(cough...splutter...) is this right???

Gotta

Hi

We have just had an offer accepted on our first place (I am now 42 and can now only afford my first place). We are in North London. The place we have is small an we are thinking of extending. We have had a few quotes which have blown my head off...please tell me if I am out of touch or them!!! It is a 3 bed typical semi...

Dormer hip to gable 3 quotes: 60k, 38k, 48k

3m back extension 4 quotes: 65k, 70k, 32k, 55k, 67k

All of this is inclusive of labour, materials, plumbing, electrics, plastering and installment of kitchen.

Is this what we should expect? They are so varied...who is right?

We let a bigger place go because we thought this option better--seems we were foolish...

Oh and full rewire and plumbing of house...30k...

bosseyed

Not sure on extension prices I'm afraid, but even in London 30k for a plumbing and electrical rewire seems pricey surely?

As a rough idea (Bristol 2008) I paid £2,500 for a full electrical rewire, and £3,300 for an entire heating system installed including all radiators pipework and new water feed from the road - so a full plumbing refit shouldn't really be massively more than that.

drummer_666

are all of them charging VAT?

that could be a factor in some of the big price differences

fluffpot

the biggest London rewire I have done was £10K and it was a huge house, so I think you need to look again at this price. Maybe get separate quotes for plumbing and electric?

I would say average for a medium house would be £5- 6K = but lot depends on your specification

keystone

Rule of thumb. When you get 5 people to quote against the same specification for the work you discard the lowest and the highest on receipt of their quotations. Grounds? Oh yes well neither have understood the question you asked in the first place so might not be best positioned to execute the contract should they be given it.

Then evaluate and negotiate with the other three.

Cheers

drummer_666

keystone wrote: »

Rule of thumb. When you get 5 people to quote against the same specification for the work you discard the lowest and the highest on receipt of their quotations. Grounds? Oh yes well neither have understood the question you asked in the first place so might not be best positioned to execute the contract should they be given it.

Then evaluate and negotiate with the other three.

Cheers

hmmm, I had 4 quotes, ended up going for the cheaper one, he then cancelled on me as had too much work on. I got 2 new guys to quote me and I ended up going with one of these. He's actually the cheapest of the lot, but he is brilliant and knows exactly what I want and given me loadsa advice about other aspects that I'm not using him for

reggie_lampert

Hi there,

I live in South London and we were quoted £45k plus VAT for a loft conversion (gable). We ended up doing it ourselves which is taking an age but is done properly and looks amazeballs :j

I think my brother paid about £50k for his which was hip to gable but he had lots of problems with his builder.

You need to make sure you know what is and isn't included in the quotes as you don't want to get stung for more money later on. Are the quotes for 1st fix or for both 1st and 2nd? Are skips included?

When getting quotes from builders for our ground floor extension we wrote our own schedule of works which helped with keeping the costs from spiralling (but they still managed to screw us on a few things).

Are you sure you need the whole house replumbed and rewired?

Again we had 2 people say we need the whole house (3 bed Edwardian semi) rewired quoting £10k. But with the 3rd company (and the one with the best rep) they said the wiring was sound we just needed to bring certain things up to standard.

Hope this helps.