Extension in front of the house

Hi all,
We are going ahead with a property in Greensborough. The house sits on a 630m2 land and has very large front yard and minimal backyard. The living and dining space is very small and all the while we had been thinking that we can extend the house in front to get a formal lounge. But i have now read at multiple places that we cannot extend the house to the front and only to rear or side. Is that right? We had only talked to the selling agent about this and he said that area has a rule to keep a gap of 12 metres from the start of the plotplot nothing about not being able to extend in front.
Any advice would be helpful.
Thanks,
Simi

 

Depends on the front setback (this is what the agent is talking about). You can usually build to the same distance from the front footpath as the houses on each side (averaged).

However, you can’t use up all the garden space, so if you have no garden space at the back, you may have to leave more at the front.

Talk to Council. You may be able to get a dispensation to build slightly into the setback if you have no other option for the extension. I got this for a dining room extension - almost two metres for a small section of the building because the awkward layout of the house made it very hard to do the extension at the rear or side.

 

Thanks Joynz.