Renovating a Cornish Cottage

ocemeer

About to take on a restoration project and a half, and any advice would be more than welcome.
The cottage is an old tin miners cottage built about 1840 in an area that is currently under review to become of national heritage importance (or something like that).
It has not been lived in for at least a year possibly hasnt been touched since ninety fifties (still has the bakelite light switches and plug sockets - are they still legal?) however its suffering form needing alot of love.

I want to renovate it symphatetically and keep/find as many of the original features as possible.

any advice on possible grants, legalities and moneysaving methods would be much appriecated.

Just as an idea here is a list of some of the jobs....
Damp proofing the whole house been quoted £9000
Unblocking fireplace
uncovering (fingerscrossed) original inglenook fireplace
refitting kitchen (range to heat hot water and cook on and poss radiators)
new bathroom inc moving hotwater tank to here.
sash windows
slate roof.
nervous as hell about it all as its a HUGE financial undertaking (at least 30,000 to do it all) and worried about throwing money down a bottomless pit when i dont have to.

I know not very moneysaving to buy such a money pit but i fell in love with it and its charm.

vansboy

Not going to give much help - other than to say Good Luck - sounds fun (& crazy, in the nicest way!!)

Guess local Council is the first place to ask!!

& £30k - crikey - we spent more than that on our place & that was just over 100yrs old & NOT in a terrible state!!

Keep us updated & don't forget to make a proper video/picture diary, somewhere, so you can look back on it & say, in a few years time............ WOW!!!! (or ask yourself - was I really that crazy!!???)

VB

callansdad

again i cant help much ... good idea speak to local council about grants .... i'm in scotland but i think the grant systems are one in the same ... we just got 50% grant for replacing a floor with wet rot.

Grants are available for homes which are 'below the tolerable standard' i.e no indoor toilet facilities ... severe damp etc.

BY all means contact your local council ..... all info should be available online but if not speak to them by phone ... their usually alright to talk to the grant process is long and drawn out and you will have to provide details of all your finances for the year previous to your application on a week by week or month by month basis.

I would also advise getting quite a few quotes for all work especially the damp work, we ended up paying £2500 for our work (including grant) but some of the quotes we got were extortionate! Youy wouldnt believe the differences the lowest was £900 the dearest was £5500 for the same job!

So good luck and i hope you get something out of them!

callansdad

also slates can be very expensive ... if you can get away with it go for tiles ... concrete or clay ... whatever, depends on planning dept and or if you are listed building/conservation area.

If it has to be slates .. again shop around there are a lot of differing qualities ... welsh is about one of the best but most expensive .. think about spanish, brazillian or even chinese slate.

Again good luck and keep us posted

arkonite_babe

What about seeing if you can get reclaimed slates?? I've seen lots of advertisements in my local paper for people selling reclaimed slates for re-roofing houses. Might be a slightly cheaper option and wouldn't look as shiny and new, which would then be in keeping with the style of your cottage?

HTH

littlereddevil

callansdad wrote:

also slates can be very expensive ... if you can get away with it go for tiles ... concrete or clay ... whatever, depends on planning dept and or if you are listed building/conservation area.

If it has to be slates .. again shop around there are a lot of differing qualities ... welsh is about one of the best but most expensive .. think about spanish, brazillian or even chinese slate.

Again good luck and keep us posted

We got a grant to replace roof of cottage we renovated but only because there was no felt underneath. It saved us loads.

weekendwarrior

Hi,

Good luck with your restoration!

If you have bakerlite switches and sockets the wire will probably be rubber and a full re-wire will be needed as soon as possible!

This can be expensive as the goverment introduced part p of the building regs on the 1st Jan this year, there is nothing to stop you doing the work yourself, but you need to inform building control first and then get it inspected.

I have done big restorations like this on terraced houses in the past, I often look here for tips-ultimatehandyman, Not sure how long this site has been online but it seems to have new pages on it all the time, if you can DIY you will save lots?

I'm concerned about the £9000 for the damp proofing, exactly what is going to cost you £9000? if it is a mere damp proof course, which will need to be electro osmosis in such a building, you should only be looking at £2000 max including re-plastering (if needed)

se999

As it's in Cornwall you should check for Radon. Any work to deal with it could be done at the same time as the other work. Here's a link to a site that explains it a bit, and it has other links you can investigate from there.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/ask_the_doctor/radonrisks.shtml

Edit - Forgot to say on budgetting, work out your estimates but then add on a contingency for bits you've not thought of, also with older properties it is very unusual not to have something unexpected discovered that needs extra work and therefore money. There's also the finishing touches too, that add up when you've got to do a whole house, even small cost items add up when you're doing them in every room!

monkey_writer

Be careful if replacing slate with concrete - concrete is heavier and you have to be sure that your roof can take the extra weight.

Good luck!

Crom_2

Get yourself over to https://www.periodproperty.co.uk. The msg forum is full of very knowledgable people who are generally very happy to help. I've learnt loads from just reading the threads. 30k sounds very cheap to me! I'd get started quickly so that you can get the permissions you need before you have more restrictions put upon you by the 'importance' of your building being upgraded. I'm working on a listed building at the moment and you would not believe the added hassle - even when we are trying to be sympathetic to the building. The idea of using concrete tiles will be straight out the window!

Don't be too quick to go down the damp proofing route without considering alternatives. Again the website above has heated debates about french drains and how useless injected DPC's are.

Good luck with it all.
Crom