As home owners considering renovation and/or construction works for their houses, you would most likely need to obtain planning permission approval from URA and other approvals from agencies such as BCA, PUB, LTA, etc. Depending on the extent of new works to be carried out, your house project may be classified as these 4 types of works, which in turn also has certain implications for your project.
1. Renovation Works
Generally, if your new works are only on the interior of the house, you won’t need to obtained any planning approval from URA and TOP is not required. For a full list of works that are exempted from URA planning permission, please refer to this:
If your new works aren’t on the exempted list, then your project is likely to come under A&A works or Reconstruction works.
2. Additions & Alterations (A&A) Works
The criteria for A&A works are:
Proposed additional gross floor area must be less than 50% of the existing approved gross floor area;
External walls that are to be demolished and reinstated with new walls must be less than 50% of the existing approved external walls;
Structural changes to the existing house must be less than 50% of existing building, this includes replacement or construction of new columns/beams and any reinstatement of existing floor slabs;
Any changes or replacement of the existing roof must not involve an addition of a new storey (eg: from a single storey house to a 2-storey house);
An attic addition shall not result in an increase of gross floor area beyond 50% of the existing approved gross floor area.
The Pros
When your project is categorised as A&A works, certain authorities requirements are relaxed. For example, you do not have to include a household / bomb shelter in your house, which means your dining / kitchen area will feel more spacious!
Another example is, if the property has a drainage or road reserve within its’ boundaries, and if your project is A&A works, you do not have to shift your boundary wall inwards until further notice from the government. Refer to this article for more information on drainage and road reserves.
The Cons
The criteria above is quite restrictive in terms of working within the limits of 50% of areas / walls / structures, etc. Having to keep majority of the existing columns could result in very awkward space planning and you may find columns in the middle of rooms, restricting space usage.
3. Reconstruction Works
The project will automatically be considered Reconstruction works if it is unable to meet the criteria for A&A works. Even if the proposed works do not exceed 50% of the existing building GFA, it will be classified as Reconstruction works if it involves the following:
Any increase in the overall building storey height, inclusive of any alterations or replacement of the existing roof(partial/full), resulting in a new storey addition.
A transformation in landed housing form, for example, from a semi-detached house to a detached house.
In this case, authorities requirements are as per the norm. Although in the case of a household / bomb shelter, we may be able to seek waiver for this if there are extreme site constraints. Any waiver made is not guaranteed and subject to authorities approvals.
The Pros of Reconstruction works
Although working with existing structures may be challenging in terms of space planning, keeping even 25% of the existing house structure could help your construction budget by 10% - 25% (dependent on size / area / site context).
4. New Erection Works
As the title suggests, the existing house will be demolished and a new house erected. All authorities requirements are as per the norm. This is strongly recommended if the condition of the existing house is poor. Starting from a clean slate also means no awkward columns in your rooms and spaces can be well planned to achieve your dream home.
This article discusses mainly URA approvals and does not cover all other authorities approvals which may be required on a case to case basis.
Helpful Suggestion
Regardless of the category of work for your house project, you should always check if the house property is eligible for URA’s lodgment scheme as this could help home owners save significantly on URA’s submissions fees!
Feel free to get in touch with READ Architecture, find out more about us here.
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