Dream house - loft conversion with no building regs

[RollaCola84]

Hoping the MN collective can help me as Google is proving confusing. I'm house hunting and yesterday viewed my dream house, I had to stop myself making an offer in the car on the way home.

The house is listed as 3 bed with "loft space". The listing is open that this is being used as a 4th bedroom but can't be called one because it doesn't have building reg approval. I'm trying to work out what would be needed to get such approval, to see if that can be reflected in the price. Or whether I should just walk, sadly, away. Is it just fire doors or does the staircase have to be enclosed ? They've installed a new staircase from the landing that doubles back on itself straight into the loft room with no door at either end. The owners say they didn't want to fit fire doors as they thought they looked ugly, so they're well aware of the shortcomings.

I love the house but don't want to saddle myself with a massive problem in future. FWIW I'd be looking at using the loft as an office / hobby room not a bedroom.

bilbodog thanks. As far as I can the owners didn't get building reg approval because they didn't want to put in fire doors but that means there's no confirmation that other things like floor strength were done properly. It looks good to me, but I'm not a professional.

We have bought and sold two houses that were similar. During that time, the building regulations changed significantly so that had an impact. The first one didn't have a door at the top or the bottom and putting a door sufficient distance from the top of the stairs would have significantly reduced the size of the remaining usable space. There was also a question over whether the joists were sufficient. They work required to get the work done would have roughly equated to the increase in value of the property.

The second was an end of terrace with a hip roof, inadequate head room, inadequate tread depth on the stairs and inadequate space at the top and bottom of the staircase.

In both cases, original victorian and Edwardian doors throughout the house would have also caused a problem.

Both houses were bought and sold as 3 bed plus loft space making it perfectly clear that they were not usable living spaces as defined by current regulations and were priced accordingly.

I would certainly want to see a Part P electrical certificate. If the electrics have been bodged it’s not only dangerous but will be a major job to rip out and re do.

Thanks ForgivenessIsDivine. This work has been done in the last two years but it's a Victorian / Edwardian mid terrace.

Is the space listed as a room on your home insurance ?

We don't live there any more, but yes, we listed the spaces on our house insurance.

If thé work has been done in the last two years, they need to be quite open about who did it, what regulations they were working to and I think you will need an indemnity policy. We had a loft conversion company round to price the work required to bring it to standard in the house where it could have worked and then decided not to have the work done.

Over the years, we saw quite a few houses with loft spaces that were used but wouldn't pass regulations.

No one has mentioned the staircase to the loft. Building regs require a staircase that meets standards as well. So as well as fire doors and structural integrity it must have a proper staircase too. If one cannot be fitted in then that’s another problem with turning it into a 4 bed and maybe why the current owners didn’t do it by the book. Together with fire doors and other work, it costs money and takes space from elsewhere. So you could ask a surveyor what needs to be done to make it a habitable space and if it’s achievable. Then you know where you stand.

Thanks Bubbles there's a proper staircase installed and it felt a decent width going up it. There's a little landing half way up for it to switch back on itself but there's no door at either the top or bottom.

Nothing in the house strikes me as having been done on the cheap, they seemed focused on the appearance of fire doors. But I'm wary they're trying to minimise other issues.

I'm trying to decide if I should persevere, try and get an offer accepted and see what a surveyor says or walk away. It doesn't seem that uncommon from PP

It is just seen as loft space, it doesn't mean you can't use it, just not as a bedroom.

Even if it had building regs when it was built doesn't mean it would be up to current standards, as they change so often!

The planning portal on www.planningportal.co.uk has advice in their mini guide. I have attached some relevant info.

Ignore the advert on my phone!!!

I would go ahead if you love the house and get a survey. Then you will know!

I'd go for it. After all fire doors are supposed to be fitted to every room - have you ever asked about that when viewing a house? Have you discounted properties with no smoke detectors wired into the mains? Didn't think so.

