Money Saving on Renovations and Property Development - DIY

HugoSP

We have all read about the thousands of uses for Vinegar and carrier bags in the home but I am amaized that there seems to be no hints on here about saving mone on materials and waste disposal etc during DIY on either small or large scales.

So - here are a few to start us off:

Materials:

Sourcing

Most DIY sheds offer a price match policy. They expect to be challenged against their main competitors but not often against trade outlets. B and Q had to knock more than 50% off the price of 2 MK distribution boards because Denmans in Plymouth were very competitive.

Take a Screwfix catalogue with you when you go to these places. If you're going to need more than £50 worth of stuff you may find that mail order from Screwfix or another mail order co can save you 50%. In addition if you plan ahead you can order in advance. Screwfix allow you to return anything you don't need within 30 days, so you needn't be stuck with a load of stuff you don't want. Since they stopped doing their discounts for larger orders I now buy exactly what I need, and make sure that is enough to get free delivery.

Builders merchants are flexible on price. If you're into a lot of DIY it's worth opening accounts to get yourself known to your branch. Then you can negotiate better discounts. These discounts tend to be at the discretion of the branch manager. Some BMs are better than others. I can get up to 50% on some items. But remember it's the final price that is important - not the % discount.

Quarries are excellent for large amounts of some sands, aggregates and concrete products. I live within about 5 minutes drive from a quarry. Hence I have an account with them. As I use relitively large amounts of sand and aggregate (2 tonnes at a time) I go and collect it in a trailer. It is worth finding out from the sales rep what prices you could pay for collected loads if you have the means to collect it. I see people with their 1/2 tonne trailers collecting their materials as opposed to buying it by the 25kg bag at B and Q.

I pay around £14 a tonne for loose 20mm to dust (ballast), as opposed to some £35 for a large dumpy bag that can contain as little as 855KG at most builders merchants. Obviously I have the means to transport and store the materials economically. Those of you who will only need a few bags won't find this information useful.

If you don't have a quarry near you there may be a merchant who sells the stuff loose. This will almost certainly be cheaper.

Seconds or damaged goods

Whenever you have a project it is worth asking two questions:

1) What in the way of seconds can I use?
2) How will the use of seconds impact on the quality of the finished job?

A 2400mm x 1200mm sheet of 1/2 inch plasterboard will normally set you back around 5.99 in a merchants or a DIY chain. I buy it at around £2 per sheet, or less. This is something you can do even if you only need one or two sheets, and especially if you intend to skim them or you are going to cut it and fit part of a sheet.

The merchants I use often have this in, so I tend to ask on a regular basis. I tend to go for sheets that have been damaged on the edges. Such damage will be invisable when it's skimmed over, so why pay £6 per sheet when I can pay £2?

Insulation. I had to fork out some £130 to insulate a concrete floor that I laid. I later found a supplier of insulation seconds who sold me about 4 times the amount of insulation for the same price. This stuff was actually thicker than the building regs requirement but that did not affect the build. I could accomodate the extra thickness without a problem.

Bagged materials. How many of you have seen split bags of sand in DIY stores with 50p knocked off? What a joke that is! It never ceases to amaze me that people actually buy a split bag of cement for £2.39 when a clean bag is there for £2.89. I am also asonished that people would even contemplate buying split bags of plaster - it takes very little in the way of contamination to render a bag of plaster unusable.

My advice with split bags is to ask the manager to knock 50% off the price or don't buy it. B and Q often end up with a large number of these that they become desparate to shift and offer them for 50p each. If you only need a few bags of sand that's great value. OK so it still ads up to more than I would pay loose but if you only want a 25kg bag of it, pay as little as possible for it.

My favourite type of split bag is a split dumpy bag of sand from a builders merchant. They sometimes come accross them in the yard where a forklift truck has collided with them and they are split. Again, if you are prepared to shovel the contents into a trailer the yard forman may encourage the branch manager to give it to you or sell it to you for a huge discount. I have had 3 tonnes of aggregate FOC in this way, though my trailer is large enough for them to load it straight on:D

There are plenty of other situations where seconds will suffice.

As well as seconds there are also ex display options. I purchased an ex display kitchen from a large DIY chain a few years ago. It was at 50% of their retail price, so I got a huge range of units and worktop etc for around £400. I was pleasently surprised to find out that the store had decided to avoid removing the units from the display and just swap the old doors for ones from the new range. Hence I got the new unused units and the old ex display doors!

Prices and purchase costs

I mentioned this in passing earlier but it's worth considering the following.

