Saturday 18 October 2014

Can I quit my day job but maintain my current living standards? PART 4



How rural home owners can make money from their house
IPART 1 I explained how the internet is allowing us to exploit the money making power of our homes. In PART 2 and PART 3 I presented the opportunities that are available to owners of city centre and surburban homes.

In this final installment I will be doing the same for rural homes.

The opportunities
I have separated the moneymaking opportunities into "Easy wins" and "Not so easy wins".  The easy wins are more straight-forward to implement, whereas the not so easy wins may require some sacrifice or greater effort on your part.

Easy wins

Make money from your outdoor space
Websites such as www.storemates.co.uk enable you to rent outdoor spaces for large items such as boats or caravans.

Expect to generate at least £750 a year for renting out land at your property.

INCOME = £750

Rent your shed, your garage or a spare room for storage space
Specialist websites such as www.sharemystorage.com will help you rent out extra space in your home for storage.  Such spaces can include your roof-space, a spare room, a shed or a garage.  The space has to be dry, secure and accessible.

The earning potential of your storage space is based on the size of the space.  Expect to earn around £100 a month (£1,200 a year) from renting out a garage or large shed.    You could earn in excess of £200 a month (£2,400 a year) if you are renting out a large garage.

For the purpose of this post I am using the lower of the two figures.

INCOME POTENTIAL = £1,200

Reduce your water bills by fitting a water meter
Most of us spend too much on our water bills.  Even larger households can benefit by fitting a water meter. By installing water saving measures such as water butts and water-efficient shower heads, you can greatly reduce your water consumption.

Note: Find out how much your household could actually save at www.ccwater.org.uk

SAVING POTENTIAL = £100

Reduce you Heating Bills
UK homes can be draughty which increases our reliance on central heating to stay warm at home. According to the Office of National Statistics (ONS) the average household spends £23.20 each week on electricity, gas and other fuels.

Bulking up on your insulation is the best way to make your home less draughty.  This will in turn help you save on your energy bills. The Energy Saving Trust estimates that householders could save £310 a year on energy bills by topping up on their loft insulation and by installing cavity wall insulation.

You may be able to access Government grants to meet the costs of your insulation upgrades.  Check out the Energy Saving Trust website for further information on the Government support available.

SAVING POTENTIAL = £310

Replace your old boiler
According to The Energy Saving Trust, upgrading an old boiler without controls with a new, top of the range, A-rated, condensing boiler could save households living in a detached house £490 a year.

SAVING POTENTIAL = £490

Generate your own heating or power
Most rural homes do not have no access to mains gas heating.  As a result your heating bills will generally be higher than for urban home owners.  However, the space available at rural homes offers you a range of options to generate your own energy. This could comprise generating your own heating or generating your own electricity (or both).  Take your pick from:
Of the above options, wood burning stoves could offer the greatest saving potential for rural home owners. If you have a reliable, local, log, wood chip or wood pellet supplier, or even better, if you have you own wood supply, then a wood burning stove with back boiler could dramatically reduce your energy bills.

The Energy Saving Trust website provides advice on the Government funding support available to help meet the cost your energy generation installation.

The savings on your energy bills from generating your own electricity and / or heating will depend on a number of variables; including your current energy usage, the age of your property and your existing central heating system.  For the purpose of this post I have applied a savings estimate for rural homes of around £500 a year.

SAVING POTENTIAL = £500


Not so easy wins

Starting a B&B or “homtel"
Start your own B&B or the more informal 'homestay' or 'homtel' alternatives.

For the purpose of working out the income potential I have assumed that you will be taking in guests on a part-time basis only.

INCOME POTENTIAL = £750

Grow your own Food
Tending an allotment size plot in your garden, with a variety of vegetables, can produce enough crop to save the typical household around £300 a year on their grocery bill.

Want to take it further?  Keep chickens to provide fresh eggs for breakfast and to reduce your grocery bill by a few more pounds.

Feeling brave?  Consider bee keeping.  Bee keepers can make over £260 per hive per year.  A large garden can accommodate multiple hives.

