Extensions in Market Harborough, priced in writing before anything starts.
An extension in Market Harborough depends heavily on which part of town you are in, and the sharpest dividing line is Little Bowden.
There, the Article 4 direction removes further permitted development rights for front elevation alterations and boundary treatments. For an extension that matters in two ways that are easy to overlook. Anything that changes the front of the building, including a porch, a bay, a new window opening or an alteration to the roofline at the front, is caught. And anything that changes the boundary in front of the property, which frequently includes the temporary or permanent removal of a wall to get plant and materials in, is caught as well.
Neither of those stops a good extension. What they do is push the work to the rear and require the access arrangements to be thought through rather than improvised, and both of those decisions belong at the design stage.
Elsewhere in the town the ordinary rules apply. A single storey rear extension of up to four metres on a detached house or three on a semi can fall within permitted development, and on the estate housing there is usually side access and a drive for the skip. Inside the Market Harborough conservation area the limits reduce and a side extension loses its permitted development rights entirely.
There is also the larger home extension route on unlisted property, up to eight metres or six by prior approval with neighbours notified. Our extensions work is set out in more detail there, including how the Building Control inspections fit around the build.
Four things we commit to on every job, rather than four things we say about ourselves.
Permitted development is not an exemption from Building Regulations. We arrange the Harborough District Council inspections, meet the inspector on site at each stage and see the work through to sign off. We do not make the application itself, and we will tell you what is needed and when.
Free, and you get it before you commit to us. Party walls and skip licences are raised at quotation stage, not three weeks into the dig.
The same people do the groundworks, the brickwork and the fit out. Nobody hands your job to a subcontractor you have never met.
You get a straight answer rather than a padded price. It costs us a job occasionally and saves you a great deal more.
Process, specification and what moves the price are set out on our extensions page.
The answers that genuinely differ from one Market Harborough street to the next.
Where a skip stands on the road it is licensed by Leicestershire County Council rather than by Harborough, and the skip company applies for it. On the estates a driveway removes the need entirely.
In Little Bowden we plan the materials route without assuming the front boundary can be opened up, because in that area it cannot be treated as a temporary convenience.
Two storey work needs permission far more often than people expect, and on the tighter plots near the centre it needs a careful look at a neighbour’s daylight. If we think an application will struggle we say so at the quotation stage rather than taking your money to find out.
Part of our wider building work in Market Harborough.
Send photographs and a rough brief, or call and talk it through. We will tell you if a job is not right for us.
Southfield Construction (Rugby) Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company 14209138.
