Can't make my mind up on Bathroom - DIY or professionals?

helping_hubby

We have £1500 to refit an entire bathroom and tile floor and walls.

We got a quote from Bathstore of things we liked and it came to £1300.
This included the bath, bath surround, waste, taps, sink, waste and taps, close-coupled toilet and lid, fixed shower head, thermostatic shower valve and radiator and radiator valves.

This leaves £200 for tiling and getting someone to plumb the bits in.

We were going to plumb as much in ourselves and tile ourselves (found tiles we like for £15 per sq meter).

So all in all, with some hunting around on ebay and maybe swapping the shower head for something cheaper and more sensible, maybe not being too over budget.

But my family say we should get people in to do the work and tiling. They are going on the principal of do we want to do the bathroom once or twice in the time we live there. I.e. it's worth spending the money now and doing it right than not being 100% happy and wanting to re-do it in a few years.

We could spend £3k on a bathroom, but we'd have to delay other plans for the house (we're renovating a house we bought). I'm just not sure what to sacrifice for the bathroom.

So, anyone else done a DIY job and regretted it?

wallbash

This leaves £200 for tiling and getting someone to plumb the bits in.

Thats a bit optimistic:D

But if its a simple 'swop' job , ...DIY

Plumbing only gets difficult when you start moving things ! or if space is tight,

So, anyone else done a DIY job and regretted it?

some times when i'm in the middle of a project, but never looking back:D

helping_hubby

wallbash wrote: »

Thats a bit optimistic:D

But if its a simple 'swop' job , ...DIY

Plumbing only gets difficult when you start moving things ! or if space is tight,



some times when i'm in the middle of a project, but never looking back:D

We're going to be swapping the bath and sink. Will this be difficult?

I'm thinking the hard bit might be the shower? The problem being that the existing shower was a power shower (pump in attic) and it's no longer attached as we had a combi installed last week. So maybe we'd need a plumber for installing the shower?

I think the hard part of tiling is the planning. But I did maths at uni so I find that sort of problem solving fun, so working out where to start the tiles should be OK. It'd just take time and patience.

Phirefly

We've just had the same dilemma.

The suite I like in B&Q is £1470 for toilet, bath, sink taps and fittings. I've bought the individual suite components from ebay for £400, and the taps (nicer than b&q) are £263.

I've costed the tiles, shower, towelrail and sundries to come to about £600.

We've had 3 quotes from local fitters. One declined to quote, and the other 2 have come in at around £2500 all-in, to include moving our soil stack outside.

We toyed with the idea of Mr P attempting some of it himself, but we are both so short of time, it's taken him almost 2 months to complete refurbishing our french doors. We've also opted for large-scale tiles, which would be a challege for a first-time tiling attempt. The amount we'd spend on tools/materials/skip/carting to & from B&Q will soon mount up too.

I'm self-employed and charge a daily rate, so I can easily equate the value of outsourcing work. It will take the fitter less than 2 weeks to complete, whereas it would take much longer as a diy job. Its our only WC and I work from home, so its important that its done as quickly and efficiently as possible. Not only that, I think the overall finish of a bathroom has a massive impact (whole being more than the sum of the parts) and a professional finish will add value to our bargain components.

EliteHeat

helping_hubby wrote: »

We're going to be swapping the bath and sink. Will this be difficult?

Not really

I'm thinking the hard bit might be the shower? The problem being that the existing shower was a power shower (pump in attic) and it's no longer attached as we had a combi installed last week. So maybe we'd need a plumber for installing the shower?

Just takes a bit of time, especially if you're recessing it.

I think the hard part of tiling is the planning. But I did maths at uni so I find that sort of problem solving fun, so working out where to start the tiles should be OK. It'd just take time and patience.

I think you're right - go for it.

Anyway, I think that with your budget you stand no chance of getting a plumber in anyway. The chances are that your entire remaining budget will be spent on fittings.

helping_hubby

Phirefly is that £2500 including your estimates for your suite and fittings? Or is that just the fitting of everything?

After some googling (found a guide on how to install a bathroom), I'm thinking of getting the professionals in now. We have very little time and only 5 days holiday left till next march and a whole house of walls to fill, sand and paint. Not to mention daily chores of cooking and cleaning And everything takes 10 times longer than you think. I'm learning...slowly

In my budget is a dropped kerb which could come in at £1000, but I've already paid £144 for the 'searches' I wonder if you have to get the dropped kerb immediately, or if you can wait a year and not have to re-apply and pay the £144 again. If so this is something I can delay.

Phirefly

The £2500 is purely for fit.

To include removing the old suite and tiling, electic shower and radiator & making good. We are having the plumbing chased in for a concealed valve shower and wall-mounted sink. It includes the floor and wall tiling, and installation of suite, shower, & towel rail. We're having the ceiling light removed and ceiling skimmed, and recessed spots fitted. We're also having our internal soil stack diverted outside and back in again at ground level.