SAVING / INCOME POTENTIAL = £600

Renting your home for a photo shoot or TV shoot
If you own a house with unique design features and your property is in an accessible location, you may be able to earn money from your home by hosting a TV crew or photo-shoot.  You can register your home through specialist websites such as www.location25.com.

You can expect to earn £500+ per day per shoot.  This is not a regular income, so I have assumed only four days of photo-shoots a year.  This would deliver earnings of £2,000.

INCOME POTENTIAL = £2,000

Car wrappings
Car wrapping companies such as Money4Space operate by matching up businesses that are seeking to advertise with drivers that are happy to display their ads. Once matched up, the car wrapping company will arrange to apply the ad to your car. You will be paid for each month that you display the ad.

This one is not for everyone!  Most of us don't want to turn our cars into mobile advertising hoardings. Obviously, if you have already sold your car this option will not be available to you.

You can earn around £1500 a year for displaying an ad that covers the whole of your car. Your earnings will reduce to around £900 a year for an ad displayed on the sides of your car.  If you only want the rear screen of your car to be covered, expect your earnings to drop to around £250 for a year's ad campaign.

For the purposed of this post I have included the £900 a year option.

INCOME POTENTIAL = £900

Summary

'Easy Win' Measures

Income / Savings


£750

£1,200
Reduce your water bills by fitting a water meter

£100

£310

£490
Generate your own heating or power

£500
Total

£3,350


‘Not So Easy Win’ Measures

Income / Savings
£750


£600
£2,000
£900
Total

£4,250


Grand Total

£7,600

The final tally
Implementing all of the above options would generate sources of income and savings worth £7,600.

By using your Tax Free Personal Allowance you would not pay Tax on any of this income (assuming that you have no other sources of income).

House-Saver's View
I have presented a number of money making and money saving ideas to show how lucrative your home can be.

The internet is creating ever more opportunities to make money from your home and also from the possessions in your home. There are even specialist websites that enable you to rent out you lawnmower or power tools.

I would love to hear your ideas for making money from your home.

David
www.house-saver.co.uk


Friday 10 October 2014

One of the most frequently asked questions about solar panels has been answered



A common solar panel query is whether the panels are effective in winter months - when the days are shorter and the sun is lower in the sky.

I happened upon a very useful post at the TheGreenAge website on this subject.

The answer?  Yes, solar panels (both solar PV and solar thermal) will continue to produce energy, but they will not provide all your energy needs in winter.

No surprise there then.  So just how much energy will they provide in winter time? The typical domestic solar PV system will produce around 75kWh of power in a winter.  Whereas solar thermal will provide 25% your hot water needs in the winter months.

Check the TheGreenAge blog post in full at "How Effective is Solar in Winter?"

A useful tip from the Energy Saving Trust website is that a wood burning stove with back boiler and solar thermal are a good combination as the stove can heat your home and provide hot water in winter and the solar can heat your hot water in the summer when no central heating is required.

Check out the House-Saver website for more information on the benefits of solar panels and wood burners.

David
www.house-saver.co.uk

Sunday 5 October 2014

Relaxed planning rules are supporting home businesses

Relaxed planning rules mean that it has never been easier to extend or adapt your home to accommodate a home business.

A recent Government report suggests that:
"New figures show planning reform and cut red tape have enabled thousands of homeowners to make improvements."
Recently published figures show how efforts to cut red tape in the Planning System have enabled thousands of householders in England to make improvements to their homes.

Since last year, new "permitted development" rights have given households more power to extend their homes without having to apply for planning permission.

The Government figures show that in the 3 months to June, Local Authorities across England received 7,700 applications for home extensions – 6,500 of which got the go-ahead without needing to go through the formal planning application process (submitting a formal planning application is an 8 week process that incurs a £172 fee).

These country-wide figures mask a contrast in activity across different local authorities.  The London Boroughs have generated the most activity as shown in the Table below. Meanwhile, a number of authorities elsewhere in England have received no applications under the new "Larger householder extensions" scheme.

