Thinking of building a home office

Paper Clip

Hi all,
I'm working from home at the moment and sometimes would have customers call to me. I am thinking of building a home office in my garden with a seperate entrance as I don't really want customers in my house - insurance problems etc. Has anybody done this? Ideas of cost?
Thanks in advance!

Joey the lips

No i have not. but my boss claims tax for something to do with a home office but be careful before you go down that road because of rates

BnB

Paper Clip

A friend of mine recently leased a fine Porto Cabin for working from home. I forget how much it cost him exactly only that I was surprised at how cheap it was. I was also surprised at how well kitted out it was. It was fully wired, floored etc. He just had to furnish it.

It might be an option to try out for maybe 6 months and if it was working well, then take the plunge and look at laying some blocks.

cnocbui

I built a log cabin that was intended as a home office in terms of it's design, but I use it as a shed. There is a photo of it in this thread:

http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=55277949

I bought it from B&Q. Google: Suoja log cabin and you will find pics of ones kitted out as offices.

http://direct.tesco.com/q/R.200-4018.aspx

looksee

Do check out all aspects of insurance, public liability and premises, and planning permission before you go ahead. It's impossible to give general info on a lot of this stuff, but you will certainly need to check out the above.

Paper Clip

Hi All,
Many thanks for the information. I am going to check out planning, insurance etc before I go ahead.
Thanks again,
Paper Clip

Paper Clip

Looks like I need planning permission so I'd better do my figures again.

cnocbui

Why - because you will be using it as an office?

I didn't need planning permission for my 'shed' as it is a few sq M less than the limit where you have to have permission.

Paper Clip

Hi Cnocbui,
I rang my local planning office and they told me because it will be an office I need planning. It does not matter if it's under the sqm its the use that requires planning. I wonder if I had an existing "shed" and wanted to convert to office what planning would I need? I'll give them a call on this and see how that would go. I know a lot of people convert their garage to office so I wonder how they do that. I'll keep you posted!

johnthehandyman

Let us know how you get on as I have converted an existing garden sheds into an office for a client. They have not started using it yet but they have no planning permission.