Lease hold garage, frosty freeholder, getting electricty installed

Tallerdave

Why not run a supply from the house to the garage - at your cost?

matelodave

Tallerdave said:

Why not run a supply from the house to the garage - at your cost?

Depends on the complexity - probably under someone elses land or across a road or public footpath where you'd have to get planning permission to dig and maby even get an approved contractor to do the work and re-instatement.

There's even a lot of controversy about hoiking a charging cable across a footpath. You'll be liable if someone trips over it and injures themselves even laying donw a rubber ramp designed for the purpose doesn't neccessarily make you imune from liabilty if a partially sighted (aparently you cant use the word blind anymore) or physically challenged (disabled?) person trips.

It's an oft quoted problem for those who live in flats, terraced houses or those with communal parking areas/no off street parking that there's no infrastructure to accommodate all these electric vehicles.

To my mind, the cost of vanity projects like HS2 could be better spent either mending potholes for the majority of use or even improving the charging infrastructure for those who want electric vehicles - just my opinion you understand

lohr500

You don't mention what type of electric car you are thinking of buying, but if it was an all electric one, then the electricity consumption is not unsubstantial. As an example the largest battery pack available in a Nissan Leaf is 62kWh according to a quick Google search.

To charge such a vehicle quickly at home, you would need more than a 13 amp plug socket. Most likely a 7kWh charger.
And to charge it as cost effectively as possible you would want to be on a smart electricity tariff, or at least an Economy 7 tariff to take advantage of off peak rates. Charging at night using Octopus Go's 5.5p per kWh rate or say a regular Eco 7 night rate of around 8p or 9p, per kWh, is going to be a lot cheaper than using a single tariff rate in the 15p to 20p range!!

Even if you could get the landlord to provide a spur off the flat supply, unless the flat has an off peak tariff, it could be a very expensive way to charge the car     

MWT

... and then there is the question of the size of the main fuse on the supply to the flat...

It really is a non-starter to even try and do anything less than a properly installed separate supply with its own MPAN

matelodave

As far as I know the average for an electric car is around 3-4miles/kwh so even a 20mile round trip is going to use 5kwh, Over a period of time it'll soon mount up and there's the expectation that the garage landlord will have to stump it up in his bills and then recover it from the OP.

As lohr points, out there's no compulsion on the landlord to get onto a decent tariff just for the benefit of the OP's electric car so it could work out quite expensive if the mileage is quite high and you can't get a suitable tariff.

Ideally you'd want a 7kw charger to take most advantage of the fairly short off-peak periods - even E7 will only give you around 45kwh, Octoppus Go only gives you four hours or 28kwh - halve that if you are trying to recharge from a 13a socket

TBH unless you can charge it at your destination (whether it's work or the supermarket) or parked outside your house (what about installing a drop kerb and parking on the front garden for charging) then you need to think very carefully before going electric.

rp1974

Harsh reality,would anyone here allow somebody else to use large amounts of electricity,regularly,on the basis of I promise I'll pay you back for it?.

OP mentioned a plug in hybrid so it has an engine,charging when required can be done elsewhere,at entirely their own expense and inconvenience,not that of the freeholder.

Anyanka1

rp1974 said:

Harsh reality,would anyone here allow somebody else to use large amounts of electricity,regularly,on the basis of I promise I'll pay you back for it?.

OP mentioned a plug in hybrid so it has an engine,charging when required can be done elsewhere,at entirely their own expense and inconvenience,not that of the freeholder.

Quite.  2040 is 19 years away.  Who says we will even have electricity by then except for cooking, lighting and heating, if for those?  Either find a way to install a supply for this hypothetical electric car at your own domicile or buy a "real" car and wait until you move to kid yourself you are saving the planet.

Sorry if that comes across as a bit harsh, OP but it might be time to face reality.  Expecting someone you don't even know to provide a charging point for your car is just not feasible.  As for laying a cable from your house to your garage you would, I imagine, require "wayleave" rather than planning permission.  This is what telecoms companies need when they start digging up bits of land that don't belong to them, as do their customers.

Robin9

rp1974 said:

Harsh reality,would anyone here allow somebody else to use large amounts of electricity,regularly,on the basis of I promise I'll pay you back for it?.

Agreed

@Richard202 - if the boot was on the other foot and you were the landlord would you allow it ?  Hassle for you and nothing in return !

Gerry1

There would be all sorts of practical difficulties.

• The freeholder probably doesn't have E7, so you'd be paying an expensive single rate.

• If the freeholder does have E7 there would be no realistic way to determine the night/day ratio.  You'd have to accept a switched E7 supply, and that could be inconvenient if you can't top up in the day.  When the E7 supply is not live, can you even program the charger to start charging when the supply becomes live?  It may not always be convenient to open up the garage at midnight, either for you or the freeholder.
  

• How do you allocate the usage after a change in the kWh rate?  It obliges the freeholder to read the sub-meter on the date of the change, which may be difficult or impossible.

It just wouldn't fly.

Tokmon

richard202 said:

thanks for all your help, sorry if i wasn't clear and also apologies if i came over all freeloadery

There are only two parties involved:

Myself - freeholder of my house, leaseholder of my garage

Party B - freeholder of garage and flat above it

I'm expecting to pay for all electricty I use, my limited understanding is that it is trivial nowadays to report on how much electricity goes through car chargers

I will explore the DNO connection cost, thanks for your help

Alter_ego - all I know is that when you start laying cable under the ground it gets really costly really quickly

I don't think you realise how much of a pain this would be for the freeholder and the tenant living in the flat. You would need to have a meter to monitor how much of their electric you are using and this would then need to be read by both you and the tenant (because they will pay for the electric) so you both agree on the reading, the tenant will then need to look at their bill and calculate how much that usage has cost and get you to pay them, they will also need to keep a record of meter reading and payments and copies of their bills just in case their in any dispute. 

This will be a massive headache for the tenant for no return and probably put them off renting the flat which then will cause hassle for the landlord (freeholder). They would be silly to allow this and they have done you a favour by saying no because it will be hassle for you and your very naive to ask before understand what your actually asking.