Thanks, Peter. A couple of things have made me hesitate:
(1) Applying for this Certificate of Lawful Use could land me in a more awkward situation than I'm already in, for all I know. For example, if the council order me to do a lot of expensive upgrading of the conversion to comply with today's building regulations. Or they might find some reason not to grant the certificate, and order me to convert the house back to a 3-bed semi. That would cost money and reduce the renting potential.
(2): Someone suggested that it may be easy to get the said certificate, but once it has been obtained, it is much more difficult to get planning permission to convert the place back to a 3-bed house. If that is the case, I would be cutting off my options by applying for the certificate. I am speculating, but I think this *might* actually make the place harder to sell if I needed to sell the whole building quickly, as one sale.
Yes.. this is the conclusion I have come to, too (based on my very limited knowledge of what's feasable). Do you think it would be easy to get a mortgage on the property Ihave described? As mentioned, I have about £145,000 equity in the property, and I need a second mortgage of about £85,000: enough to pay off my first mortgage and my credit card debts. It would also probably need to be a non-status mortgage, as I am self-employed and don't have accounts to show yet; only bank statements. And it would need to be an interest-only mortgage; that's the only way it would be useful in reducing my monthly outgoings. Would this be feasable? If so, what is the best way to seek out such a lender?
Thanks again,
Hank