Change of use - planning permission outbuilding to workshop - any advice?!

[hopingforapeainapod]

My husband and I are looking to move and want to buy a house with some sort of outbuilding (garage / car port / stable, whatever) that can be converted into a workshop for my husband’s business. He is a self-employed furniture maker, one man band, and so a small-scale operation: no external clients / traffic, stored equipment only etc.

We have looked at a few houses but we are terrified about committing to one and then finding out after we have purchased this that we cannot develop the workshop for whatever reason. Our understanding is that we will need planning permission for change of use but have no idea how to go about this and wondered if anyone could share any experiences / advice.

1. Does anyone know if we can get pre-approval for a house we don’t currently own but are thinking about buying? Is this a Lawful Development Certificate or something else?
2. A few of the houses we have looked at are listed / in conservation areas. Will this make it significantly harder? We looked at one listed property for example that has a very large carport - all we would want to do is just add one external wall, maybe a door/window - this seems like a very straightforward ask but I don’t know if we will meet lots of resistance just because the house is listed?
3. Any other considerations / potential problems / things we should be aware of?!

many many thanks!!

I’m in a conservation area. Generally I’ve found getting planning for change of use of buildings straightforward. Went commercial/ with a formal stables to holiday let to residential. No changes to external character of buildings though. I think listed is another thing entirely, you can speak to local planners just to get a feel for what would be ok to do.

Yes, you can apply for planning permission on a property you don’t own - though the admin and costs of doing so are generally a bit prohibitive. The planning department will usually be amenable to giving pre-planning advice which will give you an indication of whether something will be an outright rejection, or what criteria they’d require a conversion to meet. Some local authorities are strict about not allowing conversion of garages or requiring that you demonstrate adequate parking would still be available, so that would be a key issue to establish.

In a conservation area you will need planning permission for just about any conversion work, a Lawful Development Certificate cannot be used to demonstrate that something complies with the requirements of a conservation area, which has its own separate criteria and legal controls.

Possibly in addition to planning and local authority permission, you have to consider whether the actual individual property or area have any restrictive covenants on running a business from the home.

Assuming he uses electric saws and sanders, he may also need some extraction fitting? Ditto if he has a spray booth?

It won’t be so much of the change of planning to a business that could be a problem but noise. Particularly in a residential area.

We had the same problems when looking for premises for the same sort of business.

Ended up just renting a small unit on an industrial estate instead.

Change of use shouldn’t be an issue for an outbuilding etc.
Listed, this is possible but will require heritage statements, appropriate materials and so on. It will take longer to sort and cost a bit more but as long as appropriate and sympathetic to its surroundings then totally possible

Thanks all, really helpful suggestions - we have honestly never done anything like this before and there seems to be a real lack of transparency around planning!

@RatherBeOnVacation yes he would need some sort of extraction but don’t think he has a spray booth. DH claims he really doesn’t think he would be very noisy, or at least no more than a hobbyist who likes tinkering away in his garage too, but I am concerned about noise complaints and so we need to factor that into location very carefully. Alternatively he could rent a unit somewhere - I think he’s just got this slightly rose-tinted dream of having his own workshop, plus we have a small child and are hoping to grow our family so having him close to home would be really helpful.

OP, what hours does he need to work to make a living? More than a hobbyist pottering in their spare time?

@hopingforapeainapod If he’s operating a furniture making business, even if he’s a one man band, the extraction noise will be an issue. Been there, done that.

We have an industrial unit on a farm 10 minutes down the road. Environmental health refused to support the change of use application on a barn attached to our house due to noise. In hindsight, it’s actually a lot noisier than we thought it was and the council were 100% correct to refuse it in a residential area.

No planning authority will guarantee a particular outcome unless you put your money where your mouth is and submit an application. Most will offer a pre-app planning service - usually tapered costs from “do I need planning permission” through to more complex schemes like big housing developments. Yours may also have a duty planner who will be able to give verbal advice for free.

it isnt opaque necessarily - it just depends on the absolute specifics of the property, scale of what you want to do, where in the plot, what else has been done already and when… the long and the short is that any development / change of use needs planning permission - it’s complicated by some specific changes which are then removed from the definition of development by changes to legislation

I wouldn't consider the listed building without formal advice (I say this as someone who worked as a listed buildings officer for a decade) because what is small scale works may fundamentally alter the character or appearance of a listed building, or block a feature which is featured in the listing and be considered unacceptable. It might be absolutely fine (especially for a detached structure in the grounds), but where for general areas there is always a presumption in favour of development, this does not hold true for a listed property or to a lesser extent a property within a conservation area. It will also be a lot more expensive than you anticipate to get the required permissions through, and you may be limited on the materials and techniques that are approved to make any changes approved to a listed building.

You canapply for planning permission on any building, you just have to serve notice on the owners. You would need planning permission not a certificate of lawful development for a change of use not yet undertaken unless the system has changed recently (again, seek formal advice from a current planning officer at the local authority where the property you would buy is situated). You would need an impact assessment and it is very very likely that should it be approved you would be limited on the hours of use. Is this his main job or a hobby side job? If he's doing it 40 hours a week with the noise and disruption that entails then they will look carefully at how close he is to neighbouring properties and the impact on them. If he works 9-5 in an office and is doing this as a hobby second income, a few hours on an evening and a bit of the weekend it would likely be considered de minimis, and within the scope of the space as a residential dwelling, and not require a change of use application.

I would be very careful with a listed building. That car port may well be a car port because it can’t be anything else. Or you might find out later that it shouldn’t be there either!