Architect fee for kitchen/diner extension

minibbb

Evening folks

We have just bought our 1930s three bed semi in East Sussex and wish to do a kitchen/diner extension. It will involve knocking the kitchen and diner in together and extending about 2-3 metres out the back. Nothing too jazzy- just a modern open plan kitchen diner with bifolds to the garden.

I contacted a local architect firm today for a quote and received this breakdown of costs- I nearly had a fit!

"Firstly you will need an existing measured survey of the property to create scale plans and elevations of the house. This information will be needed for any design work and will be a requirement of any Planning Application further down the line. On your behalf we can seek quotes from survey companies we have used previously, or indeed do it ourselves if time permits. We anticipate the fee for this survey to be in the order of £700.00 ex vat.

After the measured survey is completed, the next step would be for us to prepare feasibility sketch designs, indicating options for tackling your brief. This would include some 3d visualisations to help you understand the building's appearance. We would issue you our report and meet with you, to discuss and refine if required, before freezing the design. Our fee for the Feasibility Stage of works would be £1,950.00 ex vat.

Following your instruction to proceed. This would then be drawn up formally in readiness for making a Planning Application. We would then prepare all necessary supporting documents, submit and monitor the Planning Application to its determination. To address your brief, based on the project size and work involved, Our fee for Planning Stage of works would be £1,250.00 ex vat. FYI our planning fee would ordinarily be lower on a standard application, however for a conservation Area Application further information needs to be provided, in this instance a Design & Access statement will need to be prepared.

Our fees exclude usual disbursements and Local Authority fees which include for a Planning Application (£172), Ordnance Survey Plan required for planning (£30) & Mileage.

For your information and as you may already be aware, there are further work stages required to construct any tabled design. At the very least you will need to have drawings prepared, a Building Regulations submission made and approved to ensure the works were compliant. This information would be the minimum a contractor would need to provide you with a price, however this would mean that the contractor will be making a large number of assumptions on finishes and details. For your information, you will need to employ a structural engineer and an approved inspector (Building Regulation compliance) at this stage and again we can assist with this if needed."



So pretty much 5K before a brick has even been laid (we wanted to spend 30k tops inc the kitchen and bifolds)

Now I had it in mind architect fees would be sub 1k.... am I barking up the wrong tree or is the above quote just crazy?

Furts

I imagine you have gone to a Chartered Architects large practice for this quote. Or one with nice offices. You will be paying large overheads. It is also possible that they are not really interested in your work.

You know what you want so the feasibility meetings, the report and 3D drawings would be a waste of time and money.

£840 for a survey for an extension is a lot of money. I suspect you could find a surveyor cheaper than this by some margin.

Seek a technician, or architectural designer, or similar title and the costs should be much lower.

System

Sub 1k for a registered, insured architect is probably wishful thinking but 5k is way over the odds.
The survey is expensive imo - if it's a huge complex house 800 maybe but even then that's not cheap!
The feasibility/design stage wouldn't be so bad of there wasn't a separate fee for preparing the planning application.
It may be that your budget is unrealistic for the area and/or they have identified complexity that you haven't but speak to some others in your local area to get an idea

Keith99

I have recently got some plans drawn up for a 1930 semi for £550

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5510746

It didn't go into the detail you mentioned above but it has got through planning and I'm happy.

minibbb

Really helpful replies, thanks guys! This was a standalone firm and not a chain so was shocked at the quote.

Have been given a couple of independent architect's numbers so shall get cracking.

Great thread Keith99 thanks! Lots of super ideas there

Furts

minibbb wrote: »

Really helpful replies, thanks guys! This was a standalone firm and not a chain so was shocked at the quote.

Have been given a couple of independent architect's numbers so shall get cracking.

Great thread Keith99 thanks! Lots of super ideas there

But do not be under illusions here. Keith99 has no dimensions, so survey may not have been undertaken. These drawings then need to be worked on to produce Buildings Regulations. You will need a structural engineering input for your bifolds, you need a specification, documentation and a contract. Then there are the fees for Planning and Regulations.

You may be building over drains - more investigation required.

All this costs so a budget of say £2000 would be needed.

Keith99

Furts wrote: »

But do not be under illusions here. Keith99 has no dimensions, so survey may not have been undertaken. These drawings then need to be worked on to produce Buildings Regulations. You will need a structural engineering input for your bifolds, you need a specification, documentation and a contract. Then there are the fees for Planning and Regulations.

You may be building over drains - more investigation required.

All this costs so a budget of say £2000 would be needed.

Yeah I don't disagree but for basic plans to get through planning. On top of this I need SE calcs £300 for two, building regs £400 i'm budgetting £1.5k for it all.

marc81

Keith99 wrote: »

Yeah I don't disagree but for basic plans to get through planning. On top of this I need SE calcs £300 for two, building regs £400 i'm budgetting £1.5k for it all.

I had a similar experience to you Keith, the architect I have used is fully registered but is a partner in a large Construction and Property Consultants and just does a few smaller jobs like mine on the side. I paid the following for our extension which is a first floor side extension to go above our existing ground floor extension (approx 4.5m x 4m);

Architect - £600, this included full measure of house, plans (which were changed a few times) and liaising with council re application and regs.
Structural Engineer - £140 for steel calcs
Planning permission fee - £175
Building Regs Fee - £175

I just have to pay a further £430(ish) to building control for site inspection etc. as the build hasn't started yet, will be starting in a couple of weeks.

Marc

somethingcorporate

Those costs are insane!

I had a couple of large quotes so I decided to do it myself. Similar to you, knocking together some rooms and an extension on the side. Worked closely with the planning dept, it took a few weeks to get it right but saved a lot of money.

It took a couple of days to do on the computer (I used microsoft excel to do my scale drawings!).