Improving or upgrading your home

We have a responsibility to make sure our homes are safe and any works carried out to them are safe. We also have a duty to make sure your home are well maintained to minimise the need for costly repairs in future years.

For this reason we expect you to decorate your home to your own tastes, painting or wallpapering rooms with materials you pay for and fitting floor coverings suitable for the type of building you live in, bearing in mind noise nuisance and insulation.

We also allow you to make small repairs and modest changes. These are explained in your booklet Taking care of your BHA home.

If you want to do other works you will usually need our permission, in writing, before you start.

Then there are things we cannot let you do, on safety grounds. These are explained in another of our booklets, Keeping your home and the neighbourhood safe.

Please check with us first before you do anything that involves:

• drilling into or making other changes to walls, windows, doors and floors
• electrical sockets / fittings
• central heating and fireplaces
• water pipes, meters, bathroom fixtures (toilet seats excluded) and showers
• kitchen units

You may even be entitled to compensation for the works you have done, if and when you leave the property.

Read our policy

Download application form

Please read our policy before applying for permission to improve your home. Applications can be returned by email at info@barnsbury.org or to our office at 4-6 Colebrooke Place, London, N1 8HZ, marked for attention of the housing and communities manager.