Exhibit This

Went to Belfast a couple of weeks ago to attend the Self Build Exhibition in King’s Hall. Since we’re building a house we thought it would be a good way to get a feel for things and even some ideas for particular technologies and perhaps catch some expert advice on what is proving to be the bane of my life – choosing a heating system.

The problem with ‘Exhbitions’ is that they aren’t full of exhibits in the true sense of the word. At least not by me interpretation. When I think exhibit, I think a museum – natural or modern history – it doesn’t matter. The function of the exhibit is to increase the viewer’s knowledge of it’s subject, to educate and present the facts and figures. Unfortunately for most commercial-minded exhibits this roughly translates into trying to hawk stuff. After passing 12 different stalls full of smartly-dressed businessmen trying to make their strikingly similar looking windows seem better than their competitors I came to the realisation that was very little in the way of facts and figures to be learned here. The best part of the entire show was trying to reverse-engineer the kitchen drawers that magically close themselves when you swing them vigorously back into their units. They appear ready to slam shut only for them to slow, stop and gently coax themselves into position. That this mechanism was the single-most intriguing thing within a huge outlay of hundreds of products only serves to highlight how shows like these seem fairly pointless.

Of the very few vendors I spoke to, few were willing to discuss any kind of drawback/unsuitability/limitation of their products – even where obvious, and even fewer still were willing to quote any kind of price unless you filled out a form with your address and phone number. For a Trade Show is was poor, for an exhibition it was utterly dire and I couldn’t help but wonder how much time and money all these struggling companies had spent on getting themselves floorspace and filling it up with their stuff. I mean fair enough, there were a few nice stalls done out with various models of wood-burning stoves, kitchens and doors which is all very good but by the time we’ve come to filling our house with that kind of stuff the ‘self building’ will hopefully have already taken place.

Alas, we were stuck collecting brochures and wandering around admiring some of the carcasses of a bygotten time of luxury – we spied a hot-tub for the bargain of only 14 grand, down from 20 grand if bought on the spot. I promised Claire that we’d instead choose a roof or perhaps two walls for the same price and I will blow bubbles in our regular bath tub. The over-hearing hot tub vendor smartly remarked “that’s a cheap roof son” to which I replied “it’ll keep us drier than your expensive hot tub”. We laughed politely at one another while I checked my exit strategy from his booth.

To sum up, after a drive to Belfast and few hours pounding the indoor area of King’s Hall (which is fecking massive btw), I’m still no wiser to the type of heating system I should stump up for. Oil/Gas have the advantage of being cheap to install, reasonably efficient and instant-on. They also tend to last (standard-issue boilers have been perfected over decades). Geothermal/Heat pumps are flaky in my opinion because what they might save you on fuel could just be transferred to your electricity bill and have arguably the biggest installation charge. Gassification/Pellet burning boilers are new and efficient – the amount of propaganda available on these is staggering but their high installation cost, reliance on a cheap supply of wood/pellets and thus-far unproven shelf-life have me second guessing their alleged advantages. My architect being a traditionalist doesn’t help – he’s all for oil/gas for the moment and recommends making the saving in the short term with installation costs and in ten/fifteen years time see how the neo-heating systems have panned out. The time for us to decide is approaching fast and it looks like I’m not going to get a straight answer from anyone about the correct decision – most likely because there is no correct decision. In saying that however, given the last couple of winters I will be hoping that whatever we decide on it will lead to having a warm and toasty home.

House Build Log #1

As you may or may not know myself and my esteemed better half are in the process of trying to build a house. Under normal circumstances people locate a suitable site, buy the said site and build their house albeit with all the stress that might entail.

We are doing things a little differently. Almost a year ago (~ March, 2010) we received a very kind and generous offer from my girlfriend’s mother in the form of the option to develop the (recently deceased) granddad’s house and surrounding site. As two (relatively) young people both living in our respective homes this was welcomed with open arms. Cue excitement, relief, gratitude and above all else naivety over how smoothly the whole process would be. Big mistake.

Upon consulting an Architect he advised that there was limited scope due to the size of the site and that while we could certainly expand the existing house, the finished article would be modest enough. We were quite happy with this as the modest house we would have would beat the fancy house we don’t. Neither of us subscribe to the typical Irish mentality of your house somehow being a symbol of your identity.

