Shared access and drive

Mickygg

It's only daily mail, but things can escalate from simple neighbour annoyance.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-4776546/The-respectable-neighbours-cost-sanity.html

moneyistooshorttomention

Is there any way to be able to get owner of House A to change things to the way they should have done them in the first place? - ie extending that wall in between the two properties all the way down and having a gate put into their front wall.

I don't know what scope there is to:
a. find out what those alterations would cost and how long it would take for them to be done

b. ask if the house-owner would agree to do them prior to selling the house to you on the one hand OR at least get definite agreement from the Council that you can put a gate into the front wall okay and you then move into the place and see to the wall extension and gate yourselves after buying it?

I had not dissimilar set-up when I bought the house and went ahead and bought it and did the alterations necessary afterwards to make things more "conventional"/"independent".

moneyistooshorttomention

Further thought - there are two possible reasons why the vendor hasnt done this "proper split" thing yet:

1. They are too lazy/mean/etc to do it

or

2. They know there might be/will be trouble with the neighbour if they do so (as the neighbour is using their bit of garden for their vehicle).

The clue as to whether it's no. 2 could be if they say something like "We let neighbour use bit of our garden". Which you might take totally at face value (as vendor wants you to do) as meaning "We have given permission to neighbour to use our garden (ie you can withdraw that permission if you decide to do so)".

Neighbour might have translated giving permission or being too "weak" to kick them off into meaning = I am going to fight new neighbour (ie you) when they retract that permission/stand up to me and make it plain it's only their garden.

bluedrop

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

Is there any way to be able to get owner of House A to change things to the way they should have done them in the first place? - ie extending that wall in between the two properties all the way down and having a gate put into their front wall.

I don't know what scope there is to:
a. find out what those alterations would cost and how long it would take for them to be done

b. ask if the house-owner would agree to do them prior to selling the house to you on the one hand OR at least get definite agreement from the Council that you can put a gate into the front wall okay and you then move into the place and see to the wall extension and gate yourselves after buying it?

I had not dissimilar set-up when I bought the house and went ahead and bought it and did the alterations necessary afterwards to make things more "conventional"/"independent".

This is exactly what DH and I thought. We spoke to the council. We might just do a pre-planning application (£100) and understand the possibilities clearly before we make a decision. Its a lovely house - it ticks all the boxes for us. However we don't want to buy it with stars in our eyes.

ciderboy2009

Have you tried looking up the original planning application for converting the garage online to see if they were refused a separate access?
Might save a bit of time/money

moneyistooshorttomention

It does sound worth looking up online first - to see if there's any clue in Council minutes at which it was discussed about this. You never know - and Councils should put all their minutes up online these days for anyone/everyone to read. I read my own Council's minutes regularly - enough to know its just as well I have low blood pressure:rotfl:

Plan B - being it's a good idea to put in that pre-planning application if the minutes arent clear enough to see whats what. For the sake of saving £100 you could end up needlessly losing a house you clearly really like if you don't do that - and that would be a shame.

DCFC79

I'm not a fan of shared access, get it checked out (preferably via the way that's been suggested).

Good luck OP.