Building site etiquette

The hammering began at seven every morning. It wasn’t the usual sound of carpenters at work, which can vary from frenzied activity – often overlapping and building to a crescendo when several are working together – to sudden silence. This was steady, constant and unrelenting.

It came from a building site almost directly opposite my home office, and it went on for the best part of a fortnight. It may have been longer. It certainly felt like it. It left me with a dilemma, actually a triple dilemma.

Firstly, clearly, it was huge distraction.Secondly, it was a house build – actually a boundary-spanning, four-storey, waste-not-an-inch house squeezed into a plot previously occupied by a modest, two-storey detached property, dating from the 1920s.

As someone who writes about house-building, I was naturally interested. Marginally less so when it appeared to be a commercial development. Later I learned it was actually a turn-key operation for a single owner. In other words, a self build. I’ve written articles about being a good new neighbour. Should I really introduce myself with a complaint?

But the killer was point three. The house wasn’t just a self build. It was using a non-traditional method of construction, one whose virtues I’ve often extolled. By which I mean SIPs.

SIP stands for structural insulated panel. It’s a form of timber frame construction, based on storey-high sheets of engineered timber – typically orientated strand board – which sandwich a layer of rigid foam insulation.

The panels are strong enough to provide all the structural support a house needs. Not only that, because they are open-ended, the insulation locks together with its neighbours. The result is a continuous airtight seal, producing exceptional levels of insulation within a comparatively shallow depth.

How are these panels assembled on site? By gluing them together. And then nailing them. Now consider how many panels it would take to build a 4,000 sq ft, four-storey property (hint: a lot). Hence the use of a nail gun. And a great deal of noise.

Thinking seriously about the sound of your build isn’t often near the top of a selfbuilder’s priorities. Building sites, after all, are not renowned as domains of serenity and calm.

But it’s always advisable to acknowledge the sensitivities of your neighbours-to-be, not least for the very practical reason that they can be useful to you. They can, for example, sign for urgent deliveries when your site is unoccupied, or be more willing to move their cars when large vehicles, machinery or skips need space on the street.

Even more importantly, you may need access to neighbouring property, perhaps to erect scaffolding or to bring large or unwieldy items on site. Legally, neighbours are only obliged to allow access for necessary repairs to existing properties.

The Party Wall Act

If you are building on, or close to a boundary, the Party Wall Act applies. You will need to give your neighbour two months’ notice of the start of work, including plans. They have up to 14 days to confirm in writing that they don’t object.

If they do – and not responding counts as an objection – you will need to jointly appoint an independent surveyor to oversee the work. Their job will be to assess the current condition of the neighbour’s property and report any damage caused by your works. You will be liable for the cost of any necessary repairs, as well as the cost of the surveyor.

If you and your neighbour can’t agree on a surveyor, they can appoint their own and send the bill to you. If the two surveyors can’t agree, they have to appoint a third to adjudicate. Guess who pays that bill?

Clearly this could be rocket fuel for an aggrieved neighbour, and more than one project has had to be revised to avoid boundary issues.

But neighbourhood diplomacy should begin before submitting a planning application. Inviting locals in for wine and nibbles to show and explain plans is always a good start. It indicates good intentions and may even prompt support of your application. It might even be worth including a sacrificial element in your plans – a side window, a balcony, anything you’re not overly fussed about – which you’d be willing to drop to demonstrate your reasonableness.

But even if you win over all potential objectors, the real test begins with work on site. Months of dust, grime and – yes – noise can erode a mountain of good will. It’s important to maintain communication, warn of disruptive deliveries, any use of loud machinery and apologise in advance.

The noisiest and grubbiest period of a build is usually at the start with mechanical diggers clearing the ground and digging foundations, trucks removing waste soil, lorries delivering concrete and perhaps the use of rotary piling on poor ground.

You can also restrict the noisiest activities to nine to five on weekdays only, and insist, before you hire a contractor or subcontractor, that noise levels are kept down – ie no blaring radios or shouted conversations. Blame the deeply unreasonable neighbours.

Finally the choice of construction method could make a significant difference. Traditional brick and block isn’t particularly noisy in itself, but it’s not a speedy process. Modern forms of closed panel construction – including SIPs – can have the basic structure erected within a week or two. As we’ve seen, they’re not exactly noiseless. But within a shorter build time that might be more forgivable.

Perhaps the solution to the low-noise, neighbour-friendly building site is prefabricated modular construction – still barely eight per cent of UK construction – but rising steadily.

In their North Yorkshire factory Ilke Homes, for example, is currently building two- to three-bedroom houses complete with kitchens and bathrooms which are then delivered to site in 40 square metre sections. There, they can be assembled within 36 hours – rather less than the six- to nine-month average for a new build.

That should please the new neighbours.

APril 2019