Flat re-wire cost?

bennyj901

Hi there,

Gran lightened the mood this Christmas by having a moan about her flat. She has for the past few months been experiencing problems with the electric there, the "symptoms" as she puts it are as follows:
Oven tripping the whole supply and causing a complete "power cut"
Lights dimming
Kettle casting some issues with the lights in other rooms, when it finishes boiling the lights "flash"

We can't do much to help as we live quite far away, doing a tiny bit of research I discovered she may need a flat rewire. It is ground floor, 2 bedrooms, built around 1990's, in the £190,000 bracket price wise. For a flat it is quite big but smaller than a bungalow.

Apparently things you need to look out for are:
Cables being black rubber <--- check
Old fashioned fusebox <--- nope
Round light switches <--- nope
Wall mounted bathroom lights <---nope

I was just wondering if you guys think the rewire is needed and how much it should be, mainly because she is the perfect target for a con man, old widow, no family who live close and doesnt know the first thing about electrics.

Thanks for your help everyone!

Owain_Moneysaver

A 1990s flat should not need rewiring and if she is getting 'tripping' she at least has an RCD on the consumer unit. The cables won't be black rubber - that hasn't been used since the 1940s. (The internal wiring colours will be black and red rather than blue and brown.)

Oven tripping the RCD could be a failing element especially if it trips when cold, or it could be a build up of dirt and grease around the element or fan terminals.

Lights dimming and brightening when the kettle clicks off suggests a poor connection at the consumer unit, or possibly the meter or service fuse.

This should be checked by an electrician as a poor connection could overheat and start a fire.

The electrician may recommend a new consumer unit as having the lights on the same RCD as the sockets is now deprecated and does create a falling risk, but (a) this is a ground floor flat, so presumably no internal stairs (b) an emergency light or two are a lot cheaper and also are easy to fit adjacent to existing lights if they're looped in at the ceiling roses.

bennyj901

Thank you my friend, she has used a trusty electrician for years now, just though a rewire would be too much for the guy. Will book him in ASAP.
Thanks again!