Splitting one house into two
 

As readers of some of my previous posts will have gathered, I've
recently acquired a run-down 1900's corner terraced house to do up.

It's going to be three bedroomed by the time we've finished. However,
we've realised that there is a bricked-up door round the corner from
the current front door; and sure enough, there's a house number
missing from the sequence in that street. So our house clearly used
to be two, many moons ago. This has got us thinking; maybe we would
be better off dividing up the property again, and selling it as two
separate homes? There's an obvious place to divide it, which would
leave the smaller home as what is cuurrently a very large sitting room
(which would split into a small sitting room, kitchenette, and
stairwell); and a large master bedroom (which would subdivide into
shower-room and a smaller, but still double bedroom).

Question is, how do you set about looking into this? The larger house
would be easy; other than isolating the electrics, all it needs is two
doorways bricking up and it's ready; but for the smaller property we'd
obviously need mains water, electricity, sewage etc laying on. There
would be no rear access to the property; any soil pipe would need to
be on the street - is that a problem? - or internal. What sort of
sums are we looking at here, for the getting the new services, legal
fees, architects, building control... Is this a viable project? Given
local conditions, we believe that the property would sell for 35-45K
more if separated.

TIA
David

Splitting one house into two
 

On 16 Oct 2003 13:43:11 -0700,
(Lobster) wrote:

As readers of some of my previous posts will have gathered, I've
recently acquired a run-down 1900's corner terraced house to do up.

It's going to be three bedroomed by the time we've finished. However,
we've realised that there is a bricked-up door round the corner from
the current front door; and sure enough, there's a house number
missing from the sequence in that street. So our house clearly used
to be two, many moons ago. This has got us thinking; maybe we would
be better off dividing up the property again, and selling it as two
separate homes? There's an obvious place to divide it, which would
leave the smaller home as what is cuurrently a very large sitting room
(which would split into a small sitting room, kitchenette, and
stairwell); and a large master bedroom (which would subdivide into
shower-room and a smaller, but still double bedroom).

Question is, how do you set about looking into this? The larger house
would be easy; other than isolating the electrics, all it needs is two
doorways bricking up and it's ready; but for the smaller property we'd
obviously need mains water, electricity, sewage etc laying on. There
would be no rear access to the property; any soil pipe would need to
be on the street - is that a problem? - or internal. What sort of
sums are we looking at here, for the getting the new services, legal
fees, architects, building control... Is this a viable project? Given
local conditions, we believe that the property would sell for 35-45K
more if separated.

TIA
David
As well as talking to your LA about building control, I think you
should also talk to them about planning approval. They may have
views on the desirability of more houses of a particular size - a
problem would seem more likely if you had been wishing to combine two
small houses to make a bigger one, but ask before spending money.

Splitting one house into two
 

"Brian S Gray" wrote in message
...
On 16 Oct 2003 13:43:11 -0700,
(Lobster) wrote:


Question is, how do you set about looking into this? The larger house
would be easy; other than isolating the electrics, all it needs is two
doorways bricking up and it's ready; but for the smaller property we'd
obviously need mains water, electricity, sewage etc laying on. There
would be no rear access to the property; any soil pipe would need to
be on the street - is that a problem? - or internal. What sort of
sums are we looking at here, for the getting the new services, legal
fees, architects, building control... Is this a viable project? Given
local conditions, we believe that the property would sell for 35-45K
more if separated.

TIA
David
As well as talking to your LA about building control, I think you
should also talk to them about planning approval. They may have
views on the desirability of more houses of a particular size - a
problem would seem more likely if you had been wishing to combine two
small houses to make a bigger one, but ask before spending money.

I suspect that if there is documentary evidence that the building was
originally two properties the planning department would have no
sustainable case to refuse a request to restore it to that. BC is
another matter and I suspect that the lack of independent access for
the sewerage is likley to be the largest problem.

tim