Westhoughton: Plans refused to turn Bolton property into 6 -bed HMO

Mrs Rachel Townsend submitted plans to turn the five-bedroom HMO at 81 Church Street, Bolton into a six-bedroom HMO in November, which have now been refused.

The report stated: “It is considered that the cumulative impact of the limited internal communal space and cramped dining area, the position of bedroom three directly adjacent to the dining area, the poor outlook and loss of privacy for the occupants of bedroom two and three and the limited external amenity space would not provide residents with a high standard of internal and external amenity.”

Proposed floor plans for the 81 Church Street property (Image: Portfolio Architects)

According to the report, the property had previously been reduced from six bedrooms to five bedrooms due to problems around internal shared amenity space and concern about the location of the bedroom adjacent to the kitchen dining area.

The ground floor bedroom was converted into a communal living room.

The current plans would have reversed these changes and made the downstairs communal living room back into a bedroom.

But due to the ‘cramped’ dining area, the ‘poor outlook and loss of privacy’ for bedrooms two and three, and the position of bedroom one ‘immediately adjacent to the highway’, as well as the ‘limited external amenity space’, the plans have been refused.