1) It does not always follow that builders merchants are cheaper than DIY stores. B and Q are often cheaper than Travis Perkins, despite my havin an account with TP.
2) Mail order tends to be cheaper than most other sources, though this is not always the case.
3) For large purchases I shop around and haggle with the merchants. Most branches of merchants are what are known as profit centres, so branches of the same chain will often compete against each other. Builders can save/make £00s in a few hours by shopping around. My local BM offer me lower prices for power tools than most internet based suppliers, after I complain about the prices they offer everyone else!
4) Opening and using accounts gets a closer working relationship with suppliers. Even if you only buy a few £00 worth of stuff a year - open an account.
5) When you get good service - write to the HQ of that chain and thank them. This works especially with builders merchants

Waste Disposal

If this is likely to cost you a few quid it is worth thinking of the following.

Sort your waste. Mine is separated into the following:
1) Rubble and earth etc
2) Wood
3) Metal, then subsorted into type.
4) Reusable

If you are hiring skips you will pay less if you do not mix rubble with other materials. This is because this approach will save the operator hving to sort out your rubbish.

I cut up waste wood for firewood but you can offer it FOC on Freeads or Freecycle.org etc

I store my scrap metal until there is enough to justify a trip to the scrap yard, but there is the option of calling a rag and bone man to take it away for you.

I tend to get rid of rubble etc by finding people who are filling holes or voids in their gardens. Again, I justify a trailer on the basis that I can take it to them, but people may be happy to come and get it. Why not advertise it in Freecycle etc?

I have sold items that have been removed from prpoerties in the past. The obvious are architectural features, but surprising successes include a couple of metal windows, a calor gas water heater and some larder doors, one of which had succummed to a rat at some point. In addition a complete bathroom suite in champange made £20 that went back into the projet. Though I would normally be happy to see it reused via freecycle.

A few such items have been reused in the property.

babyangel10

Blimey Hugo, you have been busy! Don't know how you found the time to type all that, but what a very informative post!

Thanks - will be very useful for my forthcoming extension!

HugoSP

One other think I forgot about last night.

Focus do a 10% Home Movers discout card. You basically need to prove to them that you've moved house, and the card is valid for 6 months from date of issue. I used this to great effect when I bought that ex display kitchen.

IIRC they would need a solicitors letter confirming the move, or a tenancy agreement etc.

If there are any builders out there that have further experiences, lets hear them!

HugoSP

gertybertyangel wrote:

Blimey Hugo, you have been busy! Don't know how you found the time to type all that, but what a very informative post!

Thanks - will be very useful for my forthcoming extension!

The main thing is to think laterally.

1) Do you need to pay the current prices for the materials?

2) Are there any other sources for materials? Freecycle is a good bet here. I have managed to get a few bits via Freecycle.

I have also offered to deal with left over materials on sites etc. Whilst builders may be happy to take back surplus bags of cement or blocks, they may be less than enthusiastic about taking the trouble to transport half a dumpy bag of sand. They'll have no way to load half a tonne in a bag onto their van, and the economics of shovelling it into bags may not stack up for them. They will probably shovel it into the skip!

Think how you appoach them. My approach is usually to ask the foreman if he would like my help in disposing of surplus materials at the end of the job

edthedead

My best tip is to buy rubble sacks from the pound shop or market stalls, they tend to be alot cheaper than from the DIY places

Eyesparky

Excellent article ... should be really helpful on my endless renovation project. Particularly liked the damaged plasterboard tip. Thanks.

bobsa1

I always look at the returns/end of ranges in b&Q. My big store has sinks, basins, toilets etc in all the time. Just got a current range basin (order only one) for £40 instead of £200- put it with a cheaper loo and bath and still get a designer touch.

Ask for discount! local tile place I go too does great discount but only if you ask!

HugoSP

At the risk of hijacking my own thread....:D

Left over mortar or concrete after a job: what do you do with it?
a) sling it, it's no use to anyone and if it sets in the wrong place then it's a nuicance
b) identify uses for the odd mixer end, such as patch rendering, scratch coating around such areas as new window reveals or blocked off doorways.

I do (b). I have yet to revisit the render on my property as a whole but I do know that some small areas will definitely need a scratch coat, so they get it a little sooner than planned

HugoSP

On the point of bathrooms, I have done very well by using nice taps on a cheap suite. The taps make the suite look more expensive and don't cost a fortune either. The cheap but functional basin taps that came with that suite have been used for a client. I found out the price of them at a builders merchant and charged accordingly. The bath taps will probably suffer a similar fate.

I'm currently looking at the following that was removed from a house undergoing renovation as it will be insalled in our own house soon.

