Hi All,

I recently bought a 2-storey terrace corner house in Penang. The previous owner did an illegal extension (i.e. without approval) whereby he extended the back by about 17 ft, while the total backyard length is about 20ft. Because the house is double frontage (meaning it has main road in front, and main road at the back), I heard that according to Penang rule there must be a 20ft setback / building line from the boundary of the house, i.e. 20ft from my back fence I cannot build anything.

Now this is very ridiculous because land in Penang is so expensive (it costs me rm300+ per sqft to buy this house), and this extension was not done by me. I actually want to extend the side of my house, but the draftsman told me that because I have this backyard extension done by the previous owner, my new plan will never be approved.

What can I do? Is there a way to get an exception on my backyard extension which was done by previous owner?

I personally went to Komtar town planning unit to ask and they said I can appeal and they can consider case by case, but I am not sure if that's really useful (like if there is any possibility of getting it approved or they just want to shrug me off with false hope).

A lot of similar houses in my area have their backyard extension done as well. Also, there are some rows of houses which also have double frontage (front has road, back has road) but their original backyard length (without any extension) is already less than 20ft. Then isn't that a contradiction to the rule of having a 20ft setback?

What if I continue to do my side extension without approval? Will the council actually demolish unapproved extension on private land?

Hope someone can give me an advice here. Or please recommend me any architect or draftsman that has a workaround for this issue.

Regards,
Lim

Hi Dvinez,

Thanks for the suggestion. Is it that simple? Will they come back once every 2 months to get money?

I actually plan to submit plan without the back, but I heard they will send building inspectors to come take photo before approval.

Maybe really have to demolish the current backyard extension. That would be an extra RM5000 for hacking...