I've been reading back over old messages for any loft info, and have discovered that if you want to convert your loft, you need to stregthen the floor first.
However, is it acceptable to 'only' put a chipboard floor down if you are not intending to fully convert the room?
In anticipation of selling my house, i'd like to put a chipboard floor down and stick in a skylight, to create the impression of an 'almost room' as opposed to a dusty, dingy, spidery loft!
Also, i posted a message a while back about foam insulation sprayed onto the inside of loft tiles. I left it, as this was deemed undesirable, but have since seen insulation rolls that you can staple to the roof. Is this a decent alternative?
Roughly speaking, and depending on the local authority, if you don't install a permanent stairway (ie carry on using a fold up loft ladder), the space is not deemed to be habitable and is therefore classed as storage and you needn't comply with anything. Otherwise....(!)
The best insulation is Celotex (or something similar) cut and jammed between the rafters, leaving an air gap behind and then covered with something. It is important to have air circulation under the roof surface. To achieve the air gap, battens may need to be nailed to the surface of the rafters first, to increase the depth. It depends how neat you want it.
It's up to your local BCO to determine if your room is sufficiently habitable to actually need proper conversion. They all have different opinions. However, if you have a proper stair to it, or a fixed (i.e. not retractable) ladder, then they are going to start getting interested.
Some use a points score, and features like plasterboarded rafters, stairs, boarded flooring, heating, electrics etc. all count towards some sort of figure where they will want full building regulations compliance for the room.
My loft was originally in your proposed condition in that it had Velux windows and was fully boarded (with a retractable loft ladder). No idea if the BCO would have been interested. It now has deeper joists (but no flooring), a dormer rear and holes where the windows should be. Tomorrow it might even have insulation and an escape window. Next week, stairs and floor would be good...
If you are selling I would not do this as it is just as likely to cause problems re alleged unauthorised alterations etc. If it's a big enough loft to make good additional space then (a) I would make sure it's cleared out before you think of selling; and (b) that you get your agent to emphasise the potential.
On Mon, 6 Feb 2006 16:57:14 -0000, a particular chimpanzee named "Bob Mannix" randomly hit the keyboard and produced:
The other way around. If it's a habitable room, it must have a permanent stair to it. A habitable room without a fixed stair is a habitable room that doesn't comply.
If you are going to use it as a room, then if you just board it then there is a good chance that all the bedroom ceilings will crack.
The insulation on a roll is OK, but its really expensive and should not be confused with the cheap silver bubble wrap from say Wickes
Trying to pretend that it is an extra room will cause problems in any sale. Your estate agents cannot describe it as a room, and you will get no increased value from it. Unless Mr Magoo is the purchaser.
Personally, I think the skylight is the bit that's going to attract the wrong sort of attention, and *may* have planning permission issues.
IMO, nothing wrong with just boarding the floor and lining the roof for the purposes of making a clean storage facility - people have been doing that for years, and playing with trains in it!
Fixed stairs, windows and vertical stud walls up there makes it a lot harder to claim it's just a loft, with a straight face...
For a practical example of what and what not to do, based on experience:
The house I grew up in, 1950's semi. Joist span about 4-5m, ceiling joists
2x4" approx.
Centre area of loft was floor boarded and entire underside of roof was boarded (part of original construction I think). Up to a point it withstood a hell of a lot of crap going up there. However, eventually too much crap was loaded too close to the edge of the boarded area, near the centre of the joist span. This resulted in the ceiling below cracking as the joists moved down about 1" in the centre of span (there was a tie beam running over the top, not fixed, which was supposed to be touching the joists, and now had a 1" gap).
Despite this, the joists were nowhere near failing, but it did bugger the ceiling below somewhat.
My Dad had to press the ceiling upwards with some stout timbers and wedges - it did go back, he then proceded to tie the tie-beam to the joists with angle iron and move the heavier crap so it sat on the load bearing wall.
Feck knows what would happen if you did that to my 15year old rented house with it's "forest of matchsticks" roof. Probably collapse in a heap of rubble.
So how is "habitable" defined? I've heard that simply boarding and adding power and light makes a loft habitable in the eyes of some BCOs. Any comments?
On 7 Feb 2006 03:11:36 -0800, a particular chimpanzee named snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com randomly hit the keyboard and produced:
A bit of a grey area. For me it's a combination of factors, such as the flooring, the covering to the walls (ie, plastered or not), fixed power and lighting, natural light and ventilation, and yes, whether there are fixed stairs to it or not. No one thing by itself would define "habitable", and likewise the absence of any one would not mean it was not. I subscribe to the Nixon[1] quote, "if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and waddles like a duck, it's a duck".
[1] I know it's not Nixon, but I can't be arsed to look up who it was.
estate agents refer to a usable room which has not had buildings regs approval as a 'loft room', and potential sellers get the idea. The problem with using such a room is that the ceiling below will sag - I had to jack mine up, having had piles of rubbish up there for years! You should definitely strengthen the floor in some way. As a rule of thumb, joist shoould be half the room width (in feet) + 1. So a 12 feet wide room needs 7" joists. A structural engineer can do the calculations, and the local building control people can usually recommend a tame relatively cheap one. Putting thicker joists in is usually not a big problem, and then you always have the choice of going for the full conversion to a room later. It will also do job a floor is supposed to do, and I don't see any problem in putting a velux in too, sometimes the only way of getting the joists in! I ended up going the whole way, with celotex between the rafters!
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.