Having settled on a design and succumbing to the temptation of furnishing it in our heads we were knocked back by our local council. Despite consulting the council as to what would be permissible in terms of extension size prior to the design stage, the goal-posts had since been moved by the time we went back with the design and they declared our site-size insufficient for any extension. Upon the architect’s recommendation we were to approach the adjacent landowner with an offer to buy the amount of land required to meet the council’s guidelines on site-size.

Having made contact the landowner was actually quite keen to deal which was a huge relief. Being of the mindset that this project was doomed from the get-go, to get any positive response from anyone was heartening. Negotiations took place and it moved away from a straight land-for-money transaction once the landowner realised we possessed something that he could benefit from – sight-lines. His empty field is just that – an empty field. Without 75m of clear line-of-sight for a driveway it would forever remain an empty field. To the left as you pull out of the field is 75m of clear tarmac to the right is a 5-foot stone wall – our 5-foot wall. The landowner proposed a deal that would mean we would get the required land in return for the removal of the wall which would turn his empty-field into a prime site. Win/Win for both parties but it meant further delays and hoop-jumping for us in terms of our project. We were a little apprehensive due of the additional legal and planning loose ends that would have to be tied up, but we were getting what we needed (the land) and paying for it with something we had not yet owned (the wall).

Fast forward a few months and a few hundred phone calls and meetings and we’ve reached the end of Design Phase Mk.II. We’ve settled on a slightly more spacious but still humble 3-bed dormer bungalow. Oil-fired CH, pre-cast concrete floors throughout with under-floor heating in the living space and radiators in the sleeping space. Decisions have been made more in terms of the constructions materials and plumbing rather than the layout of the house due to the skills of our Architect. He seems to know what we’re after and it’s a credit to him that most of what he came up with instantly appealed. For this we are thankful because it would have been just as easy to approach an architect that was not on the same page.

Having completed the drawings the next step was to approach the landowner with our plan for the wall, his sight-lines and the land required from him. The landowner wants us to approach the council with the entire plan to ensure all party’s needs are met (which is more than fair) and as such we are now waiting for him to approve the layout our Architect has drawn up so we can approach the roads.

In the mean time when it came to signing over the site into my girlfriend’s name we encountered an entirely separate and entirely large problem. Tax. Again, due to our inexperience and naivety in all things property, we had failed to foresee any problems in the transfer of the house and site to us. Any parent that wishes to gift a site to their siblings can do so without being taxed for offloading the land. However, this land must be entirely undeveloped – green-field only. If the land is developed, it is eligible for Capital Gains Tax. Now I know it is a largely futile and tiresome waste of time to complain about taxation but this is nonetheless heartbreaking for us. Because it is a gift, no money will be changing hands. My girlfriend’s mother was given the land over two decades ago by the grandfather and no money changed hands then either, yet the government dictates that my girlfriend’s mother’s capital is ‘gaining’ in this ‘transaction’ and therefore should be taxed based on the market value – not the sum paid – of the site. This could result in my girlfriend’s mother (and hence us, since we cannot leave her with a large bill in return for gifting us the site) with a tax bill upwards of 20 to 30 thousand euro – something we simply cannot come up with given that we require to have an 8% deposit for any mortgage we require for the build.

This takes me into the obligatory rant about how a young couple who hit the relative jackpot in terms of being able to take advantage of a spare site within the family are being stifled out of the prospect by illogical taxation. No one is gaining here but us yet it is my girlfriend’s mother who is being taxed for the privilege of being in a position to provide a site for a home for one of her offspring. This is especially ironic given that should the site not contain a house no taxation would apply – instead there is a house, a house that is to be levelled should the project go ahead*.

I hope to update this reasonably regularly throughout the project both to keep a record for myself and to educate anyone who is interested as to the pitfalls that a young person/couple could face when undertaking similar projects. If you have any experience or horror stories I would urge anyone to leave a comment.

*many will likely ask the question ‘why not level the house now?’ but unfortunately due to the aforementioned sight-lines, were we to remove the house the existing driveway would no longer be an existing driveway as per council planning laws and as such would be subject to sight-line rules it would never meet. Catch-22 is truely the most evil force known to man-kind.