Half House Question

[Caxton]

Hoping someone here might be able to answer a query for us:

We live in a half-house, and are in the process of planning a loft conversion.

Because of the structure of these houses (dividing wall being non-load-bearing) its been suggested we need to install two huge steels right across the neighbours house and ours in order to support the new rooms.

Seems quite extreme and very intrusive to the neighbours (roof open, builders working in their property etc).

I see plenty of half-houses around ED and Nunhead with loft conversions though, so I assume it's been done before. Does anyone here have any experience of it, and would you be willing to share any details/issues you found etc?

Thankyou

[somrsbenson]

Go onto the Lewisham planning portal and see what has been done by others; its really useful and helped us a great deal when we extended both the loft (six years ago) then the kitchen last year

We live in a half house in Bovill Road SE23 where around 50% have gone upwards; the majority have been handled by Central London Lofts who seem to do a decent job at a reasonable price. Our (front door) neighbours went down this route and there was relatively little disruption for us with the exception of scaffolding.

We went down a much more complicated route as we wanted a very different look from the standard and had a full roof covered scaffold; this was more disruptive to the neighbours but they were fantastic as we kept them informed all the way.

Consider having a chat with your immediate neighbour and see if they are planning a similar build; if so it may be an option to consider a shared steel down the (dividing non-load bearing) wall from which you can both build off. This may be a sweetener for the neighbour too

One other thing we did was chat to neighbours who had already extended upwards and if possible have a look to see how they did it (difficult ATM).

To finish it really is well worth doing; we absolutely love the space

Hope this helps a bit and feel free to pm me if i can help more

Good luck

[malumbu]

You will probably need structural support ie RSJs (steel joists) as the house may not be designed to bear the load of a loft extension. Pretty standard.