Anyone built a wet room?

Attu

Guys,

I just registered myself now. I thought of sharing my experience in building a Wetroom to everyone.... hope it would be helpful..

I am in the process of making changes to the bathroom with a budget of 4000 totally (2000 labour +2000 materials) . I asked a local non VAT registered individual builder to build this bathroom(who says that he can do everything from plumbing, electrical, tiling, etc.).

My bathroom side is 2.65m x 1.74 m

My plan is
to break the wall in between the toilet and bathroom we had,
put a door in the middle (which involves plastering).
remove everything like tiles, old bath,etc from the bathroom.
tile the whole bathroom,
leveling the floor and also roof.
Fit a wetroom,
underfloor heating with a new RCD,
Fit a conceled shower and hand shower (inside the wall),
furnitures,
back to wall toilet,
Counter top basin,
heated towel rail,
centrifugal fan in the roof (removing my old fan in the side wall)
lights,
towel radiator
plumbing work for radiator, shower, basin.
Sewage drains for shower and
Sewage drain to toilet (since we are putting a back to wall toilet)

The summary of the material cost (I tried to list as much detail as possible)

wetroom with underfloor heating - bought it from TileFixDirect (1100£)
fully tiled - bought from homebase and B&Q (400£ wall +floor tiles)
plumbing - bought it from local plumber for 200£
concealed shower +towel radiator - bought from plumbingworld (500£)
Toilet pan and counter top Basin - bought online for 330£
Furniture - 500£
lights, towel rails, centrifugal fan, RCD - (screwfix 380£)
Other building materials like plaster boards, wires, backer boards, cements, pva,etc - Wickes (550£)
Mirror (yet to buy .. but it would cost 200£)
Totalling around 3700£ for materials alone

We thought of having a wetroom and we ended up with spending a lot more than what It would normally cost for a bathroom. The builder also initally made a mistake in estimates. He asked for 2000£ initially and now he is asking 3500£. He took almost 25 days and the bathroom is in the tiling stage ..... still half of the work is pending
Since I do some kind of DIY, I like to have the work in perfection. I am not so satisfied with the finishing until now (there are lot of gaps between tiles which he says that he will fill with grout)

My Question is,
How much does it cost for a similar job by a similar kind of builder (non vat registered)?
Would it really add value to the house? (hoping to hear YES for this Question ...)

Alan_M_2

Just a point of note, a "Non VAT registered Bulder" is someone turning over less than £60K per year....So He's not a builder..."He's a bloke down the pub that does odd jobs and is uninsured" etc etc.

You will not recover the cost of a properly built wet room in additional value, it is considered a luxury fit.

bootman

I had a quote last week, shower as a wet room area. Take out old bathroom replace everything, tile floor and walls. Topps tiles wet room and tiles. I'm buying everything.

Quoted £2K for the labour, I will have to pay an electrician for a days work and a plasterer also separately.

This chap is not VAT registered, but he was a self employed tiler who them went to work for a large local plumbing and heating firm who put him through his plumbing training. So now he's on his own again able to do the plumbing and tiling. He said he had done 9 wet rooms now, I think I'm going to ask for contact numbers to call for a reference.

I hope it will all be ok! Seemed a nice honest chap.

Attu

Guys,

Thought of updating my previous post.
My Wetroom is almost done. I was not ready to pay him more for his mistake in estimates. so we compromised on 2600.
But, to be frank I was not that much impressed with the finishing. He gave all kinds of reason (like wether, plaster boards, ceiling not even, etc) for the same.
But he took almost 8 weeks to complete my bathroom, until then we have to stay in our friends place. The material cost went really high to around 5000 and I found he wasted a lot of things. I dont doubt his honesty, he did according to his standard. May be we expected very much from him.
It costed 7500£ for a bathroom of size 2500mm X 1700 mm.

So my learning is
1) except for the bathroom suits leave the cost for building materials + labour to builder itself.
2) Try to have someone with insurance.
3) Communicate whenever there is a change in plan and ask if this would affect the cost.
4) Try to get few references and enquire about the builder.
5) define the time period to complete the work before itself.

Anyhow I am happy that the bathroom is back to me

bootman

Attu, would love to see some pictures of your new bathroom.

You sound like you have been through a right ordeal, hope my bathroom does not end up going the same way!

Attu

Hi Bootman,

Sound like your builder is better experienced guy. The best thing that I did was to buy really good tiles, bathroom sinks, shower kits and toilet pans.

I will try to put some photos sometime this week.

andrewcollins

How much from scratch for a new wet room?