Renovating a house - my experiences

geomot
geomot Posts: 17 Forumite
Six months ago we made an offer on a three bedroom bungalow that needed a huge amount of work & our offer was accepted. I then began reading and reading this forum for advice. We’ve renovated and extended the house and are in the last stages of completing the work now so I thought I’d try and pay back this forum by hopefully providing some useful reflections on how we went about it.

Planning and design

We laid out the house design the way we wanted it, initially I used hand sketches then transferred everything to Google SketchUp which is a relatively easy to use free design program. http://sketchup.google.com/

After being happy that it worked in 2D I made a 3d model of the design using SketchUp and we spent a long time agonising over whether things worked well.

At this point in time ask everyone you know if they think the design works. One of the comments made by someone was crucial and changed the location of the kitchen.

At this point I got a local firm of architectural technicians (http://www.kenefickjones.com/) to change my design into proper plans and submit them to the local authority planning department. Using a local firm was good as they knew who to talk to on the local council planning department and what would be easily accepted. It did fell like I paid them to redraw my design and initially I thought it was expensive but I had zero issues with planning or building control, so it was money well spent.

I raided Amazon and bought a copy of “The Housebuilder’s Bible” which helped me all the way through the process. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Housebuilders-Bible-Insiders-Construction-Jungle/dp/0954867440

I used this to check the costs of the job and to give myself an idea of what was a good figure & also got a ballpark figure from the architectural technicians on what they thought was likely.

Choosing a builder

I prepared an outline spec and asked four local builders to quote from a fairly large firm down to a one man band. All the companies were recommended to me by friends and family. The one man band got the job because I got the best feeling from him and I felt that he was the most “committed” to the job. He used a team of small one / two man firms that he works with for all of the other jobs such as plumbing, electrics, joinery etc. I had to finance part of the work up front but I took the risk on this and it has paid off.
Check that the electricians and plumbers are certified fully.

Fittings and equipment.

Kitchen came from Wren. I got quotes from Wickes and priced up a similar one from DIY and from KuchenHaus (fell over laughing at that one). I know that there has been a fairly fierce debate about Wren but for me they were affordable and fairly stylish (about £4300 direct to Wren).
I bought the appliances from Jual (http://www.jualdomestics.com/) who were excellent and far cheaper than I could get elsewhere. I chose a Zanussi oven and hob, a Smeg dishwasher and a Baumatic hood. All of which were on special offer and cost approx £1250 – most of these seem to be last years model but I didn’t care about that one.

Trying to keep costs under control is hard and the kitchen is one where it is incredibly hard to not overspend – it is so tempting to upscale your units, hob, worktop etc. I came really close to spending £2000 on granite worktops and am so glad I just spent £600 on good quality Duropal laminate work tops instead bought from the Worktop Centre in Liverpool who delivered them cut to fit already butt and scribed ( http://www.theworktopcentre.co.uk/)

Bathroom equipment came from Plumb-base. The plumber told me to go in an use his name – but to be honest I went in “talking the talk” with an order for a bathroom and two en-suites worth of equipment and got a 65% discount off list price on most of the stuff. Again its dead easy to overspend here, but I got Mira Mini EV showers, Mira 800x1200 shower trays, Bristan mixer taps, Ideal Standard entry level pottery and Coram shower screens for approx £2400. Their Birkenhead branch were very friendly and helpful.

Boiler and heating system is all Valliant – absolutely stunning – Ecotec plus 637 with an unvented storage system and a wireless roomstat/control system. Hot, appears to be cheap to run and the hot water pressure is amazing – the shower bath screen in the main bathroom can’t keep the overspray in.

Wall tiling came from Topps Tiling, Birkenhead – also very helpful despite the fact that Mr Tesco contributed £1600 in the form of Points vouchers towards the £2300 we spent in there.

Carpets and flooring came from Bogans in Liverpool (http://www.boganscarpets.com/) . These are a local family firm with two showrooms who were happy to do a deal. We have put a single carpet throughout the house and they fitted Hyper underlay. I went prepared to argue about costs of underlay etc but didn’t have to because of how much we spent with them – they ordered a full roll of carpet for us.

