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Complete (build) Garden Office / Pinball Room

Monkeyboypaul

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Joined
May 29, 2013
Messages
5,546
Location
South of York
Alias
Paul G
As suggested here, this will be a simple log of our building progress in case it's useful to anyone else in future.

Background:
  • We had an old garage - it was useless. Too small for car, looked hideous, damp, cold, asbestos, no power, not secure, etc.
  • We need a better & more spacious home office.
  • We need to move ourselves out of the current home office because it's destined to be our son's bedroom. And it's too small.
  • I'd like somewhere to put my 5 games where i can get the f'ing glass off/on easily. I'd naturally like more space, but room for 5 is good compromise (trust me, it's better than the other option i.e. zero).
  • We need to clear the space where i've currently got my games (where i can't get the f'ing glass off/on easily) because the flat roof if leaking (again), plus we've got some grander plans for that space in the future.
  • I'm paying a little for offsite storage of 2 games & I'd rather not (yes, i could sell them, but i don't want to).
  • The old garage looked really ****.

Plans:
  • 6m x 5m (with a corner missing so it fits next to the house)
  • Well-insulted timber structure. Cheap & fast to build.
  • Flat GRP roof, or a green roof.
  • Storage heaters.
  • Room for office, including any potential employees or visiting clients/contractors.
  • Room for 5 Pinballs as part of the office space (so they'll need to look good too, AND incorporating room to get the f'ing glass off!). If this become a fulltime Pin-shed then there would be room for 10 or 11 games... i can dream.
  • Could be converted to a generic useful space i.e. if we sold the house - hold a car (with a new front door) or gym or whatever.
  • Office by day, Pinball room evenings and weekends.
  • [Now] Aiming to be done before March '15 - as lower priority than paid work, but enables us to expand the business.

Might look something like this (stolen from one of those home office websites). Not quite so posh with all the windows, but still has the vertical timber cladding as it has to look semi-professional for Business reasons.

office (1).jpg



Budget: £7-8k, although build cost now £13-14k, therefore business loan required.

Current costs (as of 02/11/2015):
  • £500 - 'safe' re/oval of old asbestos garage.
  • £1230 - Concrete base (inc. 5m3 of concrete, steel and lots of hardcore). Was quoted £950, inc. 3m3, but hole needed to be bigger, but got a very solid base now.
  • £150ish (TBC) - Planning Application
 
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Old garage:

IMG_0560.JPG

IMG_0559.JPG IMG_0561.JPG IMG_0558.JPG IMG_0562.JPG IMG_2369.JPG

Old garage removed. New base footprint dug out. The old cracked base is surrounded by hardcore and steel ready for the concrete. There's a deeper channel around the edges, averages about 350mm deep and 200mm wide. Then there's the muddy plateau surrounding the old garage base, averaging about 300mm deep.
The old and knackered garage base is 150mm higher. Then the final concrete level will be 100mm higher again.

IMG_1421.JPG


Little 50mm pipe for power and CAT6 cables from the house:

IMG_1422.JPG

Concrete poured & drying:

IMG_1440.JPG
 
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Good to see the building of a games room, sorry to hear that you have to put a couple of pins in storage. Shame you couldn't find someone to pin sit for you.
 
Good to see the building of a games room, sorry to hear that you have to put a couple of pins in storage. Shame you couldn't find someone to pin sit for you.

Thanks - i had 7 games until about May and stored a few in Birmingham with some work colleagues for about 6months (TAF could've made about £2k if i'd charged!) but a new baby arrival and the ever-leaking flat roof forced any logic out the window - i just wanted the remaining 5 dry, secure and nearby. Can always swap 1 for another if i get bored.
 
That looks great, particularly if you can stick to your budget.

You cleared everything through planning or managing to stay within portal guidelines? I did the latter, but still raised it's ugly head by solicitor when selling house.
 
That looks great, particularly if you can stick to your budget.

You cleared everything through planning or managing to stay within portal guidelines? I did the latter, but still raised it's ugly head by solicitor when selling house.

thanks.

Good question - we'll submit a planning enquiry as soon as we can get round to doing it (see comment above about giving priority to paid work!), and [probably] won't start building anything until that's sorted. But we're hoping that it won't need any because it's below the 30m2 threshold (so i'm told). No water supply or draining either. Bit closer to the neighbour's boundary though, so maybe need a fire-rated wall that side - she's just happy the old garage is gone though, and luckily we both have big enough gardens that losing a small slither of previously wasted land is neither here nor there.
 
You should be fine with Building Regs being under 30sqm. Mine is too and building control came round to inspect, advising everything OK, except electrician needed to register the electrical installation with them. You can try get away with not doing this if no plans to sell your house and get on well with your neighbours (i.e. they don't notify them) but a right PITA if you have to do this later on.

Yep, your timber boundary wall will likely need fire-treating and keep your roof under 2.5m too (if flat) as under 2m to boundary line.
 
Nice work! That sure was one ugly garage! I love the way you buried the former foundation as part of the new. Cunning.

Keep up the log, I'm keen to see how this turns out. I did my own summerhouse/office too. No planning, regs, inspectors or registrations but made sure it followed the online guide for height and 2m distance from neighbours fence. I'm good friends with my next door neighbour and discussed it openly and fully before starting. I suspect a bad neighbour is the start of most problems with garden shed home-builds...
 
@Monkeyboypaul just been looking back at things and wanted to know if you've moved into your office/pin room yet? How's the build going?

Well reminded!

So we checked with the local council and it transpires that we need planning permission "because the front of the garage protrudes beyond the front line of the house" - although the old garage did too, because it's going exactly where the old garage was, and we phoned them to discuss this, but this is a town planning dept and we (that is my Wife who is an Architect and I; her ever-eager sounding board) are not on best pleased with town planning departments this year as they appear to be inept, poorly governed and lacking useful processes. But hey-ho.

So we're putting the planning application in today and have lined our usual local builder up for mid-Jan, providing it gets approval of course.

The price we've been quoted is about £13k, which is higher than our initial £7-8k budget and therefore means a business loan, but our 10month old son also goes into full time nursery care this week, so we're hopeful that normal-ish life can resume soon allowing us more hours in the day to pay it off quickly.

So all being well, we'd be in decorating around Feb, and in before March. Still 5months away, but we can see the light!
 
Sorry to hear that, good luck with a planning department that by the sounds of things are having problems doing their own planning!
 
Plenty of the Northern pin heads are always looking for a nice warm games room to babysit there pins. My games room for one just ain't big enough.
 
Planning application still pending decision, due 7th Jan, but no objections yet. Neighbour has no problems and is also the head of the local parish council, so that's got to be a plus.

Builder lined-up for 18th Jan pending a positive outcome.
 
Planning application still pending decision, due 7th Jan, but no objections yet. Neighbour has no problems and is also the head of the local parish council, so that's got to be a plus.

Builder lined-up for 18th Jan pending a positive outcome.

Application permitted :D

The Mrs. also put a small side extension (basically a conservatory) to the main house in with this application. The permission lasts 3 yrs, so hopefully we can get that done maybe next year or the one after too, saving another application and the £150ish it costs each time. Depends how much i can pimp her [architectural abilities] out in the meantime...
 
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That's going to be a monster games room.
I'm very jealous, which I had to room to build something that size.
Looking forward to the grand opening of that baby.
 
Insanely jealous of all these games rooms, my JD is wedged next to the telly currently! Top work on these games rooms chaps, sure I'll join the club one day. :)
 
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