First-time house renovation

FreeBear

Gwendo40 wrote: »

£25k and £20k respectively for a mid range kitchen and bathroom?!... Somebody has seen you coming if they're the kind of prices you've paid!

My kitchen came in at around £1500, but I did all the work and skipped the gold plated fittings.

phoebe1989seb

spadoosh wrote: »

Depends what youre after.

Taps can be £10 or £300. [STRIKE]Or even £700 - although the retail price was £900[/STRIKE]


Im pretty certain if i went in your respective kitchens i could very easily tell a difference in quality. It really depends if you work to a budget or a standard.

We like [STRIKE]expensive[/STRIKE] high quality stuff. But only spent around £6k on in-frame cabinets (handpainted - by yours truly) and waited for a great deal on iroko worktops and a half price Bertazzoni range, so splurged on a tap with a silly price tag, lol!


DH built our island at a fraction of the price we'd have paid had we bought from the same place our cabinets came from.

spadoosh

My comparison where in relation to a fitted kitchen that cost about £6k and a fitted kithen that cost about £20k. Should be pretty clear there will be a difference in spec and quality.

When i did my bathroom i got a few quotes to see how much i was saving myself. The cheapest for what i wanted came in at £10k. We (mainly the better half) had to put up with varying stages of development over two years but i saved myself £7.5k. Ive still not got round to fitting the bath panel because its not got to a price im willing to pay (its a pretty bespoke bath so the panel isnt standard). Contemplated cladding or boarding it but i do like the panel so just going to see if it ever drops in price.

phill99

I fit kitchens and bathrooms for a living.


For a 'turn key' solution, you will be looking at £20 - £25k for a complete mid range kitchen (inc units, tiles, electrics, plumbing etc). Allow £10k for a bathroom on then same basis. En-suite: £7k - £8k. Central heating: £5 - £7k. Carpetting: £3-£4k.


So Cakeguts is right. Allow £60k and you will be about right.

ssmforumbuddy

Thanks, everyone for the response. I know it's very vague at this stage. Just want to get an idea from the forum. I'm looking for a mid-range kitchen and bathroom. My budget is around 20k. Now am wondering :O
What specifications I need to put to get a well-estimated quote.
Am thinking stuff like Size of the room, some details of the work that I want, range of materials..
Anything else?

ScottishSaver14

Hiya,

Echoing what others have said about estimates, you're just going to have to get quotes. However as someone buying a house and going through this process of a mini refurb, here's my 2 cents.

1. Kitchen: Full refurbishment to build a good modern kitchen

This can wait. No point doing a job you're not happy with a replacing it in 5 years. Wait a while and do it when you can afford what you want. It will also give you time to consider how best to use the space if the current layout isn't working.

2. Bathroom: Full refurbishment

As above. Unless you can't flush the loo or there's black rings in the bath. If it REALLY needs done, get a suite online and employ a fitter.

3. Converting the W/C and attached storage to an ensuite kind bath & shower enclosure

Again, can wait.

4. Converting the warm air heating to gas heating and installing the combi boiler

This is an example of if you're going to do something, do it straight away. This will likely involve some wall work so could get messy.

5. Converting the open staircase to closed and carpeted

Do this at the start too after the heating.


______

Ideas:

If there is anything else you feel like you'll never get around to once your furniture is in, put that on your phase one list. Eg. Look up- is there any artex you'd rather get rid of? It might not bother you now, but in 10 years it might! While the plasterer is in after youve had the heating sorted, he could address that too.

Good luck

Gwendo40

phill99 wrote: »

I fit kitchens and bathrooms for a living.


For a 'turn key' solution, you will be looking at £20 - £25k for a complete mid range kitchen (inc units, tiles, electrics, plumbing etc). Allow £10k for a bathroom on then same basis. En-suite: £7k - £8k. Central heating: £5 - £7k. Carpetting: £3-£4k.


So Cakeguts is right. Allow £60k and you will be about right.

Fair play to you if they're the kind of prices you can get away with charging for a 'mid-range' kitchen or bathroom... you must have an ability to find some very naive and gullible people to charge those prices though.

babyblade41

I live in SE Oxfordshire so fairly expensive area and doing a refurb.

I have a budget because I will only be staying for approx 5 years so I don't want to pay silly money

I'm knocking down a porch and extending the kitchen, this is necessary as the house just doesn't flow right . To get to the dining room you have to walk through the living room to get to it from the kitchen.

The builder will build the room and obviously do the plumbing and electrics, everything else including fitting the units ,tiling and decorating will be DIY

Same as the bathroom , I'll supply the suite and he just has to fit it oh and tile the floor

If you have a budget then you have to be prepared to do a lot yourself and don't get a builder who can start straight away. I have been waiting for mine and he won't be ready until September .

Doozergirl

Gwendo40 wrote: »

Fair play to you if they're the kind of prices you can get away with charging for a 'mid-range' kitchen or bathroom... you must have an ability to find some very naive and gullible people to charge those prices though.

First rule is to be nice to people.

Perhaps your budget doesn't stretch that far, or you have a differing idea of what mid-range is, but I have managed jobs with Ikea kitchens and also with £70k bespoke kitchens and £40k on bathroom sanitary ware and tiles in one bathroom. It certainly isn't about being gullible or naive at all in the mid-market. People have differing expectations and budgets and people are also allowed to earn a living providing quality work and product.

A genuinely 'mid range' kitchen from a mid-range supplier, with all of the associated building work and mid-range flooring will easily cost as much as Phill says.

A bathroom is a proper building job and even with decent contract range fittings with some expectation of actually lasting will cost upwards of £5k. A mid range one, yes, £10k easily too.

As it is, we don't know what the OPs idea of mid range is. With a budget of £20k for everything, it probably isn't what those of us in the sector would call mid-range.

Davesnave

Doozergirl wrote: »

A bathroom is a proper building job and even with decent contract range fittings with some expectation of actually lasting will cost upwards of £5k. A mid range one, yes, £10k easily too.

That's a comfort. We researched really well, budgeted about £6k and spent nearer £8k, trying to make things 'middling' in quality.


Now, if I could only like it too! :rotfl: