New Home, Flooring help!

kittykat7210

Hello,

I just have a few questions about costs for flooring a new home. We are buying a new build property and its ready in September, it's our first house so we don't really know how much it will cost. When we move in the kitchen and bathrooms will already have flooring but nowhere else will. We are looking to laminate the hallway and carpet the lounge, stairs, landing and 3 bedrooms. My FIL can lay the laminate but I have no idea about how much it will cost to get the carpet fitted, and do they lay the grippers and underlay as well? and what about door dividers? We can buy the carpet/underlay/grippers for £900 (mid range carpet and underlay if that makes a difference to the cost of fitting), the lounge is 5.5m x 3.5M the main bedroom is 5.5m x 3m and the other 2 bedrooms are 3m x 3m, the landing is about 3m x 2m and the stairs are a standard size in a C shape, so with 2 turns. how much do you think it will cost to fit? and how do I go about finding a fitter, ideally I'd have the carpet done just after we complete ready for when we move in, so the fitter won't be able to see the property before we hire them (is that even possible?) just so we don't move all of our stuff in, just to have to move it out again when the carpets get fitted.

If anyone could help I would really appreciate it!

anto164

We had carpet fitted for approximately £55 for one room (4.2x4.2 room, so similar size), on the Wirral (North west)

Fitters provided and installed grips & door strips and was included in the above cost

Can't suggest on hallway, but i'd imagine around £250 for the whole lot.

In relation to the fitting - Just ask the carpet shop? We used a local independant carpet shopfor ours, and we paid their fitters directly on the day of fitting.

ST1991

You should be able to arrange for a carpet fitter to visit the house and measure up before you complete.
If it's still being built then perhaps it's unlikely to be able to do this right away, but you will need to check the house over before you exchange and complete in-case there is a problem - so you could get the carpet fitter to come with you then?

Alternatively are there any other houses on the development that are finished and have the same layout that you could ask for access to (e.g show house?)

You can source as many of the materials you want yourself and ask the fitter just to fit these - but if you make any ordering mistakes it will be delayed and be at the cost to yourself to put right.
If the fitter sources the carpet, underlay, grippers etc then it's their fault if they order it wrong and they will put it right.

If you have room dimensions you should be able to get a basic quote from some of the carpet shops for a ballpark idea, but then generally and independent fitter may be cheaper.

kittykat7210

Thank you for the replies, we are both complete novices at this kind of thing, we have a floorplan available, and are sourcing the carpets not from a shop due to the heavily inflated prices in the shops (the same carpet was almost twice the price in the shop!!) at the moment we are going off the floor plans, there is a show home but the people have said not to use this as a measuring guide due to possible differences in the sizes (confuses me how the same house can be different but there we go) it's currently a downstairs shell, we have a rough completion date but not a solid one and don't want to mess around a fitter, where do we find a fitter as well, do we just google it?

We were hoping to keep the fitting to under £300 but understand because of how much house there is (not huge but basically the whole house) it might not be the case!

Icecannon

Fitting should be under £300, a lot of fitters supply carpet, cheaper than a shop, they make more money than just fitting, so prefer to supply than just fit, worth getting a quote

I have just done what you are doing and wish I had just gone to a fitter to supply and fit, as taking delivery of carpet, storage, finding a fitter that is happy to just fit was a pain, and not worth the small saving.

Try and get a recommendation from a friend or try the nicf site for a fitter, failing that try Yell

But yeah the fitting price includes the grippers and door bars in most cases.

Furts

Its a while since I was involved in this with new build homes but builders I was with had a policy. You had to sign an agreed disclaimer regarding damage before handover. If so done the carpets could be fitted during the snagging stage. This meant on Completion Day one had a carpeted/floored house to the customers requirements.


Go speak with your builder and see what can be done. However accept some builders will not be keen - they want to sell floor coverings as part of their build and charge a good profit on this. Even so, it does not mean they will refuse if you persist - it depends on company policy.