A council house tenant is planning huge renovations to her home – including joining up her abode with an out-house in the garden.
A single mum living in a council house came up with a genius way to add more space to the home she’s been in since January. Throughout the past year Alexandra Wren, who regularly posts on TikTok about motherhood and house renovations, has been doing up her property. In September, she finished a big project on her garden and the last thing she had left to do was add in a back door – as she only has a side door.
The Yorkshire parent explained in an initial video: “I don’t own my house but I’m going to try and knock part of of it down. And no, I’m not crazy – I’m not going to get a mallet out and just go for it. But I have come up with a new idea for my council house and I’m going to see if I can get it approved or not.”
Alexandra had a plan to knock down an out-house attached to her home and replace it with a back door. “This out-house is not connected through a door into the house… Until now my plan was to make this outhouse into actually part of the house and then put a back door on the outhouse into the garden.”
However, the outhouse was in such poor condition that she would need to knock it down and rebuild it. She went on: “Then I realised, why don’t I just ask to knock it down… I have a enough tiles left over just to extend the patio and that way once I’ve took the downstairs loo out, moved the gas meter and took some walls down, I could put double patio doors on and I would have an open kitchen and room for a dining table.”
Alexandra said she already has permission to remove the toilet and move the gas meter with the intention to put a back door in and that, “this doesn’t change my plan too much but I think it does make the most of the space.” She also believed that it would “probably” add value to the house, which is almost 100 years old.
However, on Sunday she posted an update saying the council had rejected her planning application. “Unfortunately they said no because it is already connected to the house. The reasoning doesn’t really make sense to me and I’m going to wait for the letters to come through.”
A reflective Alexandra added: “I don’t know whether to appeal it or to get back to the drawing board and figure out what I should do instead.” After asking her followers – of more than 220,000 – for their thoughts, one replied: “Appeal it and if they say no, tell them to make it water tight then as because it’s ‘connected’ it could cause damp.”
Another said: “I love the idea of opening up the space and making the outhouse into a laundry/ mudroom. You would get more usable space in your home and gain that backdoor you want,” and a third commented: “Appeal it unless you were going to use an out house a storage it serves no purpose and tbh your plans would increase the value of the property.”