Extending an already extended house - is there a limit?

[SugarSkyHigh]

Our house is quite large and has already been extended on 3 separate occasions, before we bought it. However I'm considering extending further - the kitchen could be made larger, and we have no downstairs loo, despite size of house! Whats more, I'm sure we could do a loft extension.

However, when we went into the solicitors during the process of purchasing, she made this throwaway comment along the lines of, "you probably wouldn't get permission to extend as it's already been extended so much." I didnt take much notice as was mad keen for the house, and TBH it's not the end of the world if we can't extend any more. HOwever, I am curious. I heard (somewhere) that you can't extend beyond two thirds of the original size of the house, or something like that.

Can anyone shed any light on this? TIA xxxxxxxxxx

if you phone your councils planning dept they will tell you. im not sure tbh, but they will know.

www.planningportal.gov.uk/england/public/
This website gives you the answer I think.

I'm not sure there are any hard and fast rules - certainly I have a couple of friends who trebled the size of their houses with extensions.

Yes, there's a limit. You can extend a tiny, tiny amount without planning permission on a house that has never been extended - this is obviously not applicable to you. It may be that this is what your solicitor meant. But, you will also come up against limits to do with it being in keeping with everyone else's houses around you. Have they been extended too? How close are you to boundaries?

My parents live in the sticks, and basically, they could extend to kingdom come and no-one would care too much (once they've finished their current building work, they will have nearly doubled the size of the house they bought 20 years ago). But if you are near a neighbour or in a row of houses that were all built to look the same, you might have problems.

The term you are looking for is (I believe) "Over-development of the site"

It would depend on your garden size. I think that the limit is no more than 50% of your garden and I think that would be the original garden.

thank you thank you all! that has all been hugely helpful.......... now we only need to find the ££££ for whatever extension/s we are allowed to do!

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