Query about Party Wall Agreement

angelin77

My neighbour (a builder) built a rear extension to his property a couple of years ago which came within 3m of buildings on my land. He did not approach me regarding a PWA at that time even though his foundations would have been deeper than my building (garage and store rooms)
He then obtained planning permission to extend the front of his property, again coming less than 3m from my garage building. Both properties are detached.
I have obtained planning permission to demolish this garage building and replace it with a new bungalow. So in effect we will both be building vitually at the same time and I presume the footings will be at the same depth,
What would be the the way forward as regards to PWAs? As far as I can understand the PWA rules, an agreement is only applicable if the foundations are deeper than the neighbours.
Am I better off waiting until he commences (his pp expires way before mine) so I avoid any complications with employing numerous surveyors?
Any advice would be appreciated before I approach him.

zaqxsw

With regards to building your bungalow, there are a couple of ways in which the work may be notifiable. The first one is if any part of the bungalow is built up to the boundary. If this is the case Section 1 of the Act applies, however, I appreciate your question relates to the foundations (which is Section 6 of the Act).

Section 6(1)(b) states:
'any part of the proposed excavation, building or structure will within those three metres extend to a lower level than the level of the bottom of the foundations of the building or structure of the adjoining owner.'

Put simply, if you are not going lower then it is not notifiable. However, if there is the possibility that you are going lower, you should serve a notice to be safe. To be fair, I like to think if you did serve a notice your neighbour would merely consent given his lack of interest in applying the Act to his own work.

Good luck and I hope this helps.

teneighty

I find it better to have a chat with the neighbour BEFORE you serve any notices. Hopefully you can reach an amicable agreement between yourselves without involving Party Wall Surveyors.

The official notices are written in quite legal terminology which can be a bit scary. So the first thing a neighbour would do when they receive one out of the blue is look on Google which is full of horror stories and bad advice so you can open a can of worms.

Once you serve notice the clock starts ticking and you can end up in a dispute before you realise it.