[Closed] House buying & planning permission

internal is covered by buildings regs, not planning (unless its listed maybe?). what you do has to be safe.

how big is the external work?  https://www.planningportal.co.uk/ has good guides on what comes under permitted development etc.

most councils now won't commit to anything.

Most councils charge for pre app advice and can take months to respond.

A local architect/technician should be able to give you a fair degree of confidence that your proposal will be approved.

You could always make an offer subject to getting planning approval (thats what we do and the seller always without fail says yes) - it typically takes eight weeks to go through the councils system

What you need to do might even be permitted development - look on the planning portal web site for info on that.

that link above is the place to look - the main point is that anything directly rear of the house and not taking up more than 50% of the land is good to go

that link above is the place to look – the main point is that anything directly rear of the house and not taking up more than 50% of the land is good to go

Permitted Development rules for detached outbuildings and Planning Permission for extensions / alterations to a dwelling are separate things..........and for either theres more to it that as stated

Try the Council; they may be able to help or they may not, but don't buy anything assuming everything will be OK........it very rarely is

Also worth checking that there are no protection orders on any trees that will need to be removed as part of the extension. You can usually do that via your council website.

Thank you, some very useful info above.

Potentially we could fall outside of permitted at the rear of the house.  At the south side of the house we would like to extend out 2-3m across the lower elevation of the house to get bi fold doors etc in to the south facing garden.

On the north side we would like to extend the short 'L' to include a single garage with bedroom above.  Of course we want to do it all in keeping with the design of the house etc.

Schedule 2, Part 1 of the GDPO here (doesn't seem to be possible to insert links at the moment):

Tells you what permitted development rights area normally available to householders - noting additional constraints if in a Conservation area, Listed Building, National Park etc.

Even if requiring planning permission, extensions to houses are 'generally' acceptable provided they are not forward of the building line facing a road, don't increase height substantially, don't create overlooking or overbearing on neighbouring properties and are broadly in scale with the existing and neighbouring houses including in relation to size of curtilage.

The council won't give a definite answer. Best you can hope for is a general indication that they might support it. You really need to make your own call. First thing to check is if you have permitted development rights. Not all houses do. You can do a lot under PD, it might not be what you want but it's a handy plan b if you don't get planning. Yoyu may have to tweak the plans to make it work. Secondly have a trawl through the online planning applications for the street. See what has been approved and what has been refused. No guarantee you will be treated the same but it's a pretty good steer. Can't see there being a big issue on that property but there could be other factors

that link above is the place to look – the main point is that anything directly rear of the house and not taking up more than 50% of the land is good to go

That is too simplistic, there are loads of other variables such as proximity to boundary.

extensions to houses are ‘generally’ acceptable provided they are not forward of the building line facing a road, don’t increase height substantially, don’t create overlooking or overbearing on neighbouring properties and are broadly in scale with the existing and neighbouring houses including in relation to size of curtilage.

Don't assume anything, there is little logic! We ticked all of the above boxes and were still rejects as the Planning Officer felt it 'looked to big.' Not actually too big, just looked too big. Preparing for an appeal just now.

Hence my comment 'generally' and reference to scale...

I just look at the local area and what others have been allowed to do, on a street i am interested in every new purchaser has pretty much done the same.

you can submit a planning application without owning the property.

what local authority?

Dam just had a phone call to say viewing cancelled.

Only on the market a couple of days and already 2 offers received. Obviously others saw the potential.

All helpful info for the future though, thank you

Funny you should say that but the house i am interested in is not even on the market.  I just know the owner and someone else showed an interest in purchase. I quite like these direct deals.