I'm thinking of buying a new property

[brightmike]

This may all sound a little complicated but here goes...

We currently have a holiday let property in Brighton that is going well.

On the side I work as a dog trainer / behaviourist in Brighton.

My dream is to combine the two!

I would like to buy a property in a village on the outskirts of Brighton, like an old farm etc. This would have a house for us to live in, 3 or 4 holiday let buildings (e.g. converted stables), a barn, and some land.

The barn and land would be used to run dog training classes. The holiday lets would be dog friendly.

Ideally the holiday let customers would have their dogs trained by me or possibly dog sat while they are out. This is not central to the plan but would be nice.

My questions:

1) If we sold the currently holiday let and our home we could raise over 50% of the cost of the new property. Would we be able to get a loan for the rest?

2) If the property had land with outbuildings that needed to be converted to holiday lets would it be easy to get planning permission, assuming not a listed building?

3) If you where a dog owner do you think you would be interested in combining a holiday in the South Downs with some dog training?!?

I'm hopping that your answers may throw up a lot more questions too!

[JanB]

Exciting plans!

As regards planning, that is tough to answer as it depends on so many factors and is down to your local planning department.

My only one observation is that you might be in danger of creating a business which attracts dog owners but excludes a huge market of non dog owners.

For instance, I might look at your gorgeous holiday lets but would be very put off by the fact it was so doggy focused. I personally would not enquire or book on that basis. Nothing against dogs per se, just that it would create an image of everyone having dogs and training going on, so it would not be of interest to me.

Of course, it could be a niche market for you but I rather think you could be eradicating a rather large portion of your potential letting audience.

Hope this is of help! Good luck with your plans, it is very exciting to be considering such a large project.

[Hells Bells]

I don't think you need to worry about being exclusively dog orientated. There are similar places on the Facebook group. All seem to be very successful.

[brightmike]

Thanks Jan, it's a good point about not wanting to put off the non-dog people. I would hope to have enough land to accommodate the two sides of the business in harmony. I think I would probably only pitch the training option to dog owner that inquire.

Helen, do you know the name of the FB page of the similar business (hopefully not in Sussex!).

[greenbarn]

Planning consent seems to be highly variable depending on the area of the country.

Up here it's commonplace to be refused consent to convert old agricultural buildings to anything except holiday letting - ie not a permanent dwelling. Sussex may well be different, with different overall needs and pressures. An exploratory chat with the Planning Department won't cost you anything and should get you an idea of their general approach, without them making any commitments to an unseen case. They may regard the venture as a kennels, and there may be noise considerations?

It's worth being aware that consent for business use - ie holiday letting - may also tie in with stricter building control regs regarding disabled access, fire precautions, emergency lighting, energy footprint etc. Building Control is a different department from Planning, and from my very limited experience they barely know of each other's existence.

I think you'd probably lose potential bookings due to the dog focus, but that's the same with any niche market; the niche market for dog owners is huge. The current turmoil in the industry suggests that niche marketing is the way to go to be offering something that doesn't fit with the plain brown box shifting approach that the big sites have all adopted.

If your focus is on dog training, you may be limiting yourself too much. It's not something we'd want for our current dog for example. If it's something that you're doing on the site and can offer as an adjunct to those who want it, you'll attract those who do but not deter those who don't IYSWIM. I think I'm suggesting keeping the dog training and the holiday letting as separate businesses but with an obvious overlap to suit (if that makes any sense)

Just as a point of interest, last year we had someone stay with two young Border Collies. Part of their reason for coming into this area was to have some sessions with Katy Cropper, a trainer a few miles from us, so people with an unusual holiday requirement will search hard to find something that fits.

I think the idea has legs........ (sorry - I'll get me coat.)

ETA re-reading your last post I think you're ahead of me with not pushing the training side.

[Guest]

[greenbarn]

The advice to talk to the planning department is valid, and it would pay to have a general discussion about your plans in principle (to gauge their overall reaction/opinion), even before you have any particular property in mind.

What 7A said, plus as you get closer to decision time it's worth keeping in mind that you can apply for PP on a property that you don't actually own - so you could look to get confirmation of approval before you take the final plunge. I don't know if there are restrictions or detail considerations associated with this (eg outline v full permission), but worth looking into.

[Hells Bells]

The dog friendly group is here https://www.facebook.com/groups/dogfriendlyholidays/

[newtimber]

What 7A said, plus as you get closer to decision time it's worth keeping in mind that you can apply for PP on a property that you don't actually own - so you could look to get confirmation of approval before you take the final plunge.

The trouble with doing this is that the price of the property then increases as it now has planning permission for conversions - and you've had to pay out for the application.

Buying up property hoping to get permission is high risk; you need to have a plan B if you fail to get permission.

[Guest]

[greenbarn]

^ Useful tip - thanks!!

[newtimber]

There is a standard solution to this problem, common in the self build world, whereby both parties agree to a lock out contract. The vendor and buyer agree a price and exchange contracts on that basis. The buyer pays a deposit at exchange, but makes completion subject to obtaining planning permission. If planning permission is denied, the vendor keeps the deposit. If planning permission is approved, both parties are required to complete at the previously agreed price, within so many days.[/quote]

Thanks 7 Aspire. I'd never heard of that before. Is it used though in the situation that that OP wants - i.e. to buy an existing house and outbuildings which will have a lot of interest from other buyers? Unless the OP is willing to pay a lot more than the competition, the vendor won't want to have this uncertainty and will go for the quick certain sale.

[Guest]

[charles cawley]

bright mike

My feeling is that it would be a mistake to focus on one niche. Demand fluctuates and becoming highly specialized could well be a mistake.

People are quite able to stay in other holiday lets near-by if they choose, so the only added value would be that your lets will be on site. Yours would, still, have to compete with the quality etc: or other lets which would not be near what is a business.

I have seen others try this arrangement and many do not succeed. The trick, if possible, is to focus on serving as many niches in the holiday let market as you can and, if the added extra appeals, then all the better.

Holiday Letting is a business in its own right. It does not, always, do so well as an adjunct of another business. Some places like The Acton Scott Farm Museum do run them successfully in tandem but, even then, they often rent out to people who are only tangentially interested in antiquated farm activities.

http://actonscott.com/holiday-and-venue/holiday-houses

[brightmike]

Thanks for all the feedback. I certainly know more about planning now than I did before!

It would not be my plan to have the property as a holiday let restricted to training dogs or even a holiday let just for dog owners. I would see it as a being an add on and so should not deter the wider market.

Lots to think about though, so thanks again!

No one has answered the question about getting finance for an investment that is part lived in by myself and part holiday let. Does anyone have any experience of this?