How to fund garage conversion?

cannugec5

We have recently been discussing converting our garage, which is integral to the house, into a bedroom with accessible en suite. 

We are both pensioners so, essentially this is to future- proof our home. Joint Monthly income £3k 

We have no mortgage, nor out standing debt. But no savings either ( having cleared mortgage, car and personal loans), other than £5k premium bonds and some Abrdn shares ( approx £2K) .

I have two credit cards with, between them £23,000 of available credit. One is usually used for day to day spending and settled each month, but currently has an offer of 0% on  balance transfer and 0% money transfer.  other has an offer of 0% interest BT only. 

In any normal situation we would save up to pay for the conversion. However a relative has offered us free labour to undertake the work this summer. The major expense will be a new oil boiler to be installed outdoors ( heating engineer will quote) , and thereafter moving gas pipe-work ( yet to contact gas man re bottled gas). Other works except plastering will be undertaken by very competent and experienced relative. We know we will have a multitude of materials to pay for and are estimating £20k.

I did a quick look today for personal loans and got rejected from our own bank. My individual pension is too low and my husband is over 74 so too old. 

I am wondering how best to use and manipulate my available credit cards to fund this project. 

(I have no children, so no dependents, but nonetheless am reluctant to consider equity release. )

grumbler

cannugec5 said:

I have two credit cards with, between them £23,000 of available credit. One is usually used for day to day spending and settled each month, but currently has an offer of 0% on  balance transfer and 0% money transfer.  other has an offer of 0% interest BT only. 

0% for how long? Are you sure that you'll be able to clear the debt before 0% ends?

Also

• not full CC limit is available for money or balance transfers
• any provisional estimates of project costs tend to be overoptimistic, especially now

Also, I know little about oil boilers, but are you sure that 'outdoors' is a good place for yours?

cannugec5

0% offers are for 15 months. 

Yes exterior boiler is definitely doable. Existing indoor boiler is 16 years old so appropriate for replacement anyway. 

Section62

grumbler said:

Also, I know little about oil boilers, but are you sure that 'outdoors' is a good place for yours?

Fairly commonly done now - solves some of the issues with smell and noise.

Section62

cannugec5 said:

We have recently been discussing converting our garage, which is integral to the house, into a bedroom with accessible en suite.....

Before going too far down the road of financing, you should check you don't need planning consent.  You'll also need to get building regs sign off, which is achievable for DIY projects, but you'll need to ensure the person doing the work understands what is needed to comply with the regulations.

cannugec5

Section62 said:

cannugec5 said:

We have recently been discussing converting our garage, which is integral to the house, into a bedroom with accessible en suite.....

Before going too far down the road of financing, you should check you don't need planning consent.  You'll also need to get building regs sign off, which is achievable for DIY projects, but you'll need to ensure the person doing the work understands what is needed to comply with the regulations.

Yes, we have looked into that. No planning permission or building warrant required, but I do appreciate other eyes/ view points looking at this in case we have missed something. 

MikeJXE

cannugec5 said:

We have recently been discussing converting our garage, which is integral to the house, into a bedroom with accessible en suite. 

We are both pensioners so, essentially this is to future- proof our home. Joint Monthly income £3k 

We have no mortgage, nor out standing debt. But no savings either ( having cleared mortgage, car and personal loans), other than £5k premium bonds and some Abrdn shares ( approx £2K) .

I have two credit cards with, between them £23,000 of available credit. One is usually used for day to day spending and settled each month, but currently has an offer of 0% on  balance transfer and 0% money transfer.  other has an offer of 0% interest BT only. 

In any normal situation we would save up to pay for the conversion. However a relative has offered us free labour to undertake the work this summer. The major expense will be a new oil boiler to be installed outdoors ( heating engineer will quote) , and thereafter moving gas pipe-work ( yet to contact gas man re bottled gas). Other works except plastering will be undertaken by very competent and experienced relative. We know we will have a multitude of materials to pay for and are estimating £20k.

I did a quick look today for personal loans and got rejected from our own bank. My individual pension is too low and my husband is over 74 so too old. 

I am wondering how best to use and manipulate my available credit cards to fund this project. 

(I have no children, so no dependents, but nonetheless am reluctant to consider equity release. )

I'm 82 and the last thing I would do is take on debt at your age, It would be better to do it bit by bit as you can afford it.

You never know whats round the corner and if things go down hill the debt is harder to face 

cannugec5

I'm 82 and the last thing I would do is take on debt at your age, It would be better to do it bit by bit as you can afford it.

You never know whats round the corner and if things go down hill the debt is harder to face 

Thanks, but I’m not yet your age:) 
I’m considerably younger than my husband and we want to do this precisely because we don’t know what’s round the corner! 

We would like to have a ground floor bedroom with accessible bathroom. 

That means we can stay here, when we can no longer manage  the stairs. 

FreeBear

Some councils offer loans/grants if you can meet their criteria for financial assistance - Would be worth checking with them before running up a huge credit card bill.

At least with doing the work on a DIY basis, you don't have to foot the bill for all the materials in one go. This can be spread out as and when you need the stuff. But you need to sit down and plan exactly what needs doing, in what order, and then calculate the quantities of materials required. Break the project down in to smaller jobs, and shop for the materials needed for just that stage of work.

mi-key

Not sure how much of your budget is for the boiler, but if you are getting free labour then it shouldn't cost anywhere near £20K. If the garage is integral then it doesn't take a lot of materials to do the conversion. Might be worth costing it all out fully and then see what your options are

_Sam_

cannugec5 said:

Yes, we have looked into that. No planning permission or building warrant required, but I do appreciate other eyes/ view points looking at this in case we have missed something. 

We are doing a garage conversion too, and from what I understood if you are converting your garage into a living space you have to get building control approval. This is regardless of the need for planning permission. If you don't get BC sign off, the conversion will be illegal.