Table showing Councils that have received more than 100 applications for prior approval under the "Larger householder extensions" scheme in the period April to June 2014
                                           
Local Authority                                              Number of applications
Hounslow 188
Hillingdon 184
Birmingham 174
Brent 165
Redbridge 150
Ealing 138
Barnet 127
Harrow 118
The Full Table is provided at the end of this post.

The new figures also provide good news for home improvement proposals that still require planning permission.  The Government's figures show that planning application approvals are at a 10-year high, with authorities granting 350,200 permissions in the year to June – 2% higher than in the previous year.  91% of householder planning applications are now being granted by local Councils.

Further Information
For advice on whether you require planning permission to work from home check out www.house-saver/home-business

For further information on the above planning application statistics check out the www.gov.uk website.


Table of decisions by Councils on applications for prior approvals under the "Larger householder extensions" scheme in the period April to June 2014                                        
Planning authority
Larger householder extensions

Prior approval not required
Granted
Refused

Adur
14
1
0

Allerdale
18
0
0

Amber Valley
6
0
0

Arun
14
1
0

Ashfield
17
17
0

Ashford (1)
..
..
..

Aylesbury Vale
17
0
7

Babergh
0
12
1

Barking and Dagenham
60
3
6

Barnet
127
18
38

Barnsley
18
1
0

Barrow-in-Furness
6
0
0

Basildon
22
3
4

Basingstoke and Deane
20
0
0

Bassetlaw
6
0
2

Bath and North East Somerset UA
13
0
4

Bedford UA
18
0
1

Bexley
22
3
7

Birmingham
174
8
11

Blaby
5
3
0

Blackburn with Darwen UA
11
1
1

Blackpool UA
13
0
0

Bolsover
7
0
1

Bolton
0
18
4

Boston
3
0
0

Bournemouth UA
19
3
0

Bracknell Forest UA
3
1
0

Bradford
64
0
16

Braintree
18
2
0

Breckland
4
0
0

Brent
165
3
24

Brentwood
11
1
1

Brighton and Hove UA
39
4
5

Bristol, City of UA
33
5
12

Broadland
17
0
0

Broads Authority
0
0
0

Bromley
54
3
29

Bromsgrove
0
0
1

Broxbourne
13
2
0

Broxtowe
0
0
0

Burnley
8
0
0

Bury
8
0
8

Calderdale
18
1
1

Cambridge
7
6
2

Camden
3
0
1

Cannock Chase
7
0
2

Canterbury
9
8
4

Carlisle
12
12
0

Castle Point
7
0
1

Central Bedfordshire UA
32
3
3

Charnwood
18
0
0

Chelmsford
28
1
2

Cheltenham
0
0
0

Cherwell
10
2
1

Cheshire East UA
39
2
2

Cheshire West and Chester UA
24
0
4

Chesterfield
13
12
1

Chichester
0
0
0

Chiltern
7
1
7

Chorley
0
14
3

Christchurch
4
1
0

City of London
0
0
0

Colchester (1)
23
1
1

Copeland
11
0
0

Corby
0
1
0

Cornwall UA
10
2
3

Cotswold
1
0
0

County Durham UA
37
4
0

Coventry
30
3
8

Craven
5
0
0

Crawley
7
0
1

Croydon
0
63
24

Dacorum (1)
11
0
6

Darlington UA
