to be pissed off about the house next door being converted into bedsits?

[belfastbigmillie]

We live in a residential street where all the other houses are families or old people. The people next door to us sold their house but now it turns out that they sold it to builders. They are converting it into 2 studio flats (definitely without planning permission because we checked). There is only about 2 feet between their house and ours and we share a fence etc. It overlooks our garden. I'm not too happy about it. In my mind studio flats = young people/noise/ parties or single dodgy blokes. Either way it doesn't feel good to me. Can I do anything about it? Will it devalue our house? BTW we don't live in the kind of area where it will attract professional singles etc.

I have a single bloke living in the flat above me. He is the perfect neighbour, quiet, considerate and all round lovely.
when my exp and me split he rented a studio flat, he was a kind and considerate neighbour too.

Next door I have the dreaded young people who are house sharing. They all go out to work every day and are no trouble at all.
Stop assuming that your neighbours will be awful

I will report them as they definitely don't have planning permission. We are near a student area and I would hate our area to be turned into one too.

I'd certainly drop them in it with the council re planning permission.

I omce, recently, lived in a house converted into bedsits.
No one was noisey

A huge uproar about single people in a family area? God that's depressing.

You don't get a letter about planning permission anymore. There should be a notice displayed outside the property

There would be a notice and letters sent.

Unless that has been changed very very recently.

If work has started and they have no planing permission you need to talk to the Building Control Department at the council ASAP.

We are near a student area and I would hate our area to be turned into one too

Do you have something against the young doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers, etc of the future?

Drug addicts, ex criminals, boy racers, etc I could understand but students are fairly innocuous.

There were some boy racer types living near me until recently (I think the landlord threw them out). They were middle aged family men. The summer evenings would ruined by the whining of their souped up Subarus Impreza engines screaming as they turned the estate into a racetrack. Give me students any day.

"We are near a student area and I would hate our area to be turned into one too."

So its really just snobbery.

FYI, the noisest person that I ever lived next to was a single female nurse, loud music when she was off shift and if we made a noise when she was on shift the sparks would fly.

The second was a 60 year old buddhist
who chanted "Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo" then hit a huge bell.

Yes it's a disgraceful, fancy housing being created affordable to young people?? It's bad enough that house prices have only tripled in the last 15 years, there are still some young people who can afford housing.

We should ensure they have nowhere to live, like the rest of us did when we were young.

"Students are fairly innocuous". Hahahahahahaha. Multiple occupancy houses full of teenagers are not innocuous. If you think that then you have either never lived in a student area or are uncommonly tolerant. To the point of being oblivious to your surroundings.

I thought it was 2 studio flats? When did it become a house full of teenagers?

We used to live in a street where one of the semi detached houses a few doors down from us was converted into two one-bed flats.
Quite a 'poor' area, certainly not one to attract young professionals, nor students.
Instead one flat was inhabited by the loveliest young couple you could wish to meet, friendly, neighbourly, pleasant.
And the other flat by a dear old gentleman.

Neither were noisy, neither had loud parties. That fell to the inhabitants of the three bed semi-detached houses.

I would rather have been attached to the two flats!!

ROAR at Boney's buddhist neighbour from hell and the huge bell going BOOONNNNGGG every 10 seconds through the wall

But seriously, conversion into 2 studio flats can't be a noisy party house because there's not enough space! And students often can't afford to rent their own flats, they'll be in halls or in shared flats/houses.

If it wasn't converted but rented as a 3 bed house to sharing students, then I concede you might have a problem (remembering own student days...)

The planning dept have downsized their work load and many alterations don't need permission now. If the work has begun even if planning permission wasn't applied for, I don't think the planning dept will be bothered.

But do contact them anyway, and let us know what happens.
Good Luck

In my street of nine houses (HA) there's me and my ds, a single mum and her ds and a couple with a little girl.
All the other houses are single dodgy blokes (though one's grown up daughter has just moved in) ranging in age from 25 to early 70's.
They're always there if I need to borrow tobacco a cup of sugar, or help me out with anything if I need to ask.
What an odd POV you have, Op.

I lived in a studio flat when I was younger, I can assure you not every person who lives in one is noisy.

Do you know for sure they are Turing it into flats? They could just be reworking the internal space. It's a common thing to rip out stairs to put them in a better position. Have never watched under the hammer??

Years back, our next door neighbour attempted a conversion into flats without benefit of planning permission or building regs. The whole thing would have been a death trap in the event of fire (or any sort of use really) and all changes were forced to be ripped out.

Maybe they'll turn out to be them there Foreigners I've heard about?

Someone fan me with the Daily Wail I'm feeling a bit faint.

"Students are fairly innocuous". Hahahahahahaha. Multiple occupancy houses full of teenagers are not innocuous. If you think that then you have either never lived in a student area or are uncommonly tolerant

Funnily enough I have. What with having an education behind me and everything.

And after I finished being a student, what with having cut the parental strings and not being an heiress and all, I lived in the dreaded shared flat full of young professionals in a similar position.

I never realised cities containing a mix of demographics was considered so beyond the pail!

I have never understood this. You have children. Unless you are millionaires they are going to have to live somewhere before they buy a house, even if they can. I can't stand NIMBYism.

If they do them up nicely you may not have a problem, its when they do them really basically that may attract potential problems, we have some on our road, we have frequent stabbings, fighting, noise problems, urinating everywhere! Rubbish they dont give a shit, hardly makes it into the bin. etc etc etc. Its been an utter nightmare. .

I'm a student. I used to live in a flat in what is fondly referred to in our town as 'bedsit alley'. Always got a good nights sleep, those weird single blokes were recently qualified young professionals.

Then I fell PG and moved to a 3 bed house in a supposedly quiet family area. Lovely I thought. The young son in the family next door plays dubstep from 8am-6pm every.fucking.day. His parents have nights away, and the noise from those nights makes me want to cry. The family opposite have about 8 kids and seem to have taught them to shout instead of speak, and that fuck & cunt are almost always the right words to use.

Give me 'dodgy single blokes' and 'bedsit alley' any day.