I need to do up my bathroom and I'm not sure if my budget is realistic. Views or suggestions please

[wonkytonkwoman]

1980s semi house, it's my downsize to enable me to consider retirement in the next two years or so. I have a bit of money left over from my last house sale and some capacity to save monthly.

The only room that needs serious attention is the small, functioning but really tired bathroom. It needs everything, including a replacement window which I've already ordered and I'm waiting for a quote to replace the radiator which is working fine but it's one of the older style and the rest of the house had all the others replaced.

I plucked a figure out of the air - £2000 to do the above (excluding the window and rad). This would need to include getting someone in to do it, and someone is coming this afternoon to have a look. I haven't asked a bathroom specialist as my experience has been they're usually very expensive.

I know it's all subjective - I'm not looking for swanky, just clean, modern well designed stuff.

Am I realistic, do you think?

I'd say double that amount but it depends on what you're having. Shower over bath or separate cubicle? Are you having cabinets with loo and basin built in? Tiles?
How big is the room?

It's the labour that's expensive with bathrooms. I would say it is do-able. Tell the plumber you are doing it to sell. Start looking for cheaper bathrooms and tiles now. Ikea do sinks now. It shouldn't be too hard to get stuff as you aren't going to be getting stuff you absolutely love.

Obviously you could live in The Shetland Islands for all I know but we got our things here
http://www.amazingbathroomsupplies.co.uk/offers-c207

and they have a whole warehouse of bargain stuff. My dd said 'it's called amazing bathrooms and it actually is amazing'.

Agree with Horsemad - double it.

To give you an idea, my 6ftsq bathroom refit cost £6k:

• removed bath, replaced with large shower cubicle & electric shower
• needed to re-site plumbing for shower and basin to do this
• new basin, vanity unit, wall cupboard
• new loo
• new radiator
• tiling three walls and floor.

Obviously it'll be cheaper if you don't have any re-plumbing to do. Some of my fittings were expensive so I could have gone cheaper.

But I didn't like the cheaper ones; I wasn't deliberately trying to pay more, it's just the ones I could see myself living with were more expensive. It's been 10 years and I still like it so it's been good value for money.

So - don't scrimp for the sake of it (though of course only stick to what's affordable) as you'll be living with it for a long time.

Don’t buy Victoria Plum. I did and regret it. My reasonably small bathroom was about £4,000 including labour. Tiles were the most expensive. In hindsight I should have got a lino type floor.

My bathroom is small and it was about £5k to redo it. That included all new suite, shower (which I got online for a bargain price as it's a really good make) new plaster board for two walls, the others replastered, new spotlights, tiles on one wall, and new tiles on the floor (they were quite expensive).

Rather than replace the radiator, how about swap it for a heated towel rail? Save some space/make it useful?

We didn't get any change out of £7k

Double shower, with granted it is an AquaLisa with two shower heads, normal and rain, the rest of it is lovely, but nothing apart from the vanity unit over the sink was top dollar.

My tiny bathroom refit cost £6500 in April last year
Took out bath and had 1.5 walk in shower fitted, new wall hung vanity unit and wall hung WC
Full tiled
Hope that helps

Ours is (hopefully!) getting started in the next week or so and is costing a fortune (approx £10k) but we're having quite high end stuff and also having new hot water tank fitted.

The whole room is being completely gutted, so a lot of labour involved, which as a PP mentioned, is quite expensive.

I spent 3.5 thousand on my small bathroom refurb last year, and that involved keeping the bath, basin and loo (but changing taps and putting in a new shower unit), and I did the decorating, so I think you might need to increase your budget - sorry!

I'd definitely consider swapping the radiator for a heated towel rail - ones that are both electric and part of the heating system are more expensive but more useful as you get dry towels all year round.

I bought all my tiles from Topps Tiles, who do take tiles back if you get the quantities wrong, which helps to keep the cost down.

Mine was only finished 3 weeks ago and is only wet-walled behind the shower and tiled on the floor. Despite me getting the shower cabinet and sink unit ex-display (saving 1k), it still came in at 4.5k.

Yeah double it 😟

I think mine was around £6500. I still can’t see how, but it all adds up. I’d say you need to double your guesstimate labour alone is expensive!

It obviously depends on what you choose. I chose things that I liked (not high end, but not budget either) and it’s 3/4 tiles (including the foot) which I could have cut back on - both the area tiles & cost of tiles. I also had a digital aqua Lisa shower which was expensive and I wouldn’t do again iff a combi boiler as the pressure isn’t good and you can’t boost it

I didn’t get the Maki shower cubical I loved as I just couldn’t justify the cost, but neither did I get one as cheaply as I could have.

The bath I wanted a big one with a straight edge, again it wasnt the very expensive one id have loved, but it was far from the cheapest one that would have been ‘fine’

So if you’re not a fuss butt like me, you could do it for around £4K I think, but if you’re paying for labour, then no way can you do it for £2k

We have just done ours for a shade over £1000 - however DH is a plumber so we did the work ourselves and used a reasonably generous trade discount. Ours is not top end but like you describe, clean and functional. I don't imagine you could do it for £2k if you need to pay labour costs.

My downstairs shower room just cost 2k and my DH is a builder so we had no labour costs.
You could do this but I would imagine you'd have to buy the least expensive ( which ca still be nice), out new window cost £300 + vat and that was trade.

Oh crap, that's a bit disheartening.

Ours cost just shy of 3k, that was removing old bath suite, new power shower, cubicle, sink unit (cupboard underneath), drawer unit, new toilet (hidden cistern), shelved lighted mirror unit.

Floor repair (the actual floor boards) new floor covering, new wall and ceiling coverings (upvc sheets), new lighting, moving of pipes for shower unit.

The team messed up some measurements which meant the had to readjust our foot frame and replace the door, this was free.

We had upper mid range fittings and the work took around 3 days, minus the door frame and door.

Door frame

I don't need plumbing replacing or anything, I'd quite like a loo/sink combo thing with the cupboard underneath. I have an electric shower over the bath and a folding screen which has definitely had it .

I can't do it myself though, so I'm dependent on finding someone reasonable, which I hope the guy this afternoon will be.

We have the loo sink combo with drawers attached also.

It doesn’t have to be expensive

Good tip about the heated towel rail though, I had one in the last house and it was great.

This is a similar unit to what we have. www.bathshop321.com/p-shape-shower-bath-with-vanity-furniture-suite/

Forgot we also had the heated towel rail also, I’m a bit meh about it as I’m constantly burning myself on it because I can’t figure out how to control the temperature.

Well, new dilemma then - I've put aside some money for a new front door which will create a closed porch rather than the open one i've got now.
If you were me, would you put the money to the bathroom and then just wait for a door?
Thank you.

I think doing the bathroom will be better in terms of property value/appeal to buyers.

If you can definitely financially do both within the next two years, maybe door first then the bathroom is brand new for resale. (But then you don't get to enjoy it.)