1 Often sold with the garden
The ground-floor flat
Shares The front path, the bins, sometimes the hall
The easiest move in the borough and the one people most often under-plan, because level access makes everything look simple from the kerb.
What this position in the house does to a move
Level access from the street is a genuine advantage and it does most of the work. What complicates a ground-floor flat is everything between the kerb and the door: a front path shared with the flats above, a bin store for the whole house, and a gate that is frequently narrower than the front door.
Where the flat has its own street door the move is straightforward. Where it opens off a shared hall, the hall becomes the constraint — and a Victorian hall with a bicycle in it, a meter cupboard and a radiator is narrower than it looks.
Ground-floor flats usually come with the garden, which means a shed, garden furniture and the accumulated equipment nobody counts at survey. Open it before we visit.
Our part
What we bring to this one
- 1 A survey that measures the gate and the path, not only the door
- 2 Floor and wall protection through any shared hall
- 3 The bin store cleared and put back, with a word to the neighbours beforehand
- 4 Garden and shed inventoried as their own space
Moving to or from the ground-floor flat?
Tell us both addresses and which flat you are. If you can, photograph the communal stair from below and from the landing above — that is what decides the day.