affordable, and less of a rich mans game. Thank you also for all the info. I'm currently writing my Masters in Planning and am research self-build and custom build for my dissertation, and will definitely be using Graven Hill as a case study, so thank you for your insight. Edited February 25, 2018 by PeterW Typo... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 @Charles Ebden, I think it's worth looking at why Graven Hill had to put in place such a restrictive, and potentially expensive, solution for the self-build plots. The driver seems to have been inflexibility in the VAT legislation, which prevented the local authority from selling off plots VAT free. Normally building plots don't attract VAT, and neither does the house build itself, but in the case of Graven Hill there was a glitch that meant that all the self-build plots would have attracted VAT on the sale price. They got around this by using the "golden brick" dodge, but that both added restrictions and increased the price of the plots, but it was the only way they could come up with to avoid buyers having to pay VAT. If there had been a more sensible way around this, which would have needed a change in the VAT legislation, it would have been a very much better scheme, and would have cost far less both for the buyers and for the local authority. In many ways, what they've had to do is barking mad, but they seemingly had no other choice. I don't believe that the affordable housing there are self-builds, they are a traditional Housing Association development, just like any other. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandAbuild Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 @JSHarris - Golden brick isn't a 'dodge' - it's a well established way of disposing of land to enable the builder to get the benefits of zero rated VAT on the build. The Graven Hill site differs from buying a traditional self build plot because the site owner wants to retain control over what is built beyond each buyer getting their own planning consent. Leaving it to planning controls would be seen as a free-for-all. I believe the site was transferred from MoD to English Partnerships (EP) and subsequently onto the Homes and Communities Agency. The methodology used by all these agencies that sell off plots is designed to maintain control beyond the normal planning controls, such that the landowner can specify such things as building heights, materials and design standards. I'm not sure if the site has its Design Code, but look for example at Upton in Northampton where EP published a pretty complex set of requirements in a Design Code. That site didn't have any self build plots! @PeterW I can't find the spec either, but the FAQ section of the website says All of the plots will be sold with the foundations, drainage, substructure walls, ground floor slab and utility connections already in place. This is termed as a Golden Brick sale. The foundations, drainage, substructure walls, and ground floor slab will be designed and installed by Graven Hill to suit each self-builder's home design. I doubt if this extends to building bespoke passive slabs, but it may do. Ground conditions will be a factor - if the overall site is subject to heave, structural engineers may advise against them as they will always err on the side of caution. Would be interesting to find out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 20 minutes ago, RandAbuild said: @JSHarris - Golden brick isn't a 'dodge' - it's a well established way of disposing of land to enable the builder to get the benefits of zero rated VAT on the build. The fact remains that if the VAT legislation wasn't so obstructive, then this dodge wouldn't have been required. It would have been straightforward to put all the controls they wanted in place using a covenant, or similar mechanism, or they could even have amended the local plan to add a policy specifically for the site. The main issue is that it seems to have forced the use of less energy efficient foundation systems, unless the builders choose to try and get around that limitation at additional complexity and cost. The house footprint and design restrictions they wished to impose did not require them to go so far as to put in all the foundations. I was similarly constrained on our plot, by some very tight planning restrictions, and they included exactly where the house would be, what size of footprint would be allowed, even what the finishes were and the floor and ridge height were. However, I retained the freedom to use any build method I chose, as long as the external appearance, size and shape met the requirements. Had the VAT legislation been flexible enough to accommodate what was ultimately the government disposing of land for development, then none of this barking mad shenanigans would have been needed, and there could have been substantial cost savings for all involved. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandAbuild Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 @JSHarris +1 on VAT complications and their impact. Unfortunately HMRC couldn't give a stuff about sustainable construction! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RandAbuild Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 No passive slab here! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 3 minutes ago, RandAbuild said: No passive slab here! That's probably my main objection, the scheme forces the use of a thermally poorer foundation system, just to meet a desire for design harmony and comply with the inflexibility of the VAT legislation. Why on earth the government, who encouraged schemes of this sort, couldn't have simply amended the VAT legislation to make bare plots zero rated, as they would be in any virtually other circumstance, is beyond me. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visti Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 (edited) There is very much a Design Code which outlines the different themes within the development. This is backed up by a Local Development Order to enforce various elements such as ridge heights, build zones, limits on caravans etc... Both are distilled down into what is called a Plot Passport for each plot. This one 1982-P-P-C-xxx-0156-16.pdf is an example. You can see page 2 lists all the 'rules' of the build, including Performance and Sustainability requirements. When it comes to planning permission, we have to adhere to all of these rules point by point. It did however make it clearer what the criterion were for getting a successful planning ruling first time around through! The foundation isn't dictated by Graven Hill oddly enough. It is actually the warranty provider Premier Guarantee who are doing so. Their warranty is provided with the Golden Brick package as standard and they have some stringent limitations on what they'll accept. Hay bale construction? Just nope... You can chose to purchase your own warranty provider, but that'll be out of your own pocket. We challenged the fact we couldn't go with a passive slab several times across many months and have some lengthy essays from Premier on why it was simply a no go. There was the option to look elsewhere for a warranty provider in an attempt to get a passive slab, but ultimately we chose to take a path of less resistance so as not to lose more time on it. To be fair on GH, it is 100% clear in the Plot Passport (page 3, paragraph 9 and 10) that it is a strong recommendation by GH, not mandatory. The affordable housing isn't custom build unfortunatly, only the Golden Brick plots are. The rest vary in the amount of input you can have. Some like the Tailored Homes let you arrange the interior layout and the facade, others like the affordable housing will be sold as with any other new build (you can see these already going up in the photo below, behind the black pipework where our plot is situated). To be fair though, there is a decent range of plot sizes to pick from so that you can build what you can afford! Some, such as the apartments, are nearly done as you can see in the far distance here: Edited February 25, 2018 by Visti Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeterW Posted February 25, 2018 Share Posted February 25, 2018 Thanks for that ! So Golden Brick is not just that, it’s the warranty provider too... do they also insist on the BRegs provider..?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visti Posted February 26, 2018 Share Posted February 26, 2018 p.s. Here is a link to their latest news letter which explains the Golden Brick plots in a bit more detail. It also covers the Tailored Terraces too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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