Jenny would like to sell her house with planning permission for either a loft conversion or extension to the house. How does she go about it and is there cost involved? She wants to have the planning permission in place as an incentive to buyers.
Keith Rigby, of Bective Leslie Marsh, says: The demand for large family houses is increasing and it has become popular to exploit every bit of possible space to accommodate today’s growing households. So people have traditionally looked to go up into the loft or to dig down into the basement.
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Sounds easy. But between you and your extension are a number of hurdles, the most important two being planning permission and, if applicable, conservation area consent. Every council has a different set of rules and regulations that can change from street to street, not just between boroughs. What Westminster says no to, Hammersmith and Fulham might simply rubber stamp. Just because your neighbour has a loft conversion doesn’t mean you will automatically get consent: a lot of councils don’t like loft conversions or other roof-line development and now apply a three-year rule in order to block them — this means that if there hasn’t been something similar near you in the past three years, then that will lessen your chances.
A good starting point for all of this is your local planning office. They will be able to tell you exactly what permission you require, whether you can extend under permitted development (this allows terraced houses to be extended at ground floor level up to 10 per cent of the original volume of the house up to a maximum of 50 cubic metres without planning consent), are you in a conservation area, and what they will view favourably. The Department of the Environment also publishes a very good planning guide for householders which gives you a general guide to the planning system.
However, all of this comes at a price — the council charges for planning applications (for example, Kensington and Chelsea charges £135) and your application will require plans. So unless you are a whizz at technical drawings you will need an architect, which will mean more cost. Also if you aren’t intending to do the extension, it would be a good idea to get your plans costed so that buyers will have an indication of what they can do and how much it will cost.
Bective Leslie Marsh: 020 7221 0330
Email: property.consumer@thetimes.co.uk with your daytime telephone number. All advice is given without responsibility
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