I've decided to call it the money pit!

[Deleted User]

kwmlondon wrote: »

Mine was built in 1989!!!! I am aghast that it was so badly maintained, and fitted out to such a low standard that it will need such a drastic overhaul within the next few years. I mean, why install such small pipes for the central heating in the first place? Why put in a hot water tank system at all? How can so much of the lighting be shot?!!! A home less than 25 years old should not need rewiring!

That sounds just like my house... Built in 1989, single glazed wooden windows rotting away, lights that come on when they feel like it (once very few months in the lounge and not a all in the hall. Damp and mould in the downstairs toilet. Sealed in waste pipes that block up. Very few electrical sockets and poorly positioned. Poorly designed layout downstairs, you have to walk through the lounge to get from the dining room to the kitchen. Low pitched roof so any loft conversion is out of the question. No where to hang your coats or put shoes and pram etc downstairs as the hall is too narrow because of the downstairs toilet. Upstairs bathroom is bigger than it needs to be so makes the second bedroom smaller than it could be.
I've seen 3 bedroom semis built to a lot better design and standard from the 70s.
I do like my house but it should have been built better.

kwmlondon

societys_child wrote: »

Microbore was popular around that time.

It was 1989 - and many people prefer it, the bath fills much quicker compared to a combi.

You've not said what's wrong. Is it just the fittings need replacing? What's wrong with the wiring?

So it doesn't need rewirng then?

Not particularly unusual.

Don't know what fuses they are but a new CU isn't really expensive.

There are two light fittings in the living room that have 190v instead of 240. There is power going TO them but the neutral has been severed somewhere in the walls. Had to bury them in the plaster. One of the light fittings in the kitchen periodically blows the whole downstairs lighting. You'll be sitting there doing nothing with the light on and BANG you have to go and reset the fuse. I've changed the light fitting and checked the switch- someone must have nailed through a wire somewhere or a mouse has chewed a wire, but without ripping the ceiling and wall open no chance of finding the fault so I've disconnected it at the switch and the fitting and buried that in the ceiling as well. There is a whole circuit to power the imersion heater... except it doesn't. There's a switch in the kitchen and a fuse on the fuse box labeled, but the immersion heater takes its power from the upstairs ring main. I know, because when you turn it on it blows the whole upstairs ring main not the fuse for the immersion heater.

I have the house functioning but there lights missing so while the place functions, it's been messed up.

If you consider that the place needs a new heating system with new pipes it makes sense to live with the place as it is and save money by doing the whole place in one big hit in a couple of years.

Size66

Been in 1 yr and still need new kitchen and its a big one. New boiler an radiators . New floor covering in 2 bedrooms. Complete redecorating as previous owners where heavy smokers. What have we done in a year? New bathroom refurbished. Painted throughout.New flooring in master bedroom.u.p.v.c. front and
back doors. New lights. Underfloor insulation in one room.glittering fixed.and the best move yet......New multifuel stove. Haven't used any gas since April! We have a edwardian house so there's lots of history to look after moral of the mail is keep at it

Prothet_of_Doom

You take the wrong approach.

Plan of attack, should be sympathetic renovation.

The biggest hassle is a rewire in my oppinion, as every room will need redecorating.

Lets say rewiring it is £2K. Saved £200 a month for 1 year. Then have it done. Do no Redecorate yet

Lets say new heating is £2K. Do this year 2

Lets say DIY kitchen is £2K Year 3

Then start with one room at a time, Redecorate, 1 room per season.

That's year 4 and 5.

Then the Bathroom Year 6.

You say it's just about livable in, so just prioritise and make a plan. In 6 years it will be perfect, and you'll have spent £12K.

moneyistooshorttomention

Must admit to hollow laugh at figures mentioned there. My house is right now undergoing a substantial amount of electrical work and it will be around about £1,800 and I don't think it constitutes a "rewiring" as such and its only a small house (2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom). That is swopping a fuseboard for a circuit breaker board, putting in some extra power points and a cooker point and chasing some existing sockets and their wiring back into the walls properly basically. In the process the electrician has found a lot has been cobbled-together over the years and I only have one electric circuit in the place, so he's sorting out the bodge-ups.

Kitchen £2,000! I wish. Maybe for buying pretty cheap units for a pretty small kitchen and putting them in yourself possibly....

New heating £2,000. I wish again. I've kept existing pipework and some of the existing radiators and its more like double that.

I think kw is much like me and "wants it done now" and I fully sympathise with that.

Sorry you've found the house was such a "bombsite" kw after all your hassles managing to complete purchasing the place in the first place.

Hope it works out well for you and there's no more "unexpected discoveries" of the unwanted variety.