9
2
0

Dartford
12
0
5

Dartmoor National Park
0
0
0

Daventry
7
0
0

Derby UA
24
1
2

Derbyshire Dales
5
0
0

Doncaster
30
1
0

Dover
12
0
2

Dudley
31
1
8

Ealing
138
22
51

East Cambridgeshire
3
2
0

East Devon
0
0
0

East Dorset
0
13
0

East Hampshire
4
0
0

East Hertfordshire
8
0
5

East Lindsey
4
0
0

East Northamptonshire
0
0
0

East Riding of Yorkshire UA
1
36
2

East Staffordshire
8
1
0

Eastbourne
4
0
1

Eastleigh
13
0
0

Eden
3
0
0

Elmbridge
15
2
9

Enfield
87
5
21

Epping Forest
23
3
4

Epsom and Ewell
17
1
7

Erewash
12
0
0

Exeter
11
0
0

Exmoor National Park
0
0
0

Fareham
16
3
1

Fenland
6
0
0

Forest Heath
4
0
0

Forest of Dean
0
7
0

Fylde
8
0
0

Gateshead
10
1
1

Gedling
11
0
0

Gloucester
12
11
1

Gosport
17
0
0

Gravesham
8
0
0

Great Yarmouth
0
10
0

Greenwich
0
3
5

Guildford
12
1
10

Hackney
8
6
0

Halton UA
6
0
1

Hambleton
5
0
0

Hammersmith and Fulham
7
4
2

Harborough
5
1
0

Haringey
22
0
11

Harlow
0
0
0

Harrogate
13
0
3

Harrow
118
14
45

Hart
3
0
2

Hartlepool UA
4
1
0

Hastings
0
1
0

Havant
0
0
0

Havering
55
7
11

Herefordshire, County of UA
4
0
0

Hertsmere
0
0
0

High Peak
9
0
1

Hillingdon
184
9
74

Hinckley and Bosworth
11
1
1

Horsham
12
3
2

Hounslow
188
124
64

Huntingdonshire
0
8
0

Hyndburn
6
0
1

Ipswich
0
20
0

Isle of Wight UA
4
0
1

Isles of Scilly
0
0
0

Islington
1
4
5

Kensington and Chelsea
1
0
0

Kettering
3
1
0

King's Lynn and West Norfolk
6
0
3

Kingston upon Hull, City of UA
13
0
0

Kingston upon Thames
44
5
51

Kirklees
29
9
8

Knowsley
12
0
0

Lake District National Park
0
0
0

Lambeth
21
25
2

Lancaster
7
0
0

Leeds
65
1
3

Leicester UA
28
0
11

Lewes
0
10
1

Lewisham
41
41
10

Lichfield
15
1
0

Lincoln
6
2
0

Liverpool
7
0
1

London Legacy Development Corporation
0
0
0

Luton UA
59
7
5

Maidstone
20
1
2

Maldon
2
0
0

Malvern Hills
4
0
0

Manchester
18
8
8

Mansfield
6
1
0

Medway UA
0
20
2

Melton
0
1
0

Mendip
1
0
0

Merton
75
8
17

Mid Devon
0
6
1

Mid Suffolk
14
1
1

Mid Sussex
11
4
1

Middlesbrough UA
14
0
0

Milton Keynes UA
19
1
1

Mole Valley
18
1
1

New Forest
0
10
7

New Forest National Park
0
0
0

Newark and Sherwood
8
1
3

Newcastle upon Tyne
8
2
3

Newcastle-under-Lyme
7
0
0

Newham
42
0
13

North Devon
2
2
0

North Dorset
3
0
0

North East Derbyshire
17
0
0

North East Lincolnshire UA
6
7
2

North Hertfordshire
12
0
1

North Kesteven
1
1
0

North Lincolnshire UA
10
0
0

North Norfolk
0
7
0

North Somerset UA
14
0
2

North Tyneside
8
0
0

North Warwickshire
2
0
0

North West Leicestershire
14
14
0

North Yorks Moors
0
0
0

Northampton
13
1
1

Northumberland UA
27
2
0

Northumberland UA
0
0
0

Norwich
7
1
0

Nottingham UA
16
0
1

Nuneaton and Bedworth
9
7
2

Oadby and Wigston
8
7
1

Oldham
5
6
2

Oxford
25
0
6

Peak District National Park
0
0
0

Pendle
11
1
0

Peterborough UA
14
2
1

Plymouth UA
