Garage conversion and price impact

davilown

Hi everyone,

After some advice re a garage conversion. We have a link detached house that is connected to one neighbour via the garage and behind this the utility room. Our neighbours, who are really nice people btw, have already converted 90% of their garage into a study and put in a downstairs wash room. They have left the garage door on and separted the study by a stud wall.
We would now like to completely convert the garage into a study/forth bedroom as both of us work from home 50% of the time.

My questions are, (assume planning is not needed),
will this affect the value of the house negatively (we intend to stay for at least 10 years),
and secondly what would you do in our position as we want as much natural light as possible in the room?

fannyanna

No idea on the impact price wise.

Personally if I was a prospective buyer I wouldn't be too worried about the property not having a useable garage. Like you I would prefer more living space. Although there will be people who prefer the opposite. If I were a buyer I would still want somewhere to park my vehicle but I presume you have a driveway in front of the garage.

My suggestion would be to brick up where your garage door is and put in a big window. I've seen properties with this kind of conversion and it looks nice (IMO).

davilown

We have a drive way that would fit five family size cars easily, we could even put a car port up if necessarily. Brick and window is preferred option although I'm not sure whether to match it with the front bay (about 3m wide:eek:) or put a flat in.

Many thanks for your comments

fannyanna

I think another bay window would look best. I think people are put off by extensions that appear to be done on the cheap rather than in keeping with the main property. I think it would be a wise investment as such.

rlc22

We've just converted our garage.

We needed planning permission as our permitted development rights have been removed, but because of this we didn't have to pay for it.

We also had to comply with building control regulations regarding ventilation/insulation/smoke alarms/means of escape etc.

I'm really pleased we did it - we wouldn't have been able to fit our car in our garage anyway and we still have off street parking.

The hardest bit of the whole thing though was finding the bricks that matched the rest of the house - took me months!

BeauBelle

We converted our garage about 2 years ago. We have a 3 storey townhouse and the garage was integral.

Like the poster above, we couldn't get a car in the garage and having a small baby it was frustrating having to run up and down the stairs from the kitchen to the lounge for anything she wanted. We turned the garage into our living room and its one of the best things we have done. Its really changed the atmosphere of the house and is so much lighter and brighter and much more suited to family life!

We didn't need planning as a couple of houses in our road had previously converted their garages so had set the precedent, but we had to comply with buildings regs. Had to have everything calculated by a structural engineer and the council had a copy of his report, it also meant having a fire door downstairs between the lounge and the kitchen.

We had had the house rewired when we moved in and added mains fire alarms on all floors. Building control would have required when we converted the garage anyway so that may be a consideration depending on the position of your garage.

Good Luck!

Sensible_Jess

Interesting post OP..

I owned a link detached house several years ago, looked into converting the garage but decided against it due to cost.
After I sold the house my ex-next door neighbour put in a planning application to convert their garage to a playroom and study / bedroom .
The new owner of my house objected to the conversion on the grounds that it was converting the garage into 'living accommodation', thus making his 'link detached' house into a semi detached house. He also onjected on the grounds that the conversion of the garage would lead to an increase in noise levels which would be detrimental to his right to enjoy his property.
The neighbours opposite (town councillors) also complained that the conversion would be overdevelopment and would set a precedent for other houses in the road (I can't recall if any had converted their garages - if they had they all had kept the garage doors).

The application was refused and my ex-next door neighbour moved to a larger house soon after.

Not sure if turning a 'link- detached house' into a semi detached house would be grounds for objection or refusal, but would it need planning permission for turning a 'non habitable' part of a house into living accomodation, especially for a bedroom?

S_J

TrickyDicky101

From my own point of view having had to live next door to noisy, loud music-playing scum in a semi-detached place for 5 years I wouldn't want to effectively turn my link detached place into just another semi. This has practically already happened though because your neighbour has already done it. If I was looking to buy, your house is now effectively a semi and I would treat it as such. What your neighbours are like now is irrelevant - it's what the next set, or the one after that, or the one after that etc could be like.

davilown

TrickyDicky101 wrote: »

From my own point of view having had to live next door to noisy, loud music-playing scum in a semi-detached place for 5 years I wouldn't want to effectively turn my link detached place into just another semi. This has practically already happened though because your neighbour has already done it. If I was looking to buy, your house is now effectively a semi and I would treat it as such. What your neighbours are like now is irrelevant - it's what the next set, or the one after that, or the one after that etc could be like.

How would you know that the neighbour had converted the garage if the garage door is still there?

TrickyDicky101

Well, if it couldn't be determined eg by a skylight in the roof then the fact you may have converted yours would probably lead me to ask the question either of you as the vendor or the neighbour himself.

sunshinetours

We had this in our old house which was link detached. As mentioned above you need to factor in that that part of your house effectively becomes semi detached and you may well get increased noise associated with it, both ways.
In many cases link detached aren't necessarily worth more than equivalent semi's so value wise you may not be affected either way. If you are tio be there for 10 years then shouldn't be such an issue anyway - adapt your home as you wish to get most use and enjoyment. If you are worried about adding value then I would suggest a rear extension would be more likely to add real value. A poorly done extensio can devalue so bear that in mind also
If you have a large driveway and decent size garden with large shed for storage it can be a practical way of creating more living space, espcially if your garage is too small for car storage as many integral garages are.

Other issues are possibly bay or bow window may cause planning issues (permission may be required if you bring forward the front of the house)

We did a conversion on our current house and its a great space for office/music room and a separate utility room. We didn't need planning just building regs compliance. We used a specialist conversion company who were in and out very efficiently and covered all aspects as this was work they did day in day out. Finishing touches like brick tinting and matching of window designs and style for example were considered from day one. We also have a pitched roof on ours so it doesn't look as much like a conversion