A line of its own on the council's fee list
Stockport Council's building control team prices work by category, and turning a garage into living space has its own entry, "conversion of a garage to a dwelling or habitable room(s)". That tells you how the council sees the job. Once people are going to sit, work or sleep in there, it is building work to be checked, however little changes on the outside.
You can go in with full plans, where drawings are checked before anyone starts, or with a building notice, where the inspector judges the work on site as it goes. For a garage I prefer full plans, so the awkward details, such as how the new floor meets the old walls, are settled on paper rather than with a builder waiting. Your builder can use a registered approver instead of the council if they would rather.
There is a third route, regularisation, for work already carried out. It matters to buyers. If the house you are buying in Stockport has a room where the garage used to be and no completion certificate for it, the seller can apply to have it inspected and approved after the event. Sort that before exchange, not after.
Doors, walls and hardstanding in the conservation areas
Most of Stockport's 37 conservation areas have an Article 4 direction, and the list of what they control reads like a garage conversion specification. The council's page says permission is needed to alter doors and windows, to lay hardstanding and to knock down walls around a house. Bricking up the up-and-over door is one. Paving the front garden for the car is another.
Twenty-four directions are Article 4(2), which usually reach only the parts of a house facing a road, waterway or public open space. Five are Article 4(1), covering every external part. Swann Lane and Hulme Hall Road in Cheadle Hulme is one of those five, and its direction also takes in gates, fences and walls. A side garage tucked well back from the road could still be caught there.
Stockport's dropped kerb guidance adds one more. If your house is in a conservation area, a new vehicle crossing needs planning permission as well as the highways approval.
The four drive tests at the kerb
Lose the garage and the car lives on the drive, so check the council's dropped kerb rules before the drawings are done. The drive has to be more than 4.8 metres deep, or 5.5 metres if you park in front of a main door. It must be more than 2.4 metres wide all the way along, with a gradient under 10%. The council is blunt. Fail any one of those and you cannot have a dropped kerb.
Planning permission also comes in if the road is classified, the house is listed, or the new drive is more than 5 square metres of surface that water can't drain through. You can use the council's contractor to build the crossing, or a qualified highway contractor working under a council licence.
Which conversion fits which Stockport house
The Victorian terraces of Reddish, Edgeley and Hillgate rarely came with a garage. The council's character study describes Heald Green as detached houses and semis, mostly no taller than two and a half storeys, and that sort of suburb is where most garages to convert are found.
Single. The garage beside a semi in Heald Green or Bramhall. Where the slab stops at the old door there is often no proper footing, and LABC advises checking what is there once the opening is dug out.
Read our full guide: Single Garage Conversion: What Is Involved and What to Budget For →
Integral. Already under the main roof. The Planning Portal points to newer housing developments as the place where conversion rights were most often taken away, so Woodford Aerodrome owners should look up their phase's permission first.
Bedroom. If the room is reached only through another room, building control will want an escape window with a clear opening of 450 by 733mm, its sill no higher than 1.1 metres. Low ground near the Goyt or the Mersey is the wrong place for a bedroom, so check the flood map first.
Office. Same insulation standard as a bedroom, since it is a habitable room too. Keep the glazing to about a quarter of the floor area, the LABC guide line, or the insulation sums elsewhere have to work harder.
Utility or playroom. Often the better buy on a semi with a small kitchen, and a good use for the front half if the Article 4 rules make a new front window hard to get through.
Gym or studio. On linked semis the garages often back onto each other. LABC says a dividing wall under 200mm of dense block usually needs more sound work, and dropped weights will find any gap.
Double. A job for the larger detached houses. Check the drive meets the kerb tests above before converting both halves.
Detached. A freestanding garage made into your study or gym is still part of the house. Fitted out as a separate home, it can need planning permission whatever the building work, as the Planning Portal puts it.
Planning and building control. Outside conservation areas, and without a condition on your house, the inside usually needs no planning application. Building regulations are a different matter, handled by the council or by a registered approver.
Cost. No Stockport prices from us. A new crossing, matching brick in Heaton Moor and a planning fee on a conservation area street all add to the bill, so compare three quotes on the same drawings.
One last check below floor level. LABC says conversions in areas of elevated radon may need basic or full protection, so look your address up on the UKradon map before the floor build-up is fixed.
Where these facts come from
- Stockport Council: building control fees, section A
- Stockport Council: Article 4 directions
- Stockport Council: Article 4(1) Direction Swann Lane/Hulme Hall Road
- Stockport Council: dropped kerbs
- Stockport Council: domestic vehicular access
- Stockport Council: Heald Green character and density study
- Planning Portal: garage conversion planning permission
- Planning Portal: garage conversion building regulations
- LABC: garage conversion tips from building control
- LABC: do I need to consider radon?
- Environment Agency: Rivers Goyt and Mersey at Stockport flood warning area
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Questions people in Stockport ask
We're buying in Cheadle Hulme and the garage was turned into a room years ago. What should we ask for?
The building control completion certificate for the conversion. If there isn't one, the seller can apply to Stockport Council for regularisation, the route for building work already carried out without approval.
Our drive in Hazel Grove is about 4.6 metres. Will the council give us a dropped kerb?
Not on those numbers. Stockport's guidance says a drive must be more than 4.8 metres deep, or 5.5 metres in front of a main door, and more than 2.4 metres wide, and a drive that misses any test can't have one.
We live in Heaton Moor. Can we brick up the garage door and put a window in without asking?
Probably not. Heaton Moor has an Article 4 direction, and Stockport's directions bring changes to doors and windows on the street side under planning control. Talk to the planners before ordering the window.
Does Stockport building control treat a garage made into a playroom the same as a bedroom?
Both count as habitable rooms, so both fall under the council's garage conversion category. A bedroom brings the escape window question in more often, but insulation, damp and ventilation are checked either way.