When you buy a new build home with a garage, it’s easy to focus on the house and treat the garage as an afterthought. Yet the garage is built to the same set of standards as the rest of your home, and knowing what those standards expect can help you spot when something isn’t quite right.

NHBC Standards Chapter 10.1 covers garages in detail, whether they are integral to the home, attached to it, or standing on their own. It is written as guidance for builders, which makes it hard going for most homeowners. To make it easier to follow, we have produced a plain-language guide that works through the chapter clause by clause.

The guide walks through every part of the chapter in order, keeping the original clause numbers so you can cross-reference the source. It explains the rules for garage foundations and floors, including slab thickness, drainage and damp protection, then moves on to walls and how they resist wind and rain. It also covers fire separation between the garage and the home, security where garages are linked, doors and windows, and roofs, from holding-down straps to rainwater disposal. Finally, it looks at prefabricated garages and carports, and the services that might run into a garage, such as water, electricity and heating appliances.

Each section is kept short and to the point, so you can either read it straight through or jump to the part that matters to you.

Many of these requirements exist to keep your garage dry, structurally sound and safe over the long term. Understanding them puts you in a stronger position if you need to raise an issue with your developer, because you can point to what good practice should look like.

Read the full guide

If you have a new build garage, or one on the way, our guide is a useful reference for understanding what the standards expect.

Read the full guide: NHBC Standards Chapter 10.1 Garages, Explained