Selling: didn’t get planning

[Panicatadisco]

Help! We are looking to sell our Victorian house in a conservation area. We replaced two casement windows on the top floor, street facing, with two double glazed timber sash windows in keeping with the street. We didn’t get planning permission as we thought if you are reinstating original features it would not be needed. Some lawyers on our street did the same. Our local authority is useless and takes months to do basic things. If we apply retrospectively it will hold up the sale.

Does the four year rule apply and will anyone ie the buyers’ conveyancer be able to find out we did it three years ago rather than four?
Should we get indemnity insurance?
We also changed an upstairs makeshift utility and kitchen into a bathroom without building regs about a decade ago. Will that come up and if so, how do they know?
Lesson learned, will do things by the book in the next place.

Oh dear. 🙄

Please don’t compound what you have done by lying about it

Some lawyers on our street did the same
Please don't try to insinuate that was your "taking legal advice" on the matter? 😬
If you're aware that you needed planning permission now that you want to sell, you'll have been aware at the time you did it.
Zero sympathy from me.

Not here for sympathy but for advice from
people hence in legal matters. Never mind! Maybe I will reinstate the 1970s casement single glazed windows then. 🤔

Ask the estate agent

It's crazy that you need planning for stuff like that. I bought a place that didn't have planning for underfloor heating in the bathroom - really didn't care but the lawyers were worried! If I was your buyer I wouldn't be concerned and would go ahead without any problem but some will ask you to pay for indemnity insurance.

Read form TA6 if you haven't already completed it and decide if you are going to lie on a legally binding document.

Just get an indemnity policy surely at this stage?

The chances of op's buyer being happy to ignore this when her solicitor points it out is practically zero.

It's hardly "crazy" that there are planning restrictions in a conservation area, why is that crazy?

Apply retrospectively, much easier to come clean rather than get tripped up later in the process.

You can make an enquiry, in my experience they're unlikely to be worried about this kind of thing- but better to check.

@Johnnysgirl Please can you tell me why it needs taxpayers money wasted on planning officials to approve two square meters of underfloor heating in my 1990s house just because it is in a conservation area. What possible effect could it have on anyone else?

Thanks @HouseHistoryHunter when you say make enquiries, do you mean ring the planning department and ask if it’s the sort of thing they are worried about or how long ago we would have had to have had the work done for it to have become regularised due to use? Does the four year rule still apply?

Are you sure you need permission? We live in a conservation area and when i called them about replacing our front door we were told we could put in whatever we liked, windows too although we haven't done those.

If you ring planning you cannot subsequently get an indemnity policy.

That wouldn't usually need planning as it wouldn't affect the external appearance of the building unless your house is listed or something as well as being in a conservation area.

I wouldn't worry. I'm hoping people on the thread being all angry have simply misunderstood the difference between a conservation area and listed buildings. You don't live in a listed building.
We live in a CA and similar to you we replaced ugly aluminium windows with period appropriate timber sash.
A quick conversation with Ealing planning department told us we were fine- "You do not need planning permission to change your windows and doors in a conservation area on condition that they are 'like for like in material and appearance'."

As we were improving they had no issues.

Also if the work you did inside isn't structural then again there should be no concerns.

To be fair, that does sound nuts.

The house was not itself listed - it was only built in 1990s, but it was within a few hundred yards of a listed property. I still think the need for planning was way over the top! The solicitor suggested we get an indemnity.

Just reading up now and I think we are in an Article 4 area which means we probably should have submitted to do them. Also, they’re timber sash and period appropriate but double glazed. How will anyone be able to tell when we put them in? Surely we say that they’re ten years old and then it becomes permitted use? We have enhanced the property so it is more in keeping with the conservation rules ironically!
Very good point about the indemnity by PP! Thank you!