£3k designer bathroom suite - Ideal Standard Sottini CW bath, sink, pedistal, loo and bidet.
Good quality cloackroom suite including hand painted hand basin with stripped pine unit underneath and designer taps.
Ceramic 1 and a half bowl kitchen sink that we are keeping for the new utilit room - we have a much better sink for the kitchen
Designer brushed aluminium light fittings
2 good quality carpets in reasonable colours from bedrooms - due for rented accomodation.
1 gas fired Aga.

The cost to me for the above was £0. I did do a few favours for the owner in return and sent him some vintage port as a thankyou. There were other items in the house that friends needed and I uninstalled them for him.

The owner was keen for these to be removed because he knew that people could make use of them and that their removal would reduce his renovation costs. It stands to reason that if I removed these items and capped off the plumbing free of charge to him then the plumber would cost him less. So we all won.

The Aga needed to go in a hurry (long story) so I was loading it into my trailer within 2 hours of being asked to do just that

The kitchen sink is a Bulthaup unit that retails for a frightening amount. This was removed from another house having a new kitchen some years ago when the owner was going to get it binned! These now change hands on e bay for around £1500 a piece.

Whilst I am on the subject of kitchens...........

Relatives were having a new kitchen fitted but had a perfectly good 18mm carcase fitted kitchen. I agreed to tile their floor for them (paid of course ) but had to remove the kitchen first.

I spent the best part of the day removing the old kitchen and carefully transporting the units away in the van. A few weeks later it went into our rented flat. The kitchen in there was very definitely on borrowed time. The tenant thought Christmas had come early when an oak kitchen appeared piece by piece.

I bought new worktops, sink and an under sink cupboard. I didn't even try to salvage the old. The unit below the sink is almost always ready to be written off, the worktops are always cut different to the way you want them and the sink may or may not be what you want. In our case the sink was bonded so well to the worktop that my attemt to remove it snapped it. The relatives got a discount on the basis that the fitters did not have to remove the old kitchen!

This exercise got me thinking - there are several people out there having new kitchens fitted all the time. Sometimes the old kitchen really needs to be binned but sometimes they are perfectly servicable and would do great at another house if removed carefully. Quite often the owners cannot be bothered with trying to salvage it but would welcome its free removal with a view to paying the fitters less. A Quantity Surveyor or project manager looking to save the client's cash would jump at the chance.

If you go down this route I suggest you do the following:

1) Write off the under sink unit
2) Consider that the worktops may be unusable, unless they are granite or such like, in which case they could be reused or used elsewhere.
3) Be prepared to write off other pieces of the kitchen
4) Be aware that if you agree to remove it from someone elses house you are responsible for damage that may occur to the house upon its removal. Be very careful about gas, water and electrical services. These may render some cabinets unusable upon removal. I would not commit to such an agreement before assessing the kitchen for its value and suitability. I could not afford to spend a day removing a kitchen only to find I couldn't use it.

The same general rules apply to anything you may wish to remove from a house undergoing a refurbishment.

HugoSP

edthedead wrote:

My best tip is to buy rubble sacks from the pound shop or market stalls, they tend to be alot cheaper than from the DIY places

...or reuse the ones that the 25kg loads of aggregate come in.

We use anything from chicken feed bags to compost bags. If you're careful not to overload them they'll be easier to lift and they will last longer.

I have in the past used cement bags when I was desparate but they ned to be kept dry and they tend to be single use only, fine if you're going to the tip and can sling the whole lot.

That brings me onto another idea. Tips and scrap yards can be a very good source for these bags. People often chuck them out along with the rubbish.

Alternitively, if you want to splash out a bit you can get those Gorrila tubs from B and Q for around £3.50 each. Load 4 or 5 of them in the back of your car fully laden and that may be plenty depending on the size of car you have. When you get to the tip just heave them out between 2 of you and empty them into the relevent skip/pile.

Tips have been known to be a good source of one or two bits of building materials. I picked up 2 bags of cement that someone just wanted rid of, for nothing. The lads there were just happy to see it reused.

I also picked up 8 single plastic airbricks, unused, for £1.

ormus

there are real bargains everywhere if you look.

i got a 2 yr old baxi boiler off ebay for a quid!
i got a pallet of white wall tiles off ebay for 15 quid!
i was given a new white bath/sink from BQ.
got a new front door for nowt!
got a very good garage door for 25 quid. ebay again.
was given a newish gas fire. very smart too.
bought a very fancy marble fire surround for 100 quid. (the owner paid a 1000 for it!)

i live near the pilkington factory tiles shop. they are always selling off seconds or end of lines etc.. dirt cheap.

wickes is the cheapest for laminate. poor selection/choices though.
theres a company in north wales that supplies the big boys with laminate underlay. half the price of the BQ sheds etc.. they will supply you too.
(cant remember the name off hand).

large paving slabs off ebay a quid each. sometimes free off freecycle.
the list is endless.