I could probably find a cheaper quote, but as I said, we got 3 fitters to come round intially. One was a recommendation from several family & friends who can't be praised enough, another was a local fitter who came recommended on here, and another was out of the yellow pages. The first two have submitted near-identical quotes and the latter declined to quote. Mr P is as we speak negotiating to reduce the bottom line with quotes 1&2.

I've sourced all the components myself for around £1250, but we're having premium tiles, I could probably save a good £200 on the tiles, but I think they're too important to scrimp on. The whole thing will come in under £4000, and it's going to look twice that (check out my bedroom thread, it looks a million dollars and was done on a shoestring). My initial budget for the bathroom was £1500 too, but I soon realised that it just wasn't worth it, we'd be better off leaving it. Just means no foreign holidays this year. Ho hum - home spa for me

helping_hubby

Ouch, £2500 for fitting. I've got a man coming round tomorrow to quote and another next week. If it comes to that much I might just get the plumbing done and tile myself. I seriously need to save somewhere. This is our first home, and not a forever home...so I am open to compromise.

We'll definitely remove the tiles ourselves. I helped my mum de-tile her entire bathroom, and ours is only tiled around the bath/shower, so should be doable pretty quickly.

So many things to think about. I'll let you know what quotes I get as and when.

Your bedroom is lovely by the way. And well done for getting the prices you did.

Phirefly

thanks

Scratch my previous post, Mr.P has just worked his magik (I really don't know how he does it) and got the family-recommended fitter to give us his best price at £2200. EEE I'm excited now. My sisters bathroom that he did looks like something out of a boutique hotel.

Its out first home too and we're on a pretty tight budget, its taken me a while to justify the expense, but I just don't think we'll find time to do it ourselves. Neither of us have done any tiling before, and Mr. P is the worlds biggest perfectionist and it would take him a year of sundays let alone a month. And if we come to sell the house in 3-5 years, theres no doubt it'll be made easier by the wow factor of a pro finish.

Do keep us posted on your quotes. And don't forget to negotiate!

helping_hubby

Hope you don't mind me asking (and going off subject) but it's nice to find someone who seems to be in a similar position to us (as in being quite keen and excited about doing a house up)...do you have a fixed budget for the whole thing? And how long have you been in your house?

Sounds like your OH has this negotiating to a T. My hubby is rubbish and accepts the first price. I'm still learning. We managed to knock off nearly £180 off our French Door quote. We've just got an electrical quote through for £1100 that seems reasonable and if we go for it I suppose I ought to try and get a little something off that too, or maybe they could throw in a couple of other small jobs that have come into light since we got that quote.

Phirefly

No I don't mind you asking at all.

We bought the house just over a year ago, but we'd been living in it as a rental for 2 years prior to that. You can imagine that by the time we got our names on the deeds and the green light to do whatever we wanted to it we were falling over ourselves to get stuck in, after years of thinking 'if we owned it we'd change xyz'

We redecorated the 'easy' rooms first. Just changing the knackered old carpets made the world of difference. After lots of shopping around we found a local independent carpet fitter who has since done the whole house and he's loads cheaper and very reliable. Mr. Phirefly managed to save us about £500 in total from our very first carpet quotes.

The bedroom is the biggest expense so far, but the other thread pretty much exemplifies how I go about things. Rather than start with a budget, I tend to start by getting a fixed image of how I want it to look, then see how much that would be, then try and halve that by shopping around relentlessly and getting Mr. P on the case with the negotiations. He's a sales executive himself so I think this is why he's so confident in dealing with salespeople.

As I said, the bathroom started off with us thinking we'd do it under 2k. We probably could do it for much less than the 3.5k it will probably be, but I'm a designer and can't help but get fixated on how I want things to look. One of my best mates did his for around 1k, but he bought the most basic suite, fittings and tiles and did it all himself, it took him months. It looks refreshed, but nothing more.

As far as overall budget for doing the house up, I kind of bury my head in the sand a bit about that. I almost bought a classic car this weekend which would have wiped me out for the next year or so, but I decided that until the house is finished, every spare penny is going towards doing it up. We thought we'd be here about 3 years, but the way the housing market is looking, its likely to be longer than that, so I want it to be as nice as it can possibly be so we can cope with being 'stuck' here, for want of a better term. I'm aware that 2 beds can be over-developed, using materials and finishes that actually outclass the property. Its a small house, but quite a unique location, so I feel the house can take a premium finish to a degree.

The kitchen is next, (though not till next year) Mr. P used to work as a kitchen salesman so I'm hoping we can make some savings, and this time, we might actually take on the work ourselves, I've lived through 2 kitchen refits and know I can cope with a microwave on the table in the lounge and washing up in the bathroom. So perhaps 5k for the kitchen? That would bring the enire spend on the house to about 10k over about 2-3 years for a really plush interior.