Does a bespoke garden room add value to your home?
If you need extra space, investing in a bespoke garden room is a great solution.
But beware: many garden room companies present themselves as offering a bespoke package but the finished product is actually more of a ‘posh shed’, which bears no resemblance to what Inside Out Oxford do. In fact, we’re not big fans of the phrase posh shed, because what we build for our customers is more akin to a Scandinavian house building than a trumped up shed. If you’re thinking about investing in an Inside Out Oxford bespoke garden room, here are five things you need to know:
Does a bespoke garden room add value?
In simple terms, when it comes to selling your house, a bespoke garden room looks good on an estate agent’s property listing, much like a garage or loft conversion. It’s not going to do you any harm, put it that way.
“The bespoke route gives you something that looks drop dead gorgeous in the context of your own home — sympathetic with the garden, your home, your personality.”
At a more sophisticated level, it is now being viewed as an extra room to the house. Aesthetics and build quality contribute hugely to the added value. In fact, we regularly hear of price differences for identical houses with or without a garden room starting at £50,000 for very simple constructions.
How much does a bespoke garden room cost?
A starting price is £25K… up to the sky’s the limit!
Do you need planning permission for a bespoke garden room?
For most homes in the UK, the answer to this question is no, as the permitted development regulations for outbuildings make it possible to build a bespoke garden room without first obtaining planning permission. However, the regulations govern important ingredients such as size, height, and intended use.
The bespoke garden room is supposed to be ‘incidental’ to the existing home – that means it has to be adding something the home doesn’t have, such as a gym, play room, music studio or office.
Adding a bedroom isn’t permitted without obtaining planning permission. Allowing somebody to sleep in your room is a different question, however, and whether that is allowed comes down to the intention — are you renting this out? (see more about this below). Most families permit sleepovers and occasional use sleeps.
The homes in the UK that do not have permitted development for outbuildings are typically either listed, in a conservation area, or have had the rights removed for some reason (usually significant previous development work).
To confirm that your garden room doesn’t need planning permission, you can apply for a lawful development certificate (LDC). These aren’t compulsory, but there may be times – for example, if you sell your home – when you need a record that your garden room meets all planning rules. Apply to your local council for an LDC via the Planning Portal.
What’s the difference between off-the-peg and a bespoke garden rooms?
In our opinion, the difference is a premium quality and longevity. Off the shelf garden rooms are fine, if they give you what you need. We don’t compete with that, and don’t want to compete. The off-the-peg ones we’ve dismantled and inspected up close are not built to anything like the level of quality that ours are.
By way of contrast, we build everything on-site to agreed drawings that have come from a detailed design exercise in which the homeowner can specify pretty much anything they want. We build from scratch, taking in any angles, unconventional quirks, and required extras (monkey bars, bars, bathrooms, wood burning stoves, sound booths, you name it).
Off the shelf rooms are built in panels off-site and assembled on-site. The assembly usually takes one or two days. You need to have already allowed for a base (typically not included in the price), the electrical supply (not included in the price) and sufficient insulation (often an extra) to name just a few considerations. There’s precious little in it when you look at this from a price perspective.
The bespoke route gives you something that looks drop dead gorgeous in the context of your own home — sympathetic with the garden, your home, your personality. Why would you buy an off-the-peg suit when you could have a tailor-made one for similar money?
Can you sleep in a garden room?
Yes, and people do, although this is a complex subject. Most families permit sleepovers in their garden rooms, and, in outbuildings built under permitted development regulations this is unlikely to be a problem. Using them structurally as a permanent bedroom in addition to the home will cause a problem, unless you get planning permission with that usage stated as intended.
“Why would you buy an off-the-peg suit when you could have a tailor-made one for similar money?”
Without planning permission, you’re in a grey area as councils do not like garden rooms being used as bedrooms (the so-called “beds in sheds” problem). The legal aspects that are challenging are: standards used in the construction, rateable values and off-radar income streams. Safety aspects are also important (ventilation, fire-retardant materials, electrical certification, etc.).
Can you rent out a garden room?
Yes, but only provided that you have obtained planning permission where that intended usage has been stated and approved.