Party wall questions...

[MaggieW]

I've looked at various websites but am a bit bamboozled with information and not sure if it applies. Our neighbours are planning to convert their loft (I've only found out because a surveyor has written speculatively saying there's a planning issue that may affect us.) We have already converted ours.

1. Can we prevent them building on the party wall that we've put up?. (This may seem strange but they have a house full of dogs and I really can't bear to have another shared party wall which means we'll be disturbed in our loft bedroom by the barking that goes on day and night).

1. Having had ground floor extensions done by ourselves and both neighbours either side, I would want to have a surveyor do a condition survey before work starts. Can I insist on this? (We ended up with a massive crack in our living room wall which required the plaster to be taken off, mesh inserted, redecoration etc etc when next door did their extension and it was a massive hassle for all concerned. These neighbours are less considerate than those ones, so am keen to have a third party involved to verify/rectify things.)

TIA.

I presume this neighbour is joined to you? Did you not have to serve a PWA on them when you converted your loft? I'm a bit confused as to who is doing what where

Yes, they're next door to us, and are planning to convert loft. It was different neighbours when we did ours and it was done so long ago I can't remember what the procedure was.

I'm not an expert but we briefly looked into this when doing work on our kitchen - as I understand it, yes you can definitely insist on a surveyor to look after your interests appointed at their expense.

Building on a wall you put up - I'm confused about this bit. Surely the whole definition of a party wall is one you share? How would they be building on your wall - it's their wall too?

As I understand it, I don't think you could prevent them, no. You can refuse to consent to the party wall agreement and it then goes into dispute, but this would then get resolved by an independent surveyor who would simply set out what has to happen when they build. There is a downloadable booklet on this site which explains it www.communities.gov.uk/publications/planningandbuilding/partywall

Why not look into soundproofing your side of the wall? You could ask them to do the same as part of the agreement?

Thanks for that. Sorry - seem to have inadvertently started two threads on this. The soundproofing idea is a great one.

Yes, I understand your confusion re party wall being both of ours, even though we put it up, and understand what you mean. However, I read on one website of a case where neighbours objected and the people building then had to build inside their boundary, ie not onto the party wall but created a separate one, so I was trying to see if this applied in this case.

I don't want to prevent them going ahead, but just want to ensure that we aren't subjected to more noise from dogs than we are already, and ensure if anything untoward happens during the build that we're not left dealing with the neighbours directly as they're not the easiest to get along with. Thanks again.

oh I see - so this is a wall you erected inside your boundary? I wasn't sure whether you were referring to the loft partition wall (which is obviously half theirs).

I know a friend did have to do this - this was relating to a ground floor extension where their neighbour had built right up to (but inside) their side of the boundary. My friend asked for permission to hang their extension onto the wall, and the neighbour refused unless they paid some astronomical sum, and because the wall was inside the neighbour's boundary they were not able to do it, so they built a second wall inside their boundary. I believe this still required party wall approval (because it involved digging foundations close to the boundary) but their neighbour did not have the right to refuse.

I think whether this would apply in your case would be complicated and maybe you should get a surveyor's advice, but it could be a good lever to persuade them that it would be cheaper to invest in soundproofing than to build a new wall?