I would tend to agree with your plans to try and make it basically surviveable for now and save up to do things properly, rather than do a half-hearted job and waste time and money on that meanwhile. I wish you more joy than I've had on some points. To date, re the electrics I've found they could have started a fire once and currently could electrocute me if I'm not careful...don't suppose there would be any chance of me communicating via a medium to try and get someone to sue the vendor if I had been electrocuted......

kwmlondon

Well, we have basically made it totally livable.

It's okay, but it's all on the edge of needing proper re-doing.

The problem is that doing ANYTHING is majorly disruptive. If we work on one room, moving all the stuff out makes the whole of the rest of the house a bombsite so there is no way on this earth we're going to be able to do it room-by-room.

It's got a new kitchen that looks nice enough, but it's temporary. The whole thing cost less than a grand and when you first see it, it's okay, but like everything else in the house it's a solution to see us through the next couple of years.

If you came and saw our house now you'd wonder what I'm fussing about. It looks perfectly okay. But I know what's going on under the surface. The heating, wiring, flooring etc.

There's lino covering the tiles on the bathroom floor.

Fine for now, but the whole bathroom needs replacing and that's not just a case of new tiles, removing the tiles will take the plasterboard with them so it will need new plasterboard, plastering, ceiling etc. etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.etc. etc. etc. etc.


It will be okay, but when we tackle it we'll do the lot. Bang. One single go. Move out for a month and rip it right back.

new_owner

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

My house is right now undergoing a substantial amount of electrical work and it will be around about £1,800 and I don't think it constitutes a "rewiring" as such and its only a small house (2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom). That is swopping a fuseboard for a circuit breaker board, putting in some extra power points and a cooker point and chasing some existing sockets and their wiring back into the walls properly basically. In the process the electrician has found a lot has been cobbled-together over the years and I only have one electric circuit in the place, so he's sorting out the bodge-ups.

that seems very expensive...

Rovver125

kwmlondon wrote: »

If you came and saw our house now you'd wonder what I'm fussing about. It looks perfectly okay. But I know what's going on under the surface. The heating, wiring, flooring etc.

That's exactly what ours is like! On the surface it seems ok, but after living here for a few months, we know how much extra there is to do that we hadn't accounted for. We were chuffed with the price we got the place for at the time, but if we'd known what we know now, we'd have been offering 5-10k less & if they'd rejected the offer, we'd probably have walked away!

Currently looking into possibly taking legal action against the previous owner over the heating system, as they have lied on the property info form & neighbour has confirmed what really went on & agreed to give a statement. Don't want to end up throwing good money after bad though & need to weigh up the options carefully. The one positive thing we've taken from it is that it gives us the chance to install a more modern, more efficient system which in the long run will hopefully pay for itself.

Loads to think about at the moment, but we're trying to stay positive, look to the future & imagine what a cracking house we could turn this into! Just going to cost more then we envisaged!

Being able to do as much as possible yourself helps. We need a full rewire, but I've already discussed with the electrician doing all the donkey work for him, i.e. chasing out walls, fitting sockets, pulling in cables etc, which he has agreed to as long as it's all left exposed prior to connecting it all up & he agreed that it's going to vastly reduce the amount it will cost us.

It's just finding the time to do these things when you're working 60+ hours a week to pay for it all!

Stay positive KWM, one day we'll have beautiful houses to be proud of & look back & laugh at all the issues we faced!!

moneyistooshorttomention

...and one day I'm going to come across an old person who bought a house needing a lot of work..and then went on to do that work.

No wonder house renovation seems to be a young - middle-aged persons game....

I've come to the conclusion that once you get to the Old Age Agegroup (ie 70 plus) that you only ever move to a brand new place or, possibly, to a house needing work but you don't do much (if any) of that work.

I don't think I could tackle all the work on the house I've just bought if I were even 10 years older (and, anyway, would start calculating what my "return on investment" would be if I had entered the Old Age Agegroup and might think twice).

The last owner of my current house must have been in her 70s when she bought it and all she did (as far as I can tell) was swop the kitchen and bathroom (and both of them were cheap/badly-planned/badly-installed). Bit of a difference to someone like myself, as I intend everything to be modern/decent-quality/perfect.

katejo

I have never been in the position to simply rip everything out and pay builders etc. to perfect it before I moved in. It all happens bit by bit and is mostly funded by having a lodger (and the current low mortgage interest rate). I have been in my current house nearly 8 years. Gradually over that time I have had various jobs done including a new fuse box, living room repainting, new lead flashings on the roof , garden fencing, stairs/landing redecoration and a new kitchen. I want a new fireplace/gas effect fire but that is still waiting together with a few other things. I decide on the next project, save the money and the get it done.