Your house is the most important asset you have. We would assume you spend a lot of time in your home, so improving your house increases not only the quality of living within it but quite often, also increases its value. I say often because not all of the changes made to a property will increase its value, or get a good return so to speak. A good example of this is garage conversions, in my opinion extending is much better than converting and therefore losing a garage.
If we ever see anything occurring in the design stage which would decrease the value of the property, we make our clients aware because we always look to try to add value to the building when developing schemes for a project. If we were asked to add a porch, for example, we would automatically look for ways in which we could improve the whole façade.
Currently, I have a project on my desk where the clients have asked for fairly modest changes; namely adding some lounge space. The rear garden has no access other than through the house, so the obvious answer to adding this space is probably through a rear extension. The problem with this is the process of removing the excavated foundation soil, and bringing in materials is going to be labour intensive and therefore very expensive.
We discussed with the clients the points about their house that they like and dislike, and one of the outstanding points that they mentioned was their dislike for the front of the house. Due to this, one of the schemes that I am currently developing for their project is for a front extension, whilst rearranging the non-loadbearing interior walls so that the lounge is made bigger by moving the kitchen further forward.
Written by Tony Keller, Building Tectonics.
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