Scottish Elises

Hi,

I realise that the answer to my question is really 'seek professional legal advice' but I wanted to post here incase anyone is able to share their experience of a similar situation.

I am looking to build a garage - my initial plans were rejected by the planning department, so I'm now on plan B which is to locate it in one corner of my plot, which is currently my driveway (it's actually the obvious place to put it). I'd like to build right up to the boundary to make the most of the available space and that corner is bordered by two neighbours gardens. It is currently entirely enclosed with 6 foot fencing.

There is a provision in my title deeds which grants me servitude right of access from the two adjoining properties to renew/maintain any garage built on or near the boundary, however I can't find anything relating to who owns the fences - I would like to remove the fencing where the garage is going to stand and use that as the boundary. One neighbour has previously expressed a desire to buy part of the land in question, so I'm not expecting them to be particularly helpful.
Has anyone been through a similar situation?

Thanks in advance

Cheers
Ali

Can't help you with the legal question but how well do you get on with your neighbours?
Ours were fine...

Do you need planning permission? Is it adjoining the house?

I thought you could built a garage upto a certain size without planning permission

Up to 30 sq mtr used to be the ruling but it had to be a meter away from the boundary and no more than 2.5m in height IIRC. Think that has changed now as well, someone told me recently that you now need planning and building warrant for anything.

Not a legal issue, but if you are right up on the boundary line and your neighbour doesn't allow temporary access for construction your builder will have to allow for over-hand bricklaying which is more expensive, as it takes longer. Of course your foundations will be wider than the walls, so this may determine a gap anyway?

There are both planning and building control issues relating to this. Planning is clearly needed and a warrant is almost certainly needed unless the garage is very small < 8sqm.

Foundations can be offset, or you may wish to build a raft depending on the ground conditions, etc.

As to who owns the fence do you know who put it up?

Best if you can agree this all in advance with your neighbours though, it may not affect granting of planning permission but can be a real pain to resolve or work round. Simplest to rip it down but you already know that.

You need a building warrent if your building within 1M of the boundary dispite the size. You'll also need an eccentric foundation so your not building on your neighbours land which in turn will see the edge of the foundation on the boundary but the garage wall will be stepped back 50mm on the foundation.

I hope that helps or even makes sense?

Cheers

Mark

Thanks for the replies - some useful info there.

I'll be resubmitting my current planning application with the new plans, so it'll get the correct planning as required by the council. It will also require a building warrant; that'll get sorted once the plans are approved.

The original builder put up the fences - the estate is only about 10 years old.

I am expecting one neighbour to be difficult as they would like to purchase that corner of land from me in order to square off their garden - unfortunately my plot isn't large enough to do that and still provide two car parking spaces without using up a big chunk of the garden, which I don't want to do and I'm fairly sure it wouldn't fly with planning anyway.

I'll make an appointment to speak to the solicitor that handled the conveyancing next week and see what she says ...

Cheers
Ali