Kitchen Extension on Terraced Houses - things to watch for.

Many terraced houses have flush rear wall elevations lining up with the neighbours. Some will have staggered or offset rear elevation wall lines and some will be end of terraces that may have some side space for a decent sized kitchen extension or wrap around.

Whatever the style of your terraced house it will usually be the relationship or interaction of your property with your neighbours that will decide whether or not the kitchen extension to a terraced house will be acceptable under planning policy if formal planning consent is required.

As your kitchen extension will be creating additional bulk in the built form of the dwelling, this will have an impact upon your neighbours to some degree. It is usually the Case Planning Officer who will decide whether or not the impact has any adverse or detrimental effects. This issue is usually heightened or made worse if the neighbour complains or objects during the planning application of your kitchen extension to a terraced house or property.

Many kitchen extensions to terraced houses can be built without formal Planning approval and this is what is called permitted development or PD. It is a set of criteria that allows homeowner to erect extensions to their property without obtaining formal planning consent first. It can be compared to the phrase - ‘it is the planning permission you already own’ - you just need to reverse engineer a kitchen extension that fist the criteria and this is again where your experienced home extension designer or architect scores highly with providing you with the correct advise right from the start.

Some people find the permitted development route quite exciting especially if you are already having disputes and uneighbourly events or situations with the neighbours. This is because a PD extension is not influenced by external consultations - it is either legal or it ins not. However, to determine this correctly and legally you or your house extension design agent will need to submit proper drawings and submit an application to the council for a certificate of lawful development.