£67,031.92 is a frightening number indeed....

FacelessNumber

Hi TOPM

I don't usually comment but I read along regularly

With regard to IKEA kitchens I have only heard good things about the quality, although I don't know how they last. We got our initial designs done at IKEA which was good, there were a couple things that meant they weren't for us:
The gaps at the back of the cupboard and at the bottom of the cupboard are smaller than standard kitchens (80mm at the bottom rather than 160, I can' t remember the measurement for the back). This means plinth heaters won't fit underneath if that's part of your plan, also if the walls are uneven (ours are - with a 4cm difference from one side of the room to the other) then it's more difficult, although not impossible to get a good fit as there isn't as much leeway for the joiner to cut away at the back of the cupboard.
The only other thing for us is that they don't do any full height larder units which we definitely wanted, so we ended up going with someone else (more expensive though!)

I would say their designers were great, and we didn't book we just walked in and they saw us within half hour (easily spent in the IKEA restaurant!)

Also with regards building regs, you should be able to find out the cost on your councils website, we recently had some done for structural work and it wasn't as expensive as we were expecting.

Finally with a structural engineer - make sure they actually look at everything they need to - we offered to expose more of the beam for ours when he was round and he said we didn't need to then got half of it wrong. Luckily our builder liaised with him and got it sorted for no extra cost (and we got a partial refund) but according to our builder it's a common problem which could lead to delays - our job took a week longer than planned in the end.

Hope these bits were useful for you, having just gone through a while renovation process including holding our house up with lots of extra steel and a full new kitchen design and remodel I thought I'd weigh in fr once!

Treadingonplaymobil

Week 67: Day 6

Morning!

Thanks for all the advice Facelessnumber, Suffolklass, mfmaybe, Verbatim and Hannh (and JoJoC for sharing the five week month pain ).

We are planning to completely rein in the architect's ambitions re quantity surveyors etc. I like the idea of the online quantity surveying option to give us a rough price estimate, and it's not terribly expensive (£400 total for the architect and the estimate), as it will give us a ballpark to compare quotes against and an indication of whether we need to make major revisions, but we are clamping down further on all his other plans for our money! Once we've got the final plans in a few weeks I'm going to get friend's husband (or other friend's FIL - also a builder, and has his own company so will hopefully quote for real when it comes to it) round for a chat.

DH and I just couldn't get excited about the Ikea kitchens yesterday. We both agreed we'd rather just have a couple of units like this and a cheap larder from the local charity furniture shop, and get something better in a couple of years. But will look into the bespoke finishes for ikea kitchens before abandoning the idea totally.

DC3 spent the early hours this morning vomiting everywhere, we think due to pigging out totally in the ikea cafe. Sadly our boiler broke down yesterday (plumber came out yesterday and is returning with a part this afternoon to fix it, thank goodness), so getting her clean after each puke has been a bit epic. All saucepans pressed into service! And we ran out of laundry powder, so I have two sets of sheets, pyjamas and towels to wash. Fun times.

To do yesterday
1. Clear the ironing. Really do it this time! Down to one (packed full) basket now. Done, hurrah!
2. Make some biscuits for playdate. Might attempt the freezer biscuit thing again, since DH won't be here to cook them all while I'm not looking :rotfl: . Made them then playdate cancelled. Biscuits for us this weekend!
3. Menu plan - we have so much food in the cupboards, so should be more of a top up of fruit and veg and dairy this weekend. Done, need to shop this morning.
4. Find a campsite for next weekend. Whoops.
5. Check through contract work for the following week so I don't need to think about it over half term. Not quite finished, only needs 15 minutes spent on it.

To to today
1. Food shopping.
2. Make sourdough.
3. Go through extension stuff and make a list of amendments for final drawings.
4. Check contract work for next week.

Mini goals:
- £36.21/30 May rounding down pot.
- £2,455.31/£5,000 2018 debt repayment goal.
- £26.73 daily earning goal.

Suffolk_lass

Ugh. Vomit. Norovirus here one Christmas. Never forgotten. Enough of that. Not sure if you have caught up elsewhere on here but poor XSpender - her DH lost his job this week. Time for metaphoric hugs I think...

MatyMoo

Just my two penneth on kitchens.

Cheap is OK and can be made to look like a £30,000 kitchen, but you need a really good fitter.

I went for cheap, integrated, appliances with the view that when they broke I would replace with better quality, in 10 years the only thing that broke was the dish washer! And when they are hidden behind doors nobody knows the make anyway

You can always go down the cheap doors route and then change them down the line too.

If you want a slide out larder unti, it is better to be wide and short, rather than tall and narrow.

The slidey things for corner units are great, but can waste a lot of space. I have two corners and once the first slidey thing was fitted decided not to have the second one put in.

Granite worktops are worth their money and look as good as New Years down the line, but you can get away with the cheapest for now and replace it when funds allow.

I viewed a house with units like the IKEA shelves, but some closed cupboards too, and quite liked it. But my sister pointed out that they could be dust catchers and things not used regularly would need washing before use.

Sorry to go on!

System

Look at Howdens Joinery for kitchens , I know they have a depot in Bristol so must cover South West. I agree about ikea kitchens didn't overwhelm me either , mine is from the above .

Good luck with everything on the build.

dangers

Cumbria_lass wrote: »

Look at Howdens Joinery for kitchens , I know they have a depot in Bristol so must cover South West.

They definitely cover the area near Bristol - two come to mind immediately near me and I’m just west of Bristol (but before the water!).

Ours is a howdens kitchen and looks good. I wouldn’t use their appliances though - my mum has an oven from them and isn’t overly impressed.

enthusiasticsaver

We will be having a new Howdens kitchen this Autumn. The time to buy is September/october when they have their sale on. The discounts you get at that time are incredible apparently.

JWPopps

Ooooh TOPM your diary is helping me learn LOADS for when I!!!8217;m ready for my new kitchen!!!

Honeysucklelou2

Howdens are all over the SW but you'll need to find someone with a trade account to be able to purchase....

System

Can't sleep and remembered Stax as well for kitchens. They have a place in Bristol as well, but depends how far away you are .

Howdens will be no problem you will have a builder who will have trade accounts a lot of places.

Best get to bed again.