Total House Renovation

pingu2209

This is my first post on this area of MSE forum. I have to totally renovate my house - full rewire, new central heating and hot and cold water storate and boiler and radiators etc. Lots of pastering. Knocking down walls and new kitchen and bathroom and downstairs loo etc.

I gave a written speck to each company giving lots of detail including detail on doors, skirting boards, architrave etc. I wanted to make sure everything I wanted was included.

Basically I approached 4 firms, despite chasing loads I only ever received 2 quotes as the other 2 companies just never came back. One quote is for £49k plus VAT but does not include the cost of the kitchen and bathrooms. The other quote is for £42k plus VAT but includes the kitchen and bathrooms.

I haven't gone for references yet. However, I wanted to know why these quotes are so different in price? How can that be? Both are building companies local to me and of a similar size.

I have approached 2 other companies to get them to quote on the job too, and they will come out next week, but the whole process takes ages as they each bring in their own plumbers, electricians, plasterers, carpenters etc. So I doubt I will have their quote for ages.

stormCat99

That kind of price gap sounds perfectly plausible. I am by no means an expert, in fact I'm a complete novice who is just about to start work on an extension which will be the first time I've had anything like this done.

However, our quotes varied by as much as 2.5 times - yes, it sounds ridiculous! :eek:
Quotes were from £19k inc to over £50k which seems unbelievable. But I've spent ages reseaching on here and the web, and posted for help along the way, and it seems this is not at all unusual. I think it depends if the builder is large or small contractor, whether they are busy or not, whether they really want the work - your house may be outside of their chosen location for example.

All you can do is get multiple quotes - as you have done - and compare, then get references, speak to people about them, view their work. And then try to make your mind up.

We found the whole process very daunting, but have finally picked our builder and work starts in a couple of weeks.

eshzaina

We were also in a similar situation and got 4 quotes in ranging from 30K to 65K! in the end we decided to get individual tradesmen in, electrician, plumbers, plasteres, etc and compared them to the prices from the companies for the total works. very tiresome and long winded but we managed to get a good idea for what each work should cost.

Finally decided on one, turned out to be the cheapest, which i know everyone says is probably not the best idea, but we have seen his work, feel comfortable with him, so going to give him a go. we'll see what happens.