new bathroom advise.

susiesue_2

hi,
iam planning a complete new bathroom refit. what i need to know is the best place to source it. i live in cannock staffs. i have been to the bathstore and had some good advice but some of the prices are a little bit out of my buget.
does anyone know any good websites ect, so i can make price comparisions?

thanks in advance.:T

lightspeed

Hi, I also live in Staffs (Newcastle Under lyme) and have recently purchased a 1940's property in desperate need of a makeover before we move in and the bathroom was top of the list.

To be honest i have lost track of everything that i spent but a ball park figure would be around £1500 for everything.

I shopped around for the suite and ended up buying the bath seperate to the basin and toilet. We got a steel bath for £99 (Kaldewei, supposed to be good quality) from Windsor Bathrooms (Newcastle Under Lyme) sale stock, however i saw many of these at reasonable prices on the tinternet (just google it).

The basin and toilet were from Wickes and came in at around £120 for the two. They do a pottery pack within which there are basins and toilets at varying prices - some look better than others but are certainly no worse than some i saw at other bathroom shops.

If you go for the whole suite together you can pick them up from B&Q for around £200-300. I was told to steer clear of their cheaper baths as they are of a lesser thickness than others and can be quite fragile. That said, i have spoken to people who were more than satifsifed with the cheaper B&Q suites.

I picked up some slate effect laminate flooring (50% off) at B&Q for a total cost of £50 (7m2), however, flooring can get quite expensive depending on the amount needed. Also check places like ebay for this.

Taps were from homebase (victorian style) @ £80 for both basin and bath, again ebay had some nice ones but i opted to go with something a could see and touch before i bought.

Screwfix was excellent for the parts and materials, free delivery on orders over £50 (i think).

Towel radiator from B&Q @ £49.99 (only a smallish one but does the job and looks as good as many others i have seen.

Tiles and border came in at around £370 including trims, adhesive and grout. By far the most expensive part of the job but together with a decent floor, good tiles will make a cheap suite look expensive. I got mine from Hyde Park Tiles (Stoke), they had an excellent choice and there were some good deals. To save money dont tile the whole of the bathroom, but make sure you dont need to get plasterers in to sort out any walls (this may counteract any saving on the tiles).

Showers - again try ebay, but first establish what type you want e.g electric/power (mira and triton cam out on top when i searched around)

I think there is a limit on how cheap you can do a full refit of a bathroom for and from experience i would guess it is around the £800 mark (and that is probably as cheapas it will get - all with basic parts of course). The main saving comes if you do the work yourself, i am sure that our bathroom would have cost somewhere in the region of 3K if tradesmen had done most most of the work.

I found it very difficult to fully plan ahead because things kept on popping up. Its amazing how a few trips to local plumbers merchants can add up (at an estimate, about £150 - 200 was spent on pipes, fittings, sealants etc...)

In conclusion,the internet is a good resource for things that are easily compared (just google it), but there are just somethings that are best bought by simply shopping around. DIY stores offer some decent stuff but often at a premium e.g. fittings, pipes, materials etc... therefore for this stuff i found screwfix and local plumbers merchants the cheapest especially if you say you are trade and doing the job for someone (worth a try).

I reckon, if you are handy and prepared to shop around locally and and the internet you can refit a bathroom to a good standard for around 1K with a basic suite and "some" basic materials. As soon as you start paying someone labour expect that figure to at least double.

catchdarren

Can't improve on the advice from the last poster but I also got a Kaldewei bath. Paid £130 for it from a local plumber's merchants - £70 on E-bay. It seems really good. We splashed out (!) on all the other stuff, it came to about £1500 for all parts including tiles, etc. Fitting was through a friend, that was another £1300, (new floor, tiling floor and walls, fit suite, fit thermostatic shower), cheap for London. Looks a treat and look forwards to bath time!

D

Debt_Free_Chick

I can beat the price for taps - been looking myself in the past few days. Try this site