A WOMAN has revealed that her dad converted his garage into a tiny home for her to live in.
Esme Leon revealed that her dad decided to convert the garage for her, after she told him she wanted to move out and have her own place.
Sharing a tour of the garage on her TikTok channel, she revealed that she absolutely loves the layout of her tiny home, as she was able to pick out everything herself.
She said that her dad even built a walk-in wardrobe into her spacious double room.
It also has a large bathroom, complete with a toilet and shower.
Esme said: “I always thought it was hilarious that it’s such a small space, but my dad managed to make the bathroom bigger than most people’s places”.
Although she loves her garage home, Esme said she struggles with storage space, as her partner now shares the space with her.
“I’m constantly decluttering, but I’m running out of things”, she said, sharing a clip of her cluttered looking kitchen.
Esme’s video, which was posted under the username @esme_leonn, has likely left many people impressed as it has racked up over 342,000 views on the video sharing platform.
TikTok users raced to the video’s comments section to share their thoughts.
One person said: “I love how your dad made it for you!”
A second person said: “Such a sweet gesture”.
A third said: “You have a wonderful dad”.
A fourth added: “That’s a big garage, so cute”.
Living in your parents’ converted garage is a great way to save cash for a house, whilst still having your independence.
As the cost of living crisis continues to bite, more and more adults are struggling to get on the property ladder and are choosing to live in their family home for longer.
The 2021 census revealed that over half of people aged 23 and under still live with their parents.
The average price of a house in the UK was £285,000 as of March 2023, and this rises to a whopping £735,254, which is completely unaffordable for many.
Moreover, research from the Resolution Foundation found that the average first time buyer deposit tripled from 5 per cent of the property price in 1989 to 15 per cent in 2019.
This means that buyers have to save for far longer and use up a larger percentage of their earnings to get on the property ladder.
Are you allowed to convert a garage into a bedroom?
USING average house price figures from Zoopla, Admiral Loans crunched the numbers and worked out that each square foot of living space is worth £350 on average.
Typically, the size of a small single garage in the UK is 128 square feet making the additional space worth £45,000.
A standard conversion costs between £4,995 and £7,500 depending on what work you have done, according to householdquotes.co.uk, which will of course eat into your profits.
If the garage is attached to your home you won’t even need to pay for planning permission, which currently costs £206.
The work falls under “permitted development rules”, which allows you to make certain changes to your home as long as it’s within limits.
This is because you’re not really altering the outside dimensions of the building.
But you will need to apply to the local authority if your garage is separate to your house, you live in a flat or maisonette or in a listed building.
It’s worth checking before starting any work that there aren’t any planning conditions attached to your property – you can do this by writing to the local authority.
If you plough on with building work that actually required permission, you may be ordered to take it down.
Recent research by property site Zoopla found that 42 per cent of adults under 40 who do not already own homes have given up, due to the astronomical cost of buying a property.
This included 38 per cent of people earning over £60,000 (almost double the average salary for the UK).
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