planning permission needed? Overlooked by a monster treehouse!

[MrTumblesCrackWhore]

Dh and I bought our house 6 years ago partly because the back garden is not overlooked by any houses and is very quiet - a rarity in the part of London where we live. There is a small private road which runs at the back and beyond that there is a large back garden which belongs to a house on the corner of the next crescent along.

However, when we got back from holiday last week, the owner has built the biggest monster of a tree house at the back of his garden which his three children play in very noisily and alot. The father sits up there in the evening with a book too. Their garden is on a slighter higher level than ours and therefore looks directly over and into the back of our house. We have quite an open plan house with long sliding doors at the back so, from the treehouse, anyone can see quite far into the house.

Does anyone know whether this kind of construction needs planning permission at all?

Well I googled it and surprisingly since 2009 you do need planning permission for a tree house. I think this particular tree house does seem to be an unreasonable invasion of your privacy. Not sure what next step would be. Complain to local council or see a solicitor or maybe Citizen's advice Bureau.

Can you put trellis up on top of your fence?

Plant something to bloke their view?

bloke? Block

Depends on where you are but many councils are unwilling to take enforcement section even if it needs permission. Do you feel up to discussing it direct? If they kept the noise down and put up screening to avoid overlooking would that help?

Bear in mind that they will all be bored of it within weeks!

Ask your council.

Thanks all, some really good advice here.

The trellis idea is something we had considered but because of the incline and the configuration of our garden, it would have to be really high and that would look a bit odd in its context.

I'd definitely want to talk to them first. I don't want to go marching straight to the council with the issue but I just wanted to be armed with some good info.

rcheshire good point! Here's hoping.

The other side to this was on here a couple of days ago

You know this is MN and we want a photo, doncha?

You are going to be seen as areal kill joy if you complain, the neighbours DCs will take enormous pleasure in being very noisy at your end of their garden forever.

Well mine would, because I'd install a huge squeaky trampoline.

Beauty of the tree house is the novelty will wear off, Trampolining doesn't and even occurs in the middle of winter.

However, they have been thoughtless and I can see why you are cross.

Can you ask them to put a trellis or screen along the side of the tree house or block the window your side. Staring into your house is not reasonable.

perhaps you could invite some unsightly people to take up nude sunbathing in your garden.

I don't think we are going to complain- I wasn't sure we were going ti anyway, I just was interested in the planning permission aspect and thought a wise mnetter might know. After talking to dh last night about your comments, with all things considered, they seem like a nice enough family, we haven't caught them staring blatantly into our house and the kids, like you said, will probably grow out if it soon enough.

My two naughties will probably make enough commotion in the years
to come so it's probably best not to create any issues now.

Thanks for all your comments. Sorry chaos no photos at the mo- camera phone broken.

It's not the kids that are the problem but the dad sitting up there in the evening. Can he look directly into your house? That would seem very intrusive.

It seems a bit affected to climb up into a treehouse to read a book. I bet he really, really wants people to look at him up in his treehouse, reading. He probably wanted it in the front garden.

On those grounds alone, report them ;)

It's a weird sort of tree house. It seems like it is several platforms at different levels accessed by a normal ladder. The dad hoicks a chair up but to be fair, he does usually face away from us.

lisaro tried to find the thread you mention but can't. What was the gist of it?

Ha ha akhal maybe you're right. He has got a personalised registration plate, and given his house a new name plate.

Climbing up a treehouse to read a book in the evenings seems like the action of a twat to me. He probably wants you to see him looking enigmatic and at one with nature. Does he stare off into the middle-distance a lot?

Friends of ours had a huge tree house built for their DCs, cost thousands. They never play in it anymore. Novelty wore of pretty quickly and then inevitably spiders moved in so they refused to go in it!

Start a blog to tell everyone what he's currently reading

I think it'll be me who gets done for invading his privacy if I do that. I'll get me binoculars out. Like it.

No middle distance staring as yet, but maybe a bit of hand shuffling. :o

What about if you ever want to sell the house? It might put buyers off and it's going to be very difficult to raise it as an issue years down the line.

daisy good point. Hmmn. We hadn't thought of that. Yes, even if their kids have grown up, they might have sold the house to a young family which creates the same problem again - and we probably will want to sell the house in a few years.

Oh bugger, I really don't want to have to deal with this - I hate confrontation and being a killjoy. BUT I am a bit of stickler for doing things properly and being respectful to other people - which is why it has annoyed me.

Maybe what I'll get dh to do is when they're out in the garden, I might engineer a conversation with them about it, rather than go and deliberately go and knock on their door. We sometimes park our car out back so this might be easy to do.

plant a couple of trees to block it out.

Thanks Piglet John - unfortunately that might be too tricky as we need access to the road at the back - we have a small garage place to store our crap, a gate and a very small planted area running along the back wall. I think we might have to strategically attach various pieces of trellis to the sections instead.

I know a lot about planning rules. It may well need permission so contact your local planning department.