[Closed] Party wall agreements any experience?

Oh detached house, with a single neighbour

Ask the renters for their landlord / agency details and forward on?

It might all work out really easily.

I did an extension with one of the houses next door being a student let - had zero problems.

Oh detached house,

Party wall agreement?

I don't understand....

A party wall doesn’t have to be a “party wall” for the purposes of this legislation. It can be anything that affects the boundary between the two properties.

The wall of the consevatory is on the boundary line, probably a couple of metres from their house. Architect said it was needed, so I’m reading up about it

Seems I need to get leaseholders and freeholders to agree as well. Which is odd as surely only freeholder could suffer any “damage”

Any damage would have to be a pretty big cock up given the house is some distance from the wall and something that should be under the builders insurances surely?

I don’t understand….

OP wrote:

it may need the wall on the boundary changed

Party Wall Act can apply to boundary walls that are not part of the building. It also applies to any excavation deeper than the neighbour's foundations and within 3m of them.

In practice, if the works aren't likely to damage the property, the neighbour probably won't do anything. Our neighbour dug deep foundations for their extension and the hole actually extended underneath our garage foundation, with no notice at all. I just wrote them a letter recording the facts, and that they hadn't followed the Act, and they'd be liable for any damage. There wasn't any damage, so I didn't need to follow it up; it would have cost me money for no benefit.

Party wall agreement can also protect you, in that IF damage is caused by your building work (e.g. foundations undermining neighbours), neighbours get cracks and claim off you, if you have an agreement WITH a survey (i.e. a schedule/survey of condition before work starts) it shows the cracks before your work and so no liability from you, of course IF cracks come after your works that is a different matter!
Plus the guide shows where you need to act, hence your consultant raising this with you. Obviously I do not know all your details and IANAL.

Not sure if the foundations would be deeper than theirs, without excavating theirs that is pretty tough to know! I think the existing wall is approx 2ms from their external wall. Possibly a small chance of the wall falling over if the conservatory roof is taken off and the builders don’t support it properly, in which case I would have thought you would claim on the builders insurance?

New to this so trying to work out what is actually needed. So far no one I know who has had an extension has actually bothered with one…

This Gov guide may help, especially diagrams, not sure if you have found this yet.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/preventing-and-resolving-disputes-in-relation-to-party-walls/the-party-wall-etc-act-1996-explanatory-booklet

Thanks Cvilla, I think we will fall into the 'excavating within 3m' category. Though I'm still confused as under this category it says you can start work within 1 month of providing notice even if you had no response.....which contradicts the assumption of default if no response in 14 days in another part of the act. Think I need to talk to an expert!

Might be easier to design the plans to stay outside the 3m rule and then fill the gap with a wooden garden storage shed at a later date.

This para is the one I'm referring to:

25. What happens after I serve notice about building up against the boundary line?
Unless your neighbour objects, you may start work one month after your notice was served.

The wall will be built wholly at your own expense and you will have to compensate any Adjoining Owner for any damage to his property caused by the building of the wall, or the placing of footings and foundations under his land. There is no right to place “special foundations” (see Appendix A) under his land without his written consent, and the placing of normal projecting foundations can only be done if it is necessary.

Key sentence for me is 'unless your neighbour objects'. Objecting is definitely not the same as not responding to correspondence.

Will be trying to find out landlords details today, hopefully it'll all be fine

That clause 25 you have quoted relates to building on or at the boundary. It is likely that you will need to serve a Notice of Adjacent Excavation as well (or instead), and in that case no response from the neighbour would be deemed to be "dissent". Unless the part of your neighbour's building which is within 3m of your proposed construction was built recently there is a fairly high probability that your foundations will be deeper than theirs as Building Control tend to want them deeper these days for various reasons.
Your comment earlier about whether you have to notify leaseholders: this only applies if their lease is for a term longer than one year. If their lease is for one year or less that doesn't mean they can only live there for one year as the lease can be renewed.
In your position I would make direct contact with the freeholder and offer to prepare a schedule of condition covering the parts of their property which might be affected before you start work and see if you can get them to agree to that. Same for any leaseholders (if relevant).
IANAPWS.

Our architect handled the part wall documentation I think. I had to issue it to a neighbour and chase them for a reply.

They ticked the box to say they wanted a party wall survey. That cost £500 from memory - about 3 years ago now.

In hindsight I’d like the survey done anyway as it stops them coming back and saying your building work damaged their property even if it didn’t. When I got the survey back the neighbour had quite a few cracks inside their house at the top of walls / ceilings - so that was documented before we started digging.

Our house and their house are detached - but we were excavating within 3 or 5 metres of their house (I forget the exact wording).

You need to get it back signed before starting I think - we certainly did.

Thanks for the advice, seeing our architect next week for first draft of plans so will discuss again with a bit more understanding!