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Working From Home
With improvements in information technology and the greater use of personal computers, more and more people are discarding the daily commute by setting up business at home. Not only is this more sustainable but financially savvy given that the rented office is no longer needed. In planning terms, planning permission would not normally be required if the overall character of your home is not changed as a result of the business being conducted here.
To answer this question, you must ask yourself the following:-
- Will your home be used mainly as a private home?
- Will there be a noticeable increase in both traffic and people visiting?
- Will the business generate any activities unusual in a residential area?
- Will the business have a detrimental impact upon neighbours by virtue of the creation of nuisance and noise or smells?
In their quest to control business activities within residential areas, the Local Authority is keen to ensure that the essential character of your street is not compromised by any business activity going on thereabouts. If it were found that a business were taking place there without the necessary change of use permission, it is likely that the business will be the subject of some kind of enforcement action to either regularise it or halt it. Therefore please ask yourself the above or if in doubt, discuss your business proposal directly with your Local Authority.
See also www.communities.gov.uk
Working From Home - How to Make Use of Your Garden
When the daily grind gets all too much and you are given the opportunity to work from home, most people would grab it with both hands and feet. With living space at a premium and the loft full of unwanted gifts and furniture that may not even be yours, how else can you meaningfully take up the working from home opportunity? For many of us who are lucky to live in a house with a reasonably sized garden, the answer may lie just there. An office located in the garden works on many levels. Firstly, it quite literally divorces your work life from your home life and being in a "green environment" helps focus the grey cells. Furthermore, if you have been using a bedroom as an office, you can reclaim that space for its rightful purpose and in doing so, makes the home more marketable when it comes to selling. The costs of creating a room with a view quite often equate to less than the stamp duty on an average house sell and a sympathetic and well designed outside room will add value to your property.
Now for the boring bit....if you do consider creating an outside room, it needs to be a space which is comfortable and pleasant to be in. Firstly, make sure that the proposed structure is sited on foundations and not slabs and don't forget the need to run power cables from the house to the outside room. The building must be insulated in order to avoid freezing in winter and overheating in summer and finally remember that outside rooms can be vulnerable to burglary and therefore you will need to fix locks and possibly an alarm system.
Do I Need Planning Permission to Erect Such a Structure?
You do not need planning permission to erect such a structure if:-
- You do not build it forward of the front elevation of the house;
- It is less than 3m high with a flat roof and 4m high for a pitched roof;
- Any part of it that is 2m away or closer is less than 2.5m high;
- The proposal doesn't involve the need to construct a raised platform more than 350mm high;
- It will take up less than 50% of the garden area.
Other restrictions may well apply if for example you live in a Conservation Area or your house is Listed so it is worth checking with the relevant Local Authority.
