General Chat

Well earlier today, i heard from a friend down south that someone had made a concrete base to build a "hut" so a friend could come and stay every weekend. They would leave their backdoor open so the friend could use the batjhroom in the night.
I said surely not? If someone is going to be living in this hut 3 days a week, wouidnt planning permission be needed? Also apparently its a council house!

This so called friend doesnt like living on their own some 50 miles away in a rented flat! They will be paying rent and getting meals all weekend.

I am struggling why anyone who already has a place to live, would travel 50 miles on a Friday to sleep in the garden in a hut with nothing but a sleeping bag and no heater.

As a council tennant, are you allowed to rent out a" hut" to someone? im sure this strictly isnt allowed. :-S

Florence in the hebrides

Pretty sure you are right Florence, but you don't, I believe need planning permission for a shed/hut call it be any name, under a certain (not sure of the figure) size. So maybe somebody camping out in a shed would go unnoticed until a neighbour complains. But let's hope nobody realises that their house is unsecured all night. However if somebody checks and the 'hut' has a bed in it and other things to make it look like living accommodation that would probably be a different story. It will be pretty cold in the winter. And it is the paying of 'rent' that would cause trouble for the housing association/council tenant I think.

I here are would imagine the HA have far bigger fish to fry and there are many tenants, I know a few, who have a log cabin in the garden which one or two of the children sleep in.

As long as you keep it under 7' and don't have a balcony on it, you can put a roof on your whole garden without seeking planning permission.

My sister (after requesting planning permission, which she didn't need) put a summer house in her garden, and her neighbour - with at least 2 sheds bigger than the summerhouse, reported her to the Council for running a bed & breakfast from it! :-D :-D
Then he wondered why, after putting up a camera that covered three back gardens, but not his own, he was reported to both the Council and the police!

Wouldn't that be shed and breakfast?

A friend of mine sells jams and pickles she makes. One of her neighbours reported he for that

Oh for goodness sake why can't people just mind their own business. Only if it was a danger to neighbours or me would cause me to report to the council.

Because they have no other power or importance in their lives.

I don't think we were reported but I do think one of the council inspectors spotted a tree of ours encroaching onto public space (footpath, but above head height) too much and we were sent a letter about it.

I have kept the sides of all bushes up to about six feet high trimmed back so as not to extend beyond the garden wall since then and OH has had the job of doing the trees. Alas, he is no tree surgeon so we have some funny shapes.

I have learned to live with them rather than argue about the weird shapes. :-D

We may well be known locally as that couple with the weird trees! :-0

Each to their own I guess.I just don't understand why you would sleep in a hut when you have a flat to live in! Camping out in your garden with kids in summer is fine but a small hut that is cold is something else.Charging rent though is another matter.
Leaving your door unlocked is stupid and will invalidate the house insurance and with children in the house too it's crazy!!!

Florence in the hebrides

I have to agree with you, Florence!