Hi All,
I live in a 3 bedroom detached house built in 1984. The deeds state the boundary is next to the house wall itself (ie all of the houses are built right up to the right hand boundary line)
My neighbour, who I have always got on well with told me the other day that he is building a side extension for a cinema room in a few weeks (this was just told in passing, he hadn't come round to notify me of this) . He said it will be about a foot away from my wall, so I told him I'm not happy about that for a few reasons and offered have a discussion about it, but he flatly said there is nothing I can do under the planning rules.
I looked into this and am I right in thinking it would come under the party wall rules as he is excavating within 3 metres from my property? But as it is single story I imagine the foundations won't be deeper than my house wall, so he wouldn't even need to notify me of the work, let alone wait for me to accept or refuse? Also am I right in thinking it could be built up to 50mm from my property wall if it was unobstructed?
My main concerns are:
1) It is built on an old mining area so it built on a raft extension with suspended wooded floors and air brick ventilation. My concern here is a property further down the road had a badly built extension and it has caused structural problems due to how they built it in relation to the foundations and I don't want to risk the same.
2) With the floor being ventilated would there be issues with getting air under the floor along that side wall if indeed it is built as close as possible?
3) With it being used as a cinema room I am concerned about noise if this isn't well sound proofed and will likely have a loud sound system, as this will now pretty much turn my house into a semi detached property.
4) After speaking to him I didn't even consider drainage, my bathroom waste pipe goes into the floor next to our house on that side (so sure this is technically on his land?!?) which would obviously limit how close the extension can be in itself, but I'm sure there are manhole covers for these drains in the area where the extension would be (I can't see onto his property to verify this but I'm sure when we bought the house it was mentioned our drain runs to his property, I will search this out) so I don't know what the plans are to relocate these
I would have thought there should be enough space left to get down the side of my house to at least service the waste pipe and any maintenance to the wall like repointing etc
Just wondered if anyone else has had a similar experience with having a house built so close to the boundary, and where I could go for advice? I ideally want to know where I stand and how to approach him/his builders etc with regards to actual plans and whether I have a right to refuse the work.
Many thanks,
Martin
I live in a 3 bedroom detached house built in 1984. The deeds state the boundary is next to the house wall itself (ie all of the houses are built right up to the right hand boundary line)
My neighbour, who I have always got on well with told me the other day that he is building a side extension for a cinema room in a few weeks (this was just told in passing, he hadn't come round to notify me of this) . He said it will be about a foot away from my wall, so I told him I'm not happy about that for a few reasons and offered have a discussion about it, but he flatly said there is nothing I can do under the planning rules.
I looked into this and am I right in thinking it would come under the party wall rules as he is excavating within 3 metres from my property? But as it is single story I imagine the foundations won't be deeper than my house wall, so he wouldn't even need to notify me of the work, let alone wait for me to accept or refuse? Also am I right in thinking it could be built up to 50mm from my property wall if it was unobstructed?
My main concerns are:
1) It is built on an old mining area so it built on a raft extension with suspended wooded floors and air brick ventilation. My concern here is a property further down the road had a badly built extension and it has caused structural problems due to how they built it in relation to the foundations and I don't want to risk the same.
2) With the floor being ventilated would there be issues with getting air under the floor along that side wall if indeed it is built as close as possible?
3) With it being used as a cinema room I am concerned about noise if this isn't well sound proofed and will likely have a loud sound system, as this will now pretty much turn my house into a semi detached property.
4) After speaking to him I didn't even consider drainage, my bathroom waste pipe goes into the floor next to our house on that side (so sure this is technically on his land?!?) which would obviously limit how close the extension can be in itself, but I'm sure there are manhole covers for these drains in the area where the extension would be (I can't see onto his property to verify this but I'm sure when we bought the house it was mentioned our drain runs to his property, I will search this out) so I don't know what the plans are to relocate these
I would have thought there should be enough space left to get down the side of my house to at least service the waste pipe and any maintenance to the wall like repointing etc
Just wondered if anyone else has had a similar experience with having a house built so close to the boundary, and where I could go for advice? I ideally want to know where I stand and how to approach him/his builders etc with regards to actual plans and whether I have a right to refuse the work.
Many thanks,
Martin
