Building of top of extension from 1980

Skankuat

Dear all,

I have read a lot, but I can't find answers to our specific situation.

Our house has a kitchen extension made in 1980, so theoretically no building regs were required then. We got an indemnity policy when buying for this and removed wall between living and dining room. After purchase we got all the paperwork which includes plans for the extension and have a stamp "Passed under building regulations"

Now we are thinking of making a bathroom extension on the 1st floor on top of the existing kitchen extension but we don't know if it will cause problems. Should we take a structural engineer who can confirm that the foundations are sufficient to bear an additional floor? Will we loose the indemnity policy for diving wall and extension when we place the planning application which will obviously contain information regarding the old extension?

Many thanks in advance for your help.

marc81

Not sure about the indemnity side, but i'd definately get a structural engineer to check the foundations. We are in the middle of something similar, building above an 80s extension to create a bedroom. When building control checked the foundation dig they were not happy to sign off the foundations as they weren't 110% what they wanted (inspector could have been having a bad day who know's). We paid for a structural engineer to come out and give a second opinion and he was more than happy with them and wrote a letter to BC to that affect who were then happy to sign off... but looking back I wish i'd had them checked first as it would have been less stressfull than hearing the builder talk about underpinning etc.!

phill99

If you have a document that is stamped "passed under building regs" then there was no need for indemnity insurance the work has Building Reg Approval. Even if it didn't you can't be prosecuted due to the time that has lapsed.


You need to get a SE in to tell you if the foundations are adequate. He will require that you dig a sample hole. But your plans should give you the dimensions of the foundations.

Doozergirl

phill99 wrote: »

If you have a document that is stamped "passed under building regs" then there was no need for indemnity insurance the work has Building Reg Approval. Even if it didn't you can't be prosecuted due to the time that has lapsed.


You need to get a SE in to tell you if the foundations are adequate. He will require that you dig a sample hole. But your plans should give you the dimensions of the foundations.

What he said ^

The 'passed under building regulations' stanp is a big clue as to whether it has approval or not!!

EssexExile

If you do need underpinning it's not the end of the world. We built over an attached garage years ago, I can't remember the exact numbers but the whole job cost about £40,000 & underpinning added about £1000.

Skankuat

Thank you all very much. I think the stamp means the plan passed under building regulations, but not the actual work, which wasn't checked so I guess the question is if it was done exactly as in the plan, but SE would have a look at that.

My concern is that we will loose the indemnity policy for both - extension and wall, so even if the extension is done well which we will confirm, the living/dining room wall won't have any paperwork nor indemnity policy and it will become a problem when selling.

Doozergirl

Skankuat wrote: »

Thank you all very much. I think the stamp means the plan passed under building regulations, but not the actual work, which wasn't checked so I guess the question is if it was done exactly as in the plan, but SE would have a look at that.

My concern is that we will loose the indemnity policy for both - extension and wall, so even if the extension is done well which we will confirm, the living/dining room wall won't have any paperwork nor indemnity policy and it will become a problem when selling.

When you produce a shiny certificate for the new extension, the existing extension will be covered by the new one's certificate.

You can use a private building control company if you want and no one from the local authority will ever see the house. Planning is a totally different department to Building Control, by the way, so I'd say that your existing indemnity is safe with them.

Even a local authority BCO is not going to blink an eye at your knock-through and there will be no record of them having seen it.

In all likelihood, any buyer or solicitor will probably presume the knock through comes under the new certificate. In general, conveyancers don't really know what they're talking about when it comes to these things. If they ask for a cert and you give them one, they'll take it. When building work is old, the paperwork is really a fuss over nothing, especially when the house pre-dates regs and never had any in the first place! What is important is that the work is safe. Paperwork and safety aren't mutually exclusive, although it's obviously the best thing for anyone having work done to have it inspected.

brightontraveller

Certs are nice but for that age even if they existed only a fool/conman would go ahead with what’s supposed to be there no matter what cert says ?



You’d be advised to have structural engineers calcs for new/ added old if only to pass liability? To an extent the new should be safe meet regs etc even if the old doesn’t (Liability wise?)



Dig a few holes expose existing foundations, ditto rafters, beams etc engineers report on old /new isn’t going to add much more in costs...