Loft has no building regs. How do we proceed?

BLC1983

Sorry to ask so many questions... However I have just thought of something else...

We made an offer on the house as a 3 bedroom house. That's how the estate agents advertised it. Given the fact that we know there is no BR (because it never needed it) can it still be classed as a 3 bedroom house? Or is it a 2 bedroom house with a loft conversion?

Would that have an impact on the value of the house at all? Because without the loft bedroom the house only has 2 quite small bedrooms. One of the bedrooms I think was made smaller to fit in the staircase.

Again any advice would be really appreciated as I just want to get my head around all of this :beer:

davidmcn

It's a house with 3 bedrooms. It's a 3 bedroom house.

My house doesn't have any building regulations (because it was built in the 1880s...), that doesn't mean it isn't a house.

BobQ

BLC1983 wrote: »

By the way the loft has a proper staircase going up to it with lots of headroom so I suppose that shows they went through the trouble of doing it properly?

It shows that for the use being made of the space they needed a staircase. As the regulations were fairly lax before 1984 they can describe as they wish. When the regs came in a bedroom required such things as a fire door between the the stairway and living space and an alternative means of escape. Before 1984 you could probably call it a bedroom without such a door.

If you do not mind me saying so you seem to be a bit of a worrier about such things. If you want peace of mind I would ask the vendor to allow a specific survey and that will at least answer your concern.

If you do this, I would ask the surveyor not only to assess if there are structural problems but also for an opinion on where it differs from current regulations.You should ask a structural engineer accredited by the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors.

BLC1983 wrote: »

We made an offer on the house as a 3 bedroom house. That's how the estate agents advertised it. Given the fact that we know there is no BR (because it never needed it) can it still be classed as a 3 bedroom house? Or is it a 2 bedroom house with a loft conversion

Well if it is being used as a bedroom, its a 3 bed house built to whatever standards the builder used when built or modified and no means of verification

Would that have an impact on the value of the house at all? Because without the loft bedroom the house only has 2 quite small bedrooms. One of the bedrooms I think was made smaller to fit in the staircase.

No impact. It is common practice to reassign space to make room for a staircase.

All I would say is that if you intend to use as a bedroom I would seek advice on doing additional things to comply with modern regulations such as the fire door, automatic closers, mains smoke detector.

Doozergirl

BobQ wrote: »

All I would say is that if you intend to use as a bedroom I would seek advice on doing additional things to comply with modern regulations such as the fire door, automatic closers, mains smoke detector.

This was a bungalow. What you describe relates to a three storey house, not what is now a two storey house. that same applies here as for a regular two storey house. That said, self closing fire doors haven't been a requirement anywhere for a good decade.

Mains smoke detector has been a requirement for any new house for a good while, but it isn't retrospective and I'd strongly advocate everyone putting them in.

G_M

Might the OP not be better off buying a New Build?


that way it will conform ((hopefully) in all respects with current building Regs......

Lungboy

OP you're massively overestimating the opinion of a surveyor. We had a full structural done for our purchase and he mentioned it looked like the wall ties were going in places. When we bought the house and stripped it back it turned out the walls were solid and there were no wall ties at all. That said, if it gives you peace of mind then it might be worth it.

BobQ

Doozergirl wrote: »

This was a bungalow. What you describe relates to a three storey house, not what is now a two storey house. that same applies here as for a regular two storey house. That said, self closing fire doors haven't been a requirement anywhere for a good decade.

Mains smoke detector has been a requirement for any new house for a good while, but it isn't retrospective and I'd strongly advocate everyone putting them in.

Where does it say it is a bungalow.? The OP describes it as a 2 bed house with a third bedroom in a loft see #42.

I cannot claim your up to date knowledge of the regulations, but in my opinion if the OP is treating it as a bedroom it would be prudent to do any updates to comply with current regulations (whatever they are).

Doozergirl

BobQ wrote: »

Where does it say its a bungalow.? The OP describes it as a 2 bed house with a third bedroom in a loft see #42.

I cannot claim your up to date knowledge of the regulations, but in my opinion if the OP is treating it as a bedroom it would be prudent to do any updates to comply with current regulations (whatever they are).

Got them muddled up with someone else with a similar recent concern, sorry

BLC1983

Yes I am a worrier but to be fair this is a huge decision and a lot of money we are spending. We are also first time buyers and I have zero knowledge about this sorta stuff and don't wanna get ripped off or regret our decision.

It may seem obvious to everyone else and sound like common sense but I just like to question everything so first of all I can get clarity on my questions but also so I learn a lot in case we hit this situation again in the future should we ever buy another house.

All of you who have posted though have given some great advice and have really helped us. Especially realise the fact that this is a common occurrence with loft conversions and building regs and most of you seem to agree that as the conversion was done years ago it really isn't a big issue. :beer:

We are still waiting on the mortgage companies decision whether to carry on lending us the money or not but hopefully we will get an answer this week!

BLC1983

So I found out some interesting information over the weekend!

I was actually in contact with the lady who owned the house in the 80's and she said the loft conversion was not done in 1982. She said her husband built it in 1989! So it was in fact done after building regs came in.

She said her husband didn't put down the floor, that was already there when they moved there in the mid 80's.

So does this change anything? Should I now get the vendors to apply for regularisation now that this is a possibility?