The kitchen and hall etc have Polyflor Camaro (http://www.polyflor.com/JH/products.nsf/products!open&family=lux&prodcode=4) fitted thanks to recommendations from this site. I’ve had Karndean previously in our old house and fitting the polyflor instead saved me £1000 plus. Again this was fitted by Bogans. If you get it fitted ask for a small detail strip to be fitted around the edge it really makes it look better (and not at all chavvy). It turns out I could have got the polyflor from Lee Floorstock in Liverpool who are a trade supplier but then I would have had to arrange fitting etc myself and by this time I was loosing the ability to make decisions.

Painting the new internal walls.

No messing - Dulux SuperMatt magnolia paint – initially watered down then neat. It covers new plaster wonderfully. It is expensive but was worth it. I bought all of this stuff from Bromborough Paints (http://www.bromboroughpaints.co.uk/) a decorators merchants and should have negotiated a discount cos I spent £400 there.

Inset lighting

I didn't want them for insulation reasons - she did. I lost.

As a result I tracked down Snaplite who make a much more energy efficient version at a price- this was a bit of a cost bump on my estimation but I'm glad I did it. http://www.snaplite.co.uk/


Door handles etc.

http://www.doorhandlecompany.co.uk/ an online store but the online branch of an architectural ironmongers. – the handles we chose were only £7.00 a pair as opposed to £22 for the same one from B&Q.

When you are buying 13 sets of door handles things get expensive if you go to B&Q

Patio

I was running out of cash at this time so I visited the Paving expert website (http://www.pavingexpert.com/) – read up a bit – realised I couldn’t afford natural stone and bought 64 square metres of Mellow Stone concrete flags from http://www.pavingcentreonlineltd.co.uk/

Overall advice

Don’t do a big project like this if you can’t make decisions – you think one room is bad – try and make decisions on 10 rooms – plug locations, radiators, windows etc.

Ensure you are happy with your design before you start – be very careful if you chose to change it.

Cost manage everything – create a project file – keep copies of everything and put everypenny you spend onto a spreadsheet.

Estimate well – set a budget – add 15% over-run and try and stick to it. That wood burning stove you thought about halfway through the project is not going to happen unless its in the budget or something else can get binned.

£500 extra on a room you can cope with £500 on every room is nasty.

Don’t forget curtains, paint, etc etc etc

Was it worth it.

Yes – we have a wonderful house which we don’t intend to ever leave.
It has been a little fractious and we have occasionally argued rather ferociously about things and we have had to make some major adjustments to our life during the build – but we are really glad we did it.

Comments

  • Do you have any before and after pics?
  • RX-78
    RX-78 Posts: 223 Forumite
    Great account of re-building a house! Some before and after picture would be much appreciated
  • I am loving the doorhandlecompany, would also love to see photos. I'm intrigued with the flooring, we are in the process of choosing flooring for our kitchen and are thinkin gof karndean or amtico, how does the Polyflor Camaro compare??
    To be in your child's memories tomorrow, be in their life today.
  • RX-78
    RX-78 Posts: 223 Forumite
    Hey anychance of pics geomot??
  • ritani
    ritani Posts: 47
    First Post First Anniversary Combo Breaker
    Forumite
    What a great post and a pleasure to read. We are about 3 months into a full refurbishment on our dream house and your post is very reassuring and spookily very similar to our journey. (I too have just decided I want a woodburner..)
    Can highly recommend Bogans also, have used them before and plan to again for this place. Did you use Wren in Aintree? We are stuck between them and DIY at the moment. I have been a little bit worried about Wren's reputation from info off this site.
    We visited a kitchen appliance shop next door to The worktop Centre today and were ready to spend a lot of money with them. So glad I have waited because that link you added for Jual will save us £££ on the prices we were quoted.
    I too use this wonderful website to research and gain advice from so thank you for sharing your story. Wishing you every happiness in your new home.
    PS Show us some photos!!


    .
  • Fevvahz
    Fevvahz Posts: 30 Forumite
    Nice thread here, and not being so far away, full of useful links!
    I have a blog too...
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