I bought a similar house which had a 'loft space' which was a room that could be used as whatever but couldn't be advertised as a room or bedroom.

TBH it didn't bother me in the slightest. It was just a bonus room and up to me what I used it for, just could be advertised as a bedroom.

It's a lot of effort to do a proper loft conversion and much easier to do a loft space to make a usable room.

Nobody from the surveyor to the mortgage lender was the slightest bothered about it.

I have a house in the UK with such a space, and it is used as a study/attic and will be a sewing room when I move back. We have a fire door at the entrance to it, but that is all (and smoke alarms obviously), but it was done in the 80s I think, so current regs don't apply. It wasn't advertised as a bedroom when we bought in the 90s, and we are very clear with the tenants that it is for storage or a hobby room only.

I currently live in a house with a polyvalent room that runs the whole width of the house and is huge. There is a stair case, but no fire door, just a curtain at the bottom of the stairs. I suspect no building control here either, but it's Belgium. Renting with a room like this was a bargain, as it means we didn't have to shell out for storage when we moved.

Hi Op, I had a loft conversation done in my old house that didn’t fit building regs ( roof height didn’t comply). When I sold the house I paid for insurance to cover any future issues.

There were fire doors plus escape windows and the survey confirmed it was safe. Maybe you need to offer a price, have the survey done and if there’s any problems you’ll have to correct, adjust your offer.

Any structural work carried out to a property requires Building Control. This would include creation of new window openings, roof lights, staircases. Even if it is not counted as a bedroom. You can apply for retrospective approval: www.planningportal.co.uk/info/200137/how_to_get_approval/78/pre-site_approval/4

You could also look at indemnity insurance (not sure what this involves)

Hi
I had this. A de facto room - carpet, radiators, tv and phone sockets and 2 veluxes. Not listed as bedroom on particulars. It had pull down ladder.
I bought house, phoned council planning, told them I wasn't going to apply for retrospective planning as too much hassle. I told them I was going to put in staircase with fire doors top and bottom, smoke alarm etc. He said no problem, that what I was doing was a betterment and just had it inspected for regs after work done.
So maybe phone planning dept for advice. My fire doors looked like normal doors

We bought a house like this with a ‘loft room’. We ended up having to redo the loft properly because there was no proper support installed under the floor which started to cause structural problems, and the staircase was not legal. It cost more than if we had done the loft from scratch ourselves.

That's the sort of thing I'm concerned about Marv1nGay3. That's why I want to make sure I understand the regs and requirements before we potentially get into survey territory.

Beautifullydamaged that's probably what I'm going to do. If it's just a case of fitting internal fire doors I can live with that, just concerned about bigger, costlier jobs.

Is the internal roof height high enough to meet regulations? Just a thought in addition to what's been said above - apologies if you've mentioned this already. I think it needs to be 1.9m minimum at the highest point.

I would be rather suspicious of the lack of fire doors being supposedly the only reason why they haven't got building regs approval. It doesn't make sense to sell the house as a 3 bed instead of a 4 bed - and miss out on a substantial sum of money - if all they have to do is put in a couple of fire doors when they're ready to put the house on the market and sort out the regulations.

Once the house is officially classed as three storey (which this one is) you must have fire doors on all habitable rooms off the stairwell.

Tbh I’d be really put off by them saying that they just didn’t want to do fire doors. It’s been done in the last two years and if it’s otherwise to standard they could massively increase the value of the house by getting the fire doors. No one selling their house wouldn’t do that. That means they have begun the negotiation process by attempting to mislead you. I don’t think they’re people with whom you want to be involved in such a costly transaction.

Building regulation requirements seem to change/update frequently.

As someone about to embark on a loft conversion of a mid-terrace Victorian property, all three of the specialist loft conversion firms we have spoken to have said that it is no longer a requirement to have fire doors to each room. It is sufficient to have a fire door at the bottom of the stairs leading to the loft conversion, and then have mains wired smoke alarms installed on each floor.