Neighbours Garden Office

[Soontobesingles]

My neighbours have recently started having work done to add an office/summer house thing to their garden. No planning permission and it is absolutely massive - to the point it will put 1/2 my lovey sunny garden in shade. I have told them that it is too high and they need planning permission. Builders insisting they don’t as something to do with a slope in the garden but rules are about height from foundations. Anyway, I have said I will report if it isn’t sufficiently reduced and both neighbour and builders are going mad saying £1,000s already spent on materials and plans, labour etc. AIBU to say I don’t care an will report? My garden is my sanctuary and many of my plants will die if shaded year round.

It is both higher than regs and also on gradient garden so is effectively height of our house. I will do diagram once have a sec.

This

Those neighbours are selfish fckrs. Clearly tryna get round the planning laws. Do whatever you need to do, OP. Stand your ground. I hope it costs them.

Unless you've been into their garden and measured from the structure's floor, at the highest point in their garden, to the eaves and the apex of the roof then you don't have an accurate measurement of the structure's height.

Those are the only measurements that matter.

Exactly.
I have a feeling OPs neighbours are in the right on this one.

I'm a builder, if they are correct in their assumptions, then they have nothing to fear from a report - if they have not done the measurements and calculations, they certainly do.

The fact they are fretting says to me they are on the wrong side of the rules, and it won't be up for long.

They have a right to report it though if they think it might be flouting building regulations. I don’t see a problem with that.

So is it 4.5m from the foundations (that’s MASSIVE) …

… or 4.5m above your garden because of the slope (could well be permitted)?

Problem with the gradient is that its rather tricky to get accurate measurements from your side as you can't get round it with a tape.

You could hire a theodolite from your local tool hire shop and measure it from a distance.

Behave yourself.

Theres often a huge distinction between what you are lawfully permitted to do, and what you should do, when acting in a considerate way.

At least, that’s how reasonable people behave.

You are a reasonable person, aren’t you?

Or OP could just ask the neighbours for permission to measure it from their side at the highest point.
If they won’t allow her then all she has to do is report it to planning and they will check
Job done

Just to complicate matters, have they built it square on to the slope or is it sitting like a diamond with only one corner touching the highest point in their garden? That would increase the distance from the highest point to the lowest point by 40% for a square structure (a2 + b2 = c^2) and would, presumably, also increase the drop by 40% (and the apparent height at the boundary by 40%).

Well, I'd phrase it less aggressively, but of course you should complain to the city and ask them to check.
Just recognize that it's kind of a lose-lose situation. Either you do nothing and fume every day at the results, or you file a complaint and your neighbors hate you. Personally, I'd choose the latter.

I wouldn't hesitate to contact the Council. I would include photos as well.

We had something similar (but much worse) locally, when an apparently insane couple with a house on a corner got permission to convert their loft, with skylight windows. They then proceeded to build an entire extra storey, full height, with normal windows, and were starting to add a roof on top. It didn't affect us, but the immediate neighbours were suddenly (a) overlooked from above and (b) in the dark from the south and west. They were too nervous and uncomfortable about "authority" to report it.

I took photos and reported them online, then called the council to say this was probably quite urgent. They were there the same afternoon, told the builders to secure the site and stop, and the following week the builders started to take it all down. The owners subsequently "had to sell their business" ... though I don't see why, frankly, unless they were also fined for it?

In an amusing follow-up, we later had the surveyor round, uninvited, because we had failed to get our new roof approved. We didn't know we had to and the roofer said this never happens! He was here for about 5 minutes, checked the insulation and left. The roofer said he had never known this happen before and someone must have had it in for us!

Sure which is why I wondered if I should report or just deal with it. However I won’t sleep until I know it’s in regs and even then it hurts that someone who we have gone out of our way to be kind to over the years would do this.

Good luck! Our neighbour built a monster fence over 4 metres high along the complete length of our boundary fence so that they could build a sort of outside cooking/ seating area on their side.
We reported it to the council who said it wasn’t allowed but did nothing, then the building ombudsman who came out, made a detailed report and again said “no, well over permitted development and needs to come down”” and passed it back to the council to enforce.
But he-ho the council have no actual enforcement officers apparently now and so the fence still remains.
Our only options now are to get a solicitor involved or go to court over it but after a few years we have grown plants and shrubs up it so it doesn’t actually look that bad now, plus luckily, it doesn’t block any light out of the garden.

It's not real unless there is a diagram OP, lol.

Could they make it lower or would it be impossible

They’re “going mad” because they suspect you have a point. If they had been diligent, they’d be able to explain it calmly.

Who cares if they try to galslight you. Facts are facts. Just get the planning dept involved.

Our neighbours pulled a similar stunt and we reported them on the basis it ruined any privacy we had previously had. Planning made them apply for retrospective planning permission.

@LurkyMcLurkinson did you object during the consultation and did they get the planning permission?

A concrete base is the same as a foundation.