Owning your own home

genuine question; why is it bad living to a house converted into 8 flats?

The house isn't being converted, its being demolished and replaced with a new building which will be substantially larger.

Does this mean that if someone has a grudge against you they can just put in a planning application to turn the houses next to yours to flats when you sell your place?

Theoretically yes, but of course there's a cost and effort associated with it. It probably depends on how evil someone wants to be.

The council keep rejecting applications but we keep getting chancers who try.

We thought this one had gone away but he put in a second application just over a month ago, which will likely be rejected but in the meantime our buyers have been frightened off.

Ah, OK, so this has been going on for a while. I thought it might have. That definitely sounds like no-hoper applications, but as I said, you do get people hoping for those instances when the planning system goes wrong. I suppose, however, that it's not so much the specific application that's the problem for buyers but the threat that this will just keep recurring. What you would need to convince prospective buyers that the risk of development happening there is low would probably be a brief report from a planning consultant about the site constraints that could show the likelihood of much larger development there is very low. I don't think this would be very expensive.

The council planning officer has encouraged the developer to withdraw the application

There might also be a dimension of the owner bullshitting prospective developers and causing them to waste their time. Talking to the developer might also be worthwhile, as might putting a little list of the past, failed applications together that could demonstrate how unlikely success is.

(I don't expect there's anything here that you haven't done yet, but just in case.)

Could you not contact the developer to offer your house at a price you want so they can turn the block of 8 flats into a block of say 12 flats?

That way you get your money and the developer gets his dream side access by knocking your house down?

Gonna get some ridiculous front door locks. Anyone done this? Is it a total waste of money?
https://www.banham.co.uk/banham-l2000-and-m2002-x2-lock-kit-polished-chrome/

When we were deciding this we went for

https://www.locksonline.co.uk/Era-British-Standard-BS8621-Euro-Dead-Locks.html

And

https://www.locksonline.co.uk/ERA-1530-BS8621-2004-Auto-Deadlocking-Escape-Narrow-Style-Nightlatch.html

They will key them alike too. I really couldn't see what extra £750 got you.

The house under planning permission is detached. Our house is semi-detached, so the developer would have to buy three houses to do that and our (semi-detached) neighbour is very settled and has no desire to move, so it is unlikely.

That first day realisation of jobs to do is crushing, isn't it?
Completed yesterday. LD is a real fucker for furniture shopping (1st world problems/GC thread).

Do we like big double kitchen glasses like these? Mrs Z has started shopping (for the new house we’ve not yet had an offer accepted on, South Ealing), I’m cautious but not sure why, they feel potentially more problematic than bricks and normal windows to me.

Why the double deadlock? We are getting Banham but only going for the single deadlock and nightlatch.

Depends on your door. Would be pointless for me as if you have my door and frame a stern talking to it would fail in at least 3 places.

I'll never keep a determined intruder out, just need enough forced entry that my insurance pays out.

If you want one of the deadlocks to lock from the inside at night then you'd want one with a thumbturn on the inside. You don't want to be locked inside trying to find a key when you really need to get out in a hurry.

An extra deadlock for when you go away for a prolonged period isn't a bad idea but 3 locks on a single door is ultimate "London" living which makes me sad that it could be a necessity (although having them keyed alike makes it a lot easier).

We have some expensive ingersoll lock, tbh I’ve no idea if it’s any better than a Yale.
In a previous life, smashed a few front doors in, if you want security a London bar and a Birmingham bar work - reduced a quite hefty friend who thought he could kick a front door in to a wreck who had to ring up someone for a big red key.

access is also problematic, as it is only 2 metres wide, which effectively prevents vehicular access as it's not wide enough for emergency vehicles to get in

An old colleague of mine fought the development of flats behind his house in Chingford in a similar situation (neighbour behind had big piece of land) and eventually won on the basis that emergency services vehicles wouldn't be able to get in properly.

I'm afraid it was a long and tiring battle though. He's an absolutely lovely man who does a lot of charitable work alongside his job, a real pillar of the community and lovely to everyone, and it was the closest I ever saw him to pissed off when dealing with it.

If you thought it would help I'm sure he'd be happy to offer advice but I'd have to warn you about his comedic name beforehand so you could get any giggling out of the way first...

So if you're rich and evil you can just pay someone to do the effort for you.

I think lockpickinglawyer raked the m2002 open in about 20seconds, granted not everyone has his finesse.
Abloy protec2 gubbins are on my shopping list if this purchase ever goes through.

I'm of the opinion that people with the skills of LockPickingLawyer don't go round breaking into places to make a living as they have other less hazardous options available to them.

https://youtu.be/1jfuEKslk3A?t=222

Attack starts at 3:40

I mean its all moot anyway, since its nearly always physical attacks to doors or windows.

What I do intend to do at some point is swap the front door latch lock and garage lock so I can have something I can get keyed alike. Reduce the number of keys I need to carry. Maybe even the back door and patio door at the same time (those two are euro cylinders so easy).

I had two Banham locks fitted front and rear (4 locks) plus 5 pass through keys and hinge bolts for £1300 so that looks expensive. Give them a call and they will do a security consultation free and make recommendations. The bloke fitted all locks and deadbolts in a couple of hours, which is about five times faster than I could manage it.

I'm only considering the double deadbolt because there are already two locks on there and it would totally fuck with my OCD to have Banham, Banham and then a Yale. Having them keyed-alike is a necessity for me because I already have a load of stupid keys on me all the time anyway:

Front Door (house)
Deadbolt 1 (house)
Deadbolt 2 (house)
Flat front door
Post box (flat)
Bike Store
Bike Lock
Bike Lock (Herne Hill)
Storage Unit
Car key
Office key

I'm like a flippin' jailer. Need to get that down to a comfortable 5 keys.

Do Banham make keyed alike bike locks?

I have Banham x2, 3 seems like overkill.

I have an M2003 rather than 2002 as that has the internal lever rather than requiring a key.

They feel very secure, pretty chunky with much bigger plates than a standard lock. I think they'd be very difficult to boot in.

They also feel very nicely engineered. It sounds weird but I find using them quite satisfying.

If its a case of too many keys how about a digital door lock for the door? Granted I know nothing about them.