Home renovation costs spiralling

BelugaWhale

We bought a home, aware it needed work. A year ago, we drafted plans with our architect who gave a cost projection of £50k minus VAT, whereas our builder estimated £66k minus VAT.

I had set aside £60k and aimed to save an extra 10k as a safety net. After saving the extra, we revisited the builder. Given the time lapse, the builder adjusted the quote to £90k (which becomes £108k with 20% VAT). We had similar quotes from other builders, so I accept this is likely fair.

I now need to bridge a £29k gap. Is there a savvy approach to cut costs? I asked about cheaper materials, and was told this is not possible.

Thanks

** EDIT** - We got other estimates in... much cheaper. Turns out some builders were trying to scalp us...

jlfrs01

Went through a similar thing a few years ago with a double storey extension going up from the £120k quoted to over £150k. The reality is unless you aren't paying your builder on a weekly basis and/or owe a substantial sum your options are limited because he might just walk off the job if you say you lack the funds to continue. Other than scaling back your plans (less work = less money), if that's even possible, your only options are to either borrow against your home or get a loan. A lot of costs were tied up in materials and those I paid for with a selection of 0% interest free credit cards so I could stash as much cash for labour as possible.

stuhse

I work for a building company;  on some projects we hold 'value engineering' meetings.  An architect does drawings for the client and often they specify fancy products/odd sizes eg windows, doors , door furniture. As a contractor we have knowledge of standard off the shelf economical products, and these meetings identify where products can be potentially substituted or perhaps door / window sizes altered to be standard off the shelf sizes.  On a 80 bed care home if you can standardise the doors all the savings are x at least 80.  There is less scope for savings in small extension but it might be worth talking to your builder about scope for reducing costs by varying what is specified on the drawings.

FreeBear

BelugaWhale said: I now need to bridge a £29k gap. Is there a savvy approach to cut costs? I asked about cheaper materials, and was told this is not possible.

The cost of materials will (generally) be a fairly small part of the overall bill. Much of it is going to be for labour. Two ways of cutting back on costs is to specify cheaper decor items (assuming the £90K is for a fully finished project), or do much of the grunt work yourself.

For example, I had been looking at a bill of around £8K to replumb my central heating system. Spent ~£400 on materials and did all the work myself. A saving of ~£7.5K.

Green_hopeful

You might be able to do some of it yourself. We had our bathrooms done and I did all the decorating in the evenings and weekends. Not sure how much money it saved but it saved the effort of trying to find a decorator. I am a bit more particular about my preparation so the quality is as good if not better than an average decorator. You might also be able to delay some of the finishing elements of it. We need a new floor in our bedroom but I have waxed the floorboards cost £100 rather than paying several thousand for a new floor. You might also be able to specify cheaper materials. Eg wall tiles in a kitchen but unless you love the cheaper ones I would probably wait until you have the money. Depends on what you want though.