Sorry, but that shed is a home: Council bans NHS worker from living in her parents' garden while she saves up mortgage deposit

By Daily Mail Reporter
As most first-time buyers will tell you, getting on the property ladder these days is a minor miracle.
The first major hurdle is getting enough money together for a deposit.
With this in mind, Victoria Campbell and her boyfriend came up with a cunning plan to save cash more quickly – they moved into a rent-free garden shed.

 And the idea might have succeeded, but for Miss Campbell's local council which has ruled that the structure does not provide 'adequate living conditions' and creates an 'undesirable precedent'.
Officials have given her and Bill Warden, 26, nine months to move out or face a fine.
NHS care worker Miss Campbell, 20, and Mr Warden have been living in the shed in Miss Campbell's parents' back garden in Havant, Hampshire, since last September.
They had hoped to save around £20,000 for a deposit on a house within around five years. Miss Campbell makes £7.80 an hour in her job and Mr Warden is a £20,000 a year senior care assistant at a private home.
Miss Campbell said: 'My dream is to live in a three-bedroom home with Bill and start a family but it is so difficult to get on the property ladder these days.
'My parents have one spare room in their house but it is barely big enough to fit a single bed, so it is no use to us.
'I don't want to rent because it feels like we are throwing money away when we could be paying off our debts and saving. Living in a shed seemed like a perfect idea.

'I don't understand why the council are trying to make us move out. If they force us out, we will be homeless and the shed will remain anyway.
'Before we put it up we wrote to all neighbours within a 30-metre radius and did not receive a single complaint.'
The shed is 15ft by 15ft, has double-glazed windows and is heated by one oil radiator. It has no running water but draws electricity from the Campbell family's main three-bedroom terraced house.

The couple sleep on a fold-down sofa and eat their meals and wash in the main house.
Having had her retrospective application to use the shed as accommodation refused, Miss Campbell is now trying to get temporary permission with the help of consultants made up of former local authority planning officers.
Havant councillor Paul Buckley said the authority had been 'sensitive' to Miss Campbell's circumstances.
He said: 'Although planning permission was refused by the committee, it was resolved that a generous compliance period of nine months should be observed to allow Miss Campbell to find alternative accommodation.'