First-time house renovation

jimbugalee

good point Maggie!! I'll remind my boyfriend!

lisal0u

Hiya,

jimbugalee - Just had a look at your blog! Its looking very nice! Youve got the same doors as us :-) Total bargain from b&q. The joiner is coming back at the weekend to shave a bit more off the bottom since the carpets were so thick.

I wish our livingroom was 35m2 hahaha thats the whole of downstairs so not very big, but plenty of space for just the two of us!

jamtart6 - Heres a big HUG from me too! I know how you feel! Its such hard work and you miss having a life! I was in such a grump yesterday. I decided to do an easy job just because I knew it couldnt go wrong and it cheered me up!

One good thing, stress is great for losing weight :-)

Maggie - I think I could so with a good cry, I tend to hold it back but it doesnt do you any good!

Engineered wood is a sandwich of 1/16" to 1/8" of solid wood on top and non-finish plywood underneath. It means that the solid wood on top is less likely to warp.

We managed to almost finish the floor downstairs apart from a little bit under the stairs as we ran out :rolleyes:. We bought the flooring before we decided to take the wall out under the stairs. Im just hoping they still have some of the same wood still in stock!

Its a bit bouncy in places even though we levelled the floor. I think it might be a combination of the underlay and a few warped boards, Im hoping it will settle out! Typical that the springy areas are right in the walkways!!

The list of jobs is getting smaller. Planning on painting the skiritng and getting it stuck on this week downstairs and varnish the stairs.

Then weve got the bathroom to finish tiling and a few more bits of painting! I wish I didnt have to work, would easily get it done before Christmas then!

x

latecomer

ukmaggie45 wrote: »

We're still a bit unsure what to do, might move in and just stay at least one night every 30 days, until we've got the work starting. And then go over to unoccupied insurance... I think we've got sufficient work needing doing that we'll be able to not pay Council Tax while the work is done, since that's around £120 a month it makes the insurance look a bargain!

Not sure if its the same everywhere but up here you can only claim full council tax relief if the property is unoccupied and unfurnished.

jimbugalee

lisal0u wrote: »

jimbugalee - Just had a look at your blog! Its looking very nice! Youve got the same doors as us :-) Total bargain from b&q. The joiner is coming back at the weekend to shave a bit more off the bottom since the carpets were so thick.

We weren't planning to get those doors as at full price they are £80 plus but we walked in and saw a big pile of them for £16.15 each which make them the cheapest doors in the store. I didn't think they could be the same ones as yours which I loved but it turns out they are. What a bargain!! I'm quite tempted to ring up a bigger store (ours is quite small) and ask if the ones with glass in are on offer too as we'll be using those downstairs. What did you stain yours with to finish them?

jimbugalee

latecomer wrote: »

Not sure if its the same everywhere but up here you can only claim full council tax relief if the property is unoccupied and unfurnished.

That is true down here but it was easy to apply for ( in fact it may have only been a phone conversation with the council). It was made easier by the fact they could see I was paying council tax in another property so it was obvious we weren't living there and I can guarantee there was no furniture!

latecomer

We had the builders and roofers here on saturday. :j

Builders left just about 1pm but the roofers were there until about 4pm and just about finished the front dormer. I thought it was finished but apparently there is a little something that needs completed.

It looks great, in fact its even better looking than I expected. Only downside is that the amount of tiles that have been broken mean we dont have enough to do the rear dormer. Mind you I'm not convinced there would have been enough even if they hadn't broken any...

Builder was suggesting we have some wooden paneling instead of slates that weren't a perfect match as the slates are almost impossible to source.. Didn't like that idea (and suspect he was thinking about saving a little cash too) and after speaking to the roofer to find out what the slates are we've managed to locate some just down the road which are left over from someone else's extension. Popped down to see them on saturday and it looks like they are a perfect match. The guy even gave us a slate away with us and I got the builder to check it this morning and he agrees its a good match.

The guy is asking for £1 a slate with a little discount for a taking a lot. He thinks he's got between 4-500 and the builder has estimated that we need about 350 so has suggested we take 400. Only minor problem is that the guy has someone else who is interested in about 200 so I'm not sure that we can get as many as 400 hundred. I'll need to give him a phone tonight and ask.

Builders are looking for cash again but we need to discuss it first as they are starting to get ahead of schedule with their payments as they have had all the cash for the downstairs stage 3 despite no having started the roof which is meant to be complete.

They are not that far from stage 2 upstairs but are supposed to have the dormers, windows and veluxs fitted. Builder says they will at that point by the end of next weekend but I want to make sure they understand that this has to happen if they are going to get money this week. Not sure whether anyone thinks this is unreasonable but we dont think so.

suisidevw

Quick question guys, where did you get your underfloor heating from? Looking for the mat type for under tiling and only 2m2 or so..... did it come with the thermostat etc?

Thanks!

stolt

just want to say goodluck to everyone if they are trying to get stuff done and finished before christmas. think we have lost the will to live after this weekend. Spent all weekend stripping paint from some bannister rails and then sanding them down, some real difficult places to get too and we didnt finish it, i've lost all my fingerprints because i wasnt wearing gloves and the sandpaper has litterally sanded them off!! Had some more skirtings to take off and then some old mastic around some door frames. And finally at 1030 last night we had to clear the rooms of furniture as amtico flooring guys are in today. Hes took up the old laminate and said that hes going to be here all week!!! when it should have been a 3 day job but due to the amount of prep work involved. I was going to fix new skirting this coming saurday but i just dont think i can do that and paint them all before christmas, just run out of time. As someone else said if we wasn't at work i would have the time to finish it off. Our youngest hasnt been well this year so its back and forth for hospital visits which has eaten into my annual leave so hasnt left anything other than weekends to do stuff.

so good luck everyone, keep your chins up, summer will be here soon

jimbugalee

We got ours from here:
http://www.theunderfloorheatingstore.com/

They're all pretty much the same but this place swung it because it had a cool themostat!! Also they have an eBay store which has even better prices.

jamtart6

Thanks everyone for cheering me up! There could be much worse thngs happening so should just be grateful for what we have, but the dust is tipping me over the edge haha

Think we might revise the goals ...!