8
0
1

Poole UA
13
1
0

Portsmouth UA
20
0
0

Preston
18
1
2

Purbeck
0
0
0

Reading UA
11
0
4

Redbridge
150
72
85

Redcar & Cleveland
12
1
1

Redditch
7
0
0

Reigate and Banstead
18
4
4

Ribble Valley
2
1
3

Richmond upon Thames
23
30
9

Richmondshire
3
0
0

Rochdale
15
0
0

Rochford
14
1
0

Rossendale
3
3
0

Rother
2
1
0

Rotherham
15
0
3

Rugby
12
1
0

Runnymede
16
0
11

Rushcliffe
19
2
0

Rushmoor
2
0
0

Rutland UA
0
2
1

Ryedale
0
8
2

Salford
0
11
2

Sandwell
41
2
2

Scarborough
8
1
1

Sedgemoor
9
0
0

Sefton
22
0
2

Selby
11
2
3

Sevenoaks
9
2
1

Sheffield
23
2
3

Shepway
10
0
0

Shropshire UA
15
0
1

Slough UA
62
6
9

Solihull
27
2
0

South Bucks
16
2
2

South Cambridgeshire
8
5
0

South Derbyshire
8
0
0

South Downs National Park
0
0
0

South Gloucestershire UA
30
0
0

South Hams
2
1
1

South Holland
2
1
0

South Kesteven
8
0
0

South Lakeland
7
0
0

South Norfolk
6
5
0

South Northamptonshire
11
0
0

South Oxfordshire
1
0
0

South Ribble
16
0
0

South Somerset
9
1
0

South Staffordshire
6
2
0

South Tyneside
14
1
0

Southampton UA
12
9
3

Southend-on-Sea UA
4
14
8

Southwark
7
2
0

Spelthorne
2
16
6

St Albans
24
3
10

St Edmundsbury
9
0
1

St. Helens
20
0
0

Stafford
10
0
1

Staffordshire Moorlands
2
2
0

Stevenage
6
2
1

Stockport
4
27
0

Stockton-on-Tees UA
16
16
0

Stoke-on-Trent UA
13
12
1

Stratford-on-Avon
8
0
1

Stroud
0
8
1

Suffolk Coastal
16
0
0

Sunderland
22
0
0

Surrey Heath
13
0
3

Sutton
88
6
28

Swale
0
0
0

Swindon UA
23
0
0

Tameside
11
2
0

Tamworth
12
0
0

Tandridge
19
1
1

Taunton Deane
11
1
0

Teignbridge
4
2
1

Telford and Wrekin UA
3
5
1

Tendring
12
12
0

Test Valley
7
1
2

Tewkesbury
0
7
1

Thanet
23
2
0

Three Rivers
18
5
2

Thurrock UA
37
0
2

Tonbridge and Malling
6
0
1

Torbay UA
5
0
0

Torridge
0
1
0

Tower Hamlets
6
0
1

Trafford
20
2
3

Tunbridge Wells
11
0
2

Uttlesford
9
2
2

Vale of White Horse
0
1
0

Wakefield
30
1
0

Walsall
27
1
6

Waltham Forest
80
0
35

Wandsworth
31
5
10

Warrington UA
12
1
4

Warwick
18
0
4

Watford
21
2
7

Waveney
6
6
0

Waverley
8
1
6

Wealden
12
0
1

Wellingborough
2
0
0

Welwyn Hatfield
16
13
3

West Berkshire UA
0
1
2

West Dorset
6
0
0

West Edevon
0
0
0

West Lancashire
7
0
3

West Lindsey
4
1
0

West Oxfordshire
4
0
0

West Somerset
0
0
0

Westminster
1
1
1

Weymouth and Portland
1
0
0

Wigan
33
3
0

Wiltshire UA
4
8
0

Winchester
10
0
0

Windsor and Maidenhead UA
16
0
2

Wirral
33
4
0

Woking
3
2
0

Wokingham UA
18
0
0

Wolverhampton
21
1
1

Worcester
0
7
0

Worthing
16
2
1

Wychavon
0
8
0

Wycombe
11
2
9

Wyre
12
2
0

Wyre Forest
0
12
1

York UA
0
33
5

Yorkshire Dales National Park
0
0
0






England (1)
5 278
1 256
1 130

.. = figure not provided
(1) Estimates have not been made for questions where the planning authority has not provided a figure
Source: PS1 returns to DCLG

David