Hi back again- news on my architect having sent plans to the address on the form which was apparently then wrong one- they did forward the plans to the correct planning address but then emailed him to say that in was an invalid request as we were going into the existing loft and therefore we needed a bat survey. But they made a typo in their email so he didn't get it.
Anyway one good thing about the storms last week is I managed to get a last minute cancellation from a Batman who was due to oversee a roof being removed but that got put on hold, so he was able to come and view mine from the inside. Only a small area that is felted so he needs to come and look at that again in May but the rest is ok. Nowhere for bats to hide and half the tiles were off in November anyway.
In the meantime our builder is due to be rebuilding the old bit of unfelted roof as it's about to collapse on us. We discovered we needed to do this in November but decided to wait for better weather.
This is going to be hard as we need a temporary roof and to live downstairs for 4-6 weeks. Our kids are not going to be happy. Oh the joys of living in a renovation! It's an 1850s cottage which had a 1950s revamp with a bathroom and teeny kitchen added. Unfortunately we ripped out the kitchen when we were told the whole of the downstairs was being damp proofed but it turned out they were charlatans and what they were going to do would not have helped so we cancelled them. Sadly the kitchen was already at the tip! Luckily we have a sink and white goods still installed though.
Having a phone call with architect tomorrow as we may need to scale back on extension plans as new roof going to eat into budget, but then once done we might be able to remortgage as house should be worth a bit more with a fancy new roof that's not about to collapse! He'll also pop an attic bedroom in the new roof whilst he's at it so that'll increase value- and allow kids to have their own rooms too! By then both of the reception rooms will have been lime plastered and we will have installed wood burner and open fire and heading towards quite an appealing cottage, even without an extension. Neighbour recently sold, also a 2 bed like us but with only one reception room and it was £110K more than we bought for so having done the roof we should be able to release some more cash. I'll just need to cobble together a kitchen as I don't want to fit a new one just to rip it all out when we extend but also we need to have one to remortgage- a bit of a tricky one!