Anyone done a loft conversion

[Fortunatepiggy]

We have a 3 bed semi in a nice area. Would love to move to a 4 bed detached in a nicer area around the corner but it would cost at least 750k to get anything and even then the house would need work. Our house was £320k we have a 200k mortgage

We spent about 20k last year knocking through our dining room and kitchen and redoing the garage conversion into a kitchen so downstairs looks quite nice and I think has added value. A house down the road is on the market for 475k which needs lots of work so I reckon ours is at least worth this,, probably more

We have 2 doubles upstairs a box room and a family bathroom. We also have a bathroom downstairs. My ds who is 4 is in the box room, we are in the other the other double is for grandparents when they stay as they live 3 hours away

I am thinking about a loft conversion for more space and in case we have another child. Will we lose the box room to the stairs to the loft? I've measured and there is about 2.7 headroom in the loft and it's about 5 metres by 4 metres space plus space in the rafters.

I hope we can get it done for about 40k so we can remortgage for the money and I hope we will at least make that back when we sell in maybe 5-10 years time.

Any experiences of doing this / views welcomed

Thanks

[booellesmum]

In the middle of our loft conversion at the moment.
The stairs go in on Friday so will get a first look at the weekend.
We have a 3 bedroom semi. Two doubles, box room, bathroom.
No downstairs loo so having a shower room and bedroom in the loft. Decided against ensuite so it can be shared!

[booellesmum]

Forgot to say we thought we'd lose the boxroom but they are taking out the airing cupboard on the landing and just moving the bedroom wall slightly so stairs can go off the landing. We are going to then use it as a study for homework.

[booellesmum]

They put in a dormer window at the back to give more space/ headroom.

[MarvinKMooney]

Our set up sounds like yours - we're drawing up plans at the moment.

Our hallway and stairs are wide enough to get a second staircase in immediately above the first and we won't need to cut into the box room at the front. We will need a dormer at the side to accommodate the headheight for the second staircase. We've managed to squeeze in a shower room up there too.

Loads of semis round our way have done this as it's so much cheaper than moving. We live in a really nice area and it would put at least £150k on our mortgage to get a 4 bed. We should be able to do our lift conversion and knock through between kitchen and dining room for £65-70k (Yorks)

Have you taken a look in your neighbourhood to see if anyone else has done it? I spent several weeks walking around our nearby streets looking as if I was always looking at the sky!

[Fortunatepiggy]

Great thanks for replies. Not sure anyone in street has done it as it's mainly full of old people and students.

How long will it take roughly?
Thanks

[AllThatMatters]

Ours took about 9 weeks and very little disruption until near the end when they knocked through for the staircase. Before the plans were drawn up I was convinced we would lose space in the box room but it's amazing how they managed to fit a staircase in without losing any space. Ours cost about £45k after extras like flooring, bathroom suite etc. I absolutely love our loft room!

[booellesmum]

Have been told ours will take around 6 weeks.

[Fortunatepiggy]

Sounds great. Did you use local builders or loft conversion specialists?

[AllThatMatters]

We used a loft conversion specialist

[Fortunatepiggy]

Which one? Looking at econoloft...

[AllThatMatters]

I think they were called Elite based in South East

[booellesmum]

We are using loft specialist.
We are in the Midlands - went with Loftstyle, will let you know how it goes!

[thecookies]

We had our loft done recently. Have a bedroom, bathroom, dormer, chimney stack removed for £40k. Once we have finished everything off it will be a lovely space and will add around £60k value. Budget wise it is totally do-able. Just be hard with contract and plans from builders, we have learnt from our mistake of accepting a one page contract which was really just a payment schedule. Spend big at the start to get proper plans (not for planning permission as you won't need this) so that you can get really accurate quotes. We got utterly utterly taken for a ride by our building company - Princes Construction - so don't use them and you'll be fine

[Fortunatepiggy]

I have 2 companies coming next week to give a quote ... excited now! Any other tips/ experiences?

Thanks

[thecookies]

okay so, based on our experience (which we know was unusually bad):
*check the builders you hire are the ones doing the job - not just taking the money and subcontracting.
*set expectations of cleanliness and include a penalty in the contract if these are not met.
*get a clear schedule of works - what is going to happen when, payments should be linked to what happens, not just on a week by week basis.
*ensure they bring a million dust sheets for the day they do the breakthrough for staircase - we had old fashioned plaster and laith so when they did the break through the whole house filled with dust and they tried to clear it with a shovel...
*check whether you will need to do any work in rest of house - we had to fit new hardwired smoke alarms on all floors and install a new fire proof wall on ground floor.
*make sure they are nice people, they are going to be in your house monday-saturday for 8-12 weeks.

[SeetheseeyessogreenIcanstarefo]

Thecookies how much was your fire wiring

[thecookies]

Couldn't honestly tell you - we fell into the trap of not getting a proper schedule of works and itemised breakdown as it was our first building project ever and had nothing to base it on. We are basically advising OP to do the opposite of everything we did!
I wouldn't imagine it was more than £250/300 for alarms and fitting though.