Enforcement notice on garage conversion

mollygriffin88

xylophone said:

Have you asked the council to provide copies of the relevant documents (presumably stored in archives)?

 Not yet - am going to do this today so we can have a proper read through them 

AdrianC

It may have been part of the original planning permission for your house, or it may be a covenant.

You would need to ask the solicitor you used when you bought the place why he never brought it to your attention.

princeofpounds

This is obviously a marketing article, but it indicates that challenging of removal of PD rights is possible in some situations as councils often overreach in terms of their use of them. Getting retrospective permission would probably be quicker of course, but just something to keep in the back of your mind. 

https://just-planning.co.uk/how-to-get-rid-of-planning-conditions-that-remove-your-permitted-development-rights/

ProDave

The council man said it would be okay as a living room.  So put a sofa and a tv in there, get him to come and look at it and agree it is okay.  Ask for a certificate of lawful development to say it is okay.

Then later on (cough) you might decide to swap some rooms about and make what was a living room into a bedroom.........

Doozergirl

It's time to add that second parking space.  

I appreciate that developers don't
build garages big enough for cars but still manage to get them passed as parking spaces, but there's one rule for the big guys and one for us little people.  

It's a bit naive to take the neighbour's advice when planning have already rejected on the loss of a parking space.  The parking space being the garage.  🤦🏼‍♀️  

The crux of the matter will be the removal of that parking space.  If you add in a new parking space on the drive and use it, that's your best argument - that you've retained the original number of spaces.  I'd also make a formal complaint asking for easily obtainable evidence that PD rights have been removed and that the garage should be retained as a parking space.  

Local authorities have design guidance that sets out the appropriate size of a parking space.  You should check that to make sure that the garage actually met the current guidance(!) and that any new parking you put in does as well. Planning don't care where you parked your car before the conversion or that your current neighbours are elderly.  

Also, please drop the argument about it not being an extension.  It's not relevant.  You have extended the house into a non-habitable area.  It's semantics.  If the garage is counted as a vital car parking space, that is the crux of the argument.  It doesn't exist anymore.  

A planning consultant would probably be a good idea so that they can focus on the correct arguments.  

Jumblebumble

mollygriffin88 said:

Wonder if anyone can help me as I’m new to all of this! Sorry it’s a long one.. 

Last year we applied through planning permission to extend our garage forward and add a pitched roof turning it into a bedroom.
the council rejected our application as they said the garage counted as a parking space (not that a car would ever fit in there) and that we don’t have room out the front of our house for another car.. we have measured and we absolutely do.. thinking they know this they added that with a space outside the property could look too car heavy and not attractive. 

So we applied again and this time creating a smaller room so it didn’t count as a bedroom therefore no need for a space.. they still rejected us on the potential parking and bedroom making. 

after this our neighbour suggested not extending the garage forward or adding a pitched roof and just convert the garage through building regulations as this is what he did with his bungalow.
so we did just that.. all was happily signed off by the building inspector and we thought everything was fine.

We then received a letter from the council stating someone had complained about us carrying out a garage extension although it was rejected by the council.
we called the council and explained we didn’t carry out such work and just completed a building conversion.
the council man then explained there is a supposed clause on our property from when it was built stating that the garage was never allowed to be converted.
the council man then came and visited us and suggested changing the room to a smaller one or turning it into a big living room.. we asked how this could be allowed under this clause if it still wouldn’t be a garage?
we then asked why have we never been made aware of this clause?
the council man said he’s colleague should of attached this clause paperwork to the rejection letters at the start and never did.. so how can we be penalised for that? 

We also looked all the way back through the deeds on our property and it doesn’t state this anywhere. We looked on the council website and these forms are also nowhere to be found on there.
finally we looked on the land registry site as we registered it when we bought the house and on the charges register on there it states there are no restrictions on the property.
so it seems the only people that have this paperwork with a clause is the council themselves who have never made this public knowledge? Or knowledge to us the owners!!
so my question is how can an enforcement notice possibly be issued when 1. We didn’t even carry out the planning permission works they’re stating and 2. How can we break a clause/rule that no one except the council ever knew existed?! 

Will be grateful for any help or advise! 

Sorry for the long post  

My feeling is that the Council are indicating that if you tell them that it is a living room you will hear no more
I once asked about converting a Garage to an office
The council man said I am sure you really want to be using it as a hobby room  don't you!