Knocking down walls/new kitchen/diner...where to start???

ellie27

We have been in our new home now 9 months. Never done any work to any of the houses we have previously lived in.

We have a dining room and separate kitchen, a doorway joins them and a wall too.

Ideally in our head we could (not,actually us! We mean builders!) ...

-knock down the wall between kitchen and dining room - this is a solid wall, an external wall as the kitchen was added as an extension about 15 yrs ago.

-knock down wall between cupboard and dining room, another solid wall.

Both walls will no doubt be load-bearing walls.

-also change a doorway- block up the door into the cupboard and move the entry doorway into new kitchen diner.

This would create a room of size 5.3m x 5m which we would hope to be big enough for a kitchen/diner area.

The external wall at the back currently just has a window, but we would like some kind of doors onto the garden.

And we would do a new kitchen too.

Where do we start? Do we need builders/joiners/plumbers/electricians.....?? Or do some builders do the lot?

Do we get the walls knocked down and doors put in by builders and then see what space we have then look at kitchens?

How do you tie it all in to get done at the same time?

Many thanks!

Silver-Surfer_2

Start with identifying the wall to make sure it's not load bearing.

ellie27

Silver-Surfer wrote: »

Start with identifying the wall to make sure it's not load bearing.

I would assume both are. One is the original exterior back wall of the bungalow 1930's. A kitchen extension has been added on. There is a huge upstairs loft conversion so I assume both walls are solid thick and load bearing. There are certainly not any hollow sounding walls either.

Silver-Surfer_2

You'll need a structural engineer then.

dirty_magic

We've just done this. We asked the surveyor that did our survey to recommend some local structural engineers and then got one of them to do the drawings, I think he charged about £300, but this might not be right! It was around that.

OH knows the builders we used. He knocked the walls out himself and propped them up to keep costs down, but we had the builders in to put the steels in. They quoted 2k to do everything except plastering, 2 steels, knock walls down, and waste removal, but charged £800 in the end as OH knocked them down and we already had a skip.

Don't forget to notify building control at the council. You have to pay a couple of hundred for that too but you'll need them to sign it off. Don't rely on builders to do it for you just in case they don't.

We had different tradesmen in for everything and arranged it ourselves because OH did a lot himself and we needed to keep costs down. You can find a builder who will get his own contractors in, but I imagine you'll pay a bit more.

I found it quite stressful getting people in at the right time tbh, so it depends whether you'd rather pay more for the convenience.

cyclonebri1

There are many small often one man companies that offer a full design and specification service a whole lot cheaper than a structural engineer or architect. These are often ex local government building inspectors etc.
They will help with design, draw plans give full technical spec and submits the info to the council for building regs.
You then get an approved set of drawings that can be supplied to the builder of your choice.

Any reputable builder will have his own set of reliable subies, let him project manage with his chosen trades on the job and that way it's his responsibility to sort all issues, ie, you only have one person to deal/negotiate with.

Do that and you only have to make 1 choice of worker, not 3 or 4, the knack is to coose a reliable contractor in the 1st place and they do actually exist;);)

edited to add;

Just read the post above, we both agree re the drawing up stage, but have both given you the 2 options with regard to getting the work actually done.
Given you orig post I went for the route I think you ought to go given you lack of experience, if it were me I would do exactly as the above poster said, including as much of the work possible myself.

Daniel7777

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cyclonebri1

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DRP

Daniel7777 wrote: »

Hello, moneysavingexperts,
Stumbled upon the great splashback . I think the greatsplashbak is the first thing you should thinnk about

I am actually currently looking for a splashback (a 'great' one).

cyclonebri1

DRP wrote: »

I am actually currently looking for a splashback (a 'great' one).

!!!!!! don't feed the troll
the idiots post has been removed, leave it.