First-time house renovation

Bumblebee123

Thank you so much for coming back to me.....hopefully she'll remember because they are the exact type of thing I've been looking for!!
Just as a side comment - your kitchen looks fab

latecomer

We've had our drains inspection and despite there being some questions about the lack of traps (which was agreed with the assigned BCO) it was all fine. Heard back this morning that the BCO has confirmed no traps are required and its all good. so that means I can put some concrete under the chamber and then back fill up to ground level ready for the concrete ramp to be created.

Boiler work didn't go quite as well. Although everything else was ok, there is an issue with the flue which means that he cant get his probe in to do a flue gas analysis. He'e been on to Ferroli this morning and they have said that the problem is the flue has been pushed too far into the boiler. He'd already looked at the flue and said that there wasn't a flashing kit used, just lots of felt stuck to it in a fashion he likened to a poultice. This was meant to have been done by the so called roofer but he's obviously just slapped some felt around the hole until it stopped leaking.

We've passed this back to the builder and told him to get the roofer back to fix the problem asap.

He also found an issue with the governor on the gas input dropping pressure which he reported and was replaced within about 2 hours. Very impressed with that

I've achieved nothign this week other than messing up the PC and thankfully fixing it again. Created a backup of the entire drive to make sure we dont lose any pics of LLC which are by far the most precious thing on it.

I'm hoping to get the dining room scraped at some point before the weekend but we'll see how it goes.

spirit

not been on this thread for a while but rest assured I've been lurking and marvelling at your progress. ukmaggie, yours is coming along really well.

Latecomer, you'll soon be back on track i'm sure, how is little LC doing?

Well, i've done as much as i'm going to with mine. I'm sorting out the back garden currently wip. then i'm off

You might remember i considered going in June - on my own. since then my sis and BiL have sold up and moving to Cornwall to start or take over a business and the plan is that I shall join them.

I've thoroughly enjoyed doing this house up, never intended to buy such a house, but will probably do so again once this is sold :eek:

latecomer

Good luck with the sale

LLC is doing fine - still not great at going down in the evenings but last night once he was down he slept for 6 hours which felt like forever

Hence OH is full of beans and chasing up builders and building control etc. Hopefully its not just a blip

andrew-b

Spirit...would be interested to know what you paid when you purchased, and how much you've spent...i.e. % profit/loss! Just being nosey really! There's a house in the same street on for £10k more via same agent..but it's a bit bigger...so your up against that one. Still prices round your way seem to be about £60-70k higher than round here for about the same thing.

spirit

andrew-b wrote: »

Spirit...would be interested to know what you paid when you purchased, and how much you've spent...i.e. % profit/loss! Just being nosey really! There's a house in the same street on for £10k more via same agent..but it's a bit bigger...so your up against that one. Still prices round your way seem to be about £60-70k higher than round here for about the same thing.

Hi Andrew,

Yes I don't know why the other one's not sold yet. I know that it's one of the ones which flooded in the summer of 07 and mine didn't.

I paid £180k for this. I've spent £25k on it, New windows, doors, fascias, soffits, guttering. Cavity wall insulation, brick up front to proper window height, replace internal front door and side screens, knock down kitchen and bathroom/loo walls, insert steel beam, new kitchen, bathroom, rewire and new fuse board, all new rads and total redecoration.

There's a 2 bed opposite me just gone on for £180k. It needs extending really like their neighbours have done.

You could extend over the garage here too if you wanted, someone 2 doors away has done that and converted the garage into a study. I've not wanted to do that as i don't need the room.

Canucklehead

Hi, Spirit...nice job on the property but maybe just photos or a blog could do the trick...unfortunately the nutters out there now know where you live.:eek:

Good luck with the sale and your move down south.

Canucklehead

spirit

Canucklehead wrote: »

Hi, Spirit...nice job on the property but maybe just photos or a blog could do the trick...unfortunately the nutters out there now know where you live.:eek:

Good luck with the sale and your move down south.

Canucklehead

Thanks Canucklehead. i expect there'll soon be nutters looking round here if the last sale is anything to go by. I'll take the link off soon when the regulars on here have seen the pics.

btw, i bought that Mira Platinum shower after all. Had some intial problems with it mind. firstly it wouldn't shut off and kept dripping. Mira came out and replaced the solenoid sp? Was ok for a few days and then you couldn't control the temperature. Mira came out again and scratched his head, anyway they ended replacing the lot. it's been fine since. (((shrugs)))

ukmaggie45

Had to go to page 4 to find this!

Spirit, good luck with the house sale and move. I'm afraid your link had disappeared by the time I looked. Ah well, it's not as if I was a prospective purchaser!

OH spoke to builder yesterday, our bifold doors have been made, but there's a problem with delivery, so they won't be here this week after all. He's hoping they'll come Mon or Tuesday now. Shame, as DD1 is coming up from London for the weekend, so she won't get to see them this time.

Went and bought the tiles for the bathroom yesterday, looked at some more in Wickes that I'd seen on the web for the shower room. But we din't like them when we saw them "in the flesh", or not for the shower room, the colour was wrong. So think we'll go back to the other place as they had some that might do, but wanted to check out the Wickes ones first. Got some gorgeous glass mosaic tiles to make a stripe around the wall in bathroom, very pretty and sparkly, but not exactly money saving as the ones we liked best were the most expensive. But the tiles were reasonable, and they gave us a 10% discount on them, so I thought we might as well have exactly what we want.

Off to the house to hand over next cheque shortly, and have a look around if there's time... It's DD2's 5th wedding anniversary today, so we're heading over to babysit the twins so Mum and Dad can get out for a meal. Wish me luck - last week when they visited here Alex gave me a huge smile, and I thought - "Awwww", and then burst into tears and screamed and screamed till Mum came back in and picked him up! :eek:

Gotto go or we'll be late!

Maggie

latecomer

We spent a lot on tiles for our downstairs bathroom to get the look we wanted and for us it was worth the extra. The tiles for upstairs came from B&Q and were cheap by comparison. Good luck with baby sitting!

We got an email back from the builder saying the flue pipe wasn't his responsibility and hence he wouldn't be getting the roofer back and apparently we had said we didn't want him back. Have replied to put him straight and point out the issue that he's responsible for is the flashing around the pipe which is what is causing the problem and have stated that we are more than happy for the roofer to return and complete the work that was paid for but not performed at the same time. OH is sure he just wants to walk away from the job but I'm not letting him off with that. I'm fed up of builders just wanting the easy option after they've got what they want from a job.

He did say that the downpipes are ready to be installed by one of his guys so we've asked for a date for this (and the rest of the work to be done).

We had clarification that the drains are approved provided the downpipes are soil grade so I'm going to put some concrete under the chamber over the weekend and then back fill round all the pipes. Plumber has left some drain rods for me to clear the old drains under the extension through to the chamber and has suggested doing the same from the chamber to the trap at the sewer end but that depends on being able to locate the trap access which i'm not so sure about. Will need to investigate the drains over weekend - there are a couple of slabs in the corner of the garden so I'm going to see whats under those.

And stil hoping to get the dining room paper scraped hopefully over the weekend but also want to spend some quality time with LLC too