Right this might be long but bear with me!
All Freehold properties have Deeds. The Deeds are there to set rules and standards. Some of these are ages old and by modern standards etc do seem odd.
However the one reguarding not running a business or working from home are there to protect yoour neighbours and neighbourhood as a Residential and pleasant area for people to live in without being distrubed all day and night. It is in most Deeds of Freehold properties, it is in mine most of us don't read them they are held by the Company who we have or Mortgages with because they own the property and Deeds until we have paid off the mortgage.
Is what you are proposing to do going to unduly distrub your neighbours? I doubt it so you should be fine dong it. But just ask yourself a few questions.
Is there plenty of access for you mindees parents to drop and collect children without causing bloocked driveways or access or cause a lot of traffic noise early in the morning or late at night?
Are the children going to be screaming aroung the garden from 5am to midnight?
Probably not, so there would be no cause for concern or complaint from ther parents. So you should be fine working as a cm.
Likewise someone using a home office to do mostly paperwork, the neighbours wouldn't even know.
But if a car welder set up shop in the garage and had lorries,cars etc parked up all over the place and was welding morning, noon and night then people would rightly complain. Or a bulider used the front garden as his 'yard' and had a cople of huge metal storege bins on there it would impact on the Residential nature of your houses. It is more for this reason this is written into Deeds. It means that ultimately through the Deeds action can be taken against someone who is causing a nuisance. You could complain about the white vans and work lorries through this route.
One of the keys with Deeds/Covernats on properties is not so much breaking them but considering if anyone and who might enforce them?
For example years and years ago I wanted to run a Licienced Conference Centre in a part of a property owned by my father. He ahd bought it a number of years earlier and it was an old Victorian Vicarage. When the Church sold the house they attached a Restrictive Covenant to the Deeds. It stated that Alcohol could not be sold from any part of the property and I wanted to apply to the Courts for a Liquor Licience for the Conference Centre so we asked a Solicitor what was the best thing to do. He suggusted we consult Council in London for a view (very,very expensive!!) to have the Covernant removed. In the end my father said it was all too comlicated and expensive so he wrote to the Church Commissioners and explained what we wanted to do and asked if they would enforce the Covernant if we did it? Several letters went back and forth, I started my business and the Church gave me their blessing and as far as I know the Covenat is still in place.
I guess what I am saying is just because its there doesn't mean you can't do what you want to do.
It might be worth checking with you local planning department wether you need to apply for planning permission to childmind. Some are fine as long as you don't go over your 6 under eights and only ask you to apply for it if you go over this but thers want it anyway. If you change the use of you house through planning you would be wise to talk to a solicitor about all the tax implications in doing this and the effect it could have when you come to sell your house.
I did warn you it would be long but I hope its been of help.
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