I just got a quote for a new drive and am gobsmacked by how expensive they are.

[JacobReesMogadishu]

Small drive. Just fits 2 cars on very snugly. Currently a combination of mismatched height concrete.

Got a quote for tarmac, blockpave and resin. All between 3.5k and 4K. North/midlands so not even London prices.

I’d like a new drive but not enough to spend 4k. Am now seriously considering buying a few tonne of gravel and throwing that down!

Yes, sounds about right. It is bonkers

Yeah, I feel your pain. Had a ridiculous quote recently too. About the same price as yours to do a section of my drive that only fits one car

Bloody hell, I was thinking of a new drive but seeing this I’m going to put up with the one we’ve got!

Doesn’t sound like it’s worth getting any further quotes. I thought it might be about 1.5k. Well if I get made redundant I know what I’m retraining as! 😆

Yep, we got quotes of between 5 - 8 grand! We went gravel, much, much cheaper then tarmac and we love it. We also went with a local one man band who came recommended then a big firm.

Apart from the few weeds that break through, I think gravel is better, less likely to flood too.

We got some quotes a few years ago for block paving and tarmac. Quotes varied from 6k-12k (big drive). I was amazed. It is very expensive.

My favourite was the chap who came to quote us for tarmac and initially said 8k. We said too expensive for us at the moment and he then came back every weekend for the next 3 weeks and reduced the price each time. He eventually got down to 1.5k. From 8k! We said no as by that point we weren't convinced the tarmac hadn't been nicked from the local council!

That's what I would have expected. Whatever you do, don't go cheap, it will look awful in a year or three. It's the groundworks that cost the money.

If you want to check the quote for fairness, ask how many days they expect it to take. 2-3 people per day at a rate you'd think is fair, add on the cost of materials and hire of a mini digger for a few days.

It won't be shockingly unreasonable.

About 2.5 - 3 for a block driveway is normal outside south East. A good bit of that is materials. It’s not an unfair price as it’s at least a weeks work for several people

You'll have to save up then, always baffles me when people complain about the costs of

Everyone has block paving where I live and does it themselves. You will need to hire a machine to smash up the concrete, then you put down sand, pack it down hard, and then the paving. My neighbours redid theirs on Wednesday. It took two men less than a day.
If after a few years it's started to sag where the car is parked, you just pull up those blocks, pack down more sand, and put them back. Block paving and sand allows for free drainage and you can pressure wash the paving to keep it looking new.

We've just had ours done as part of a bigger renovation project. We went for fairly standard block paving that DH bought off eBay and the. BLocks alone were nearly £1k. The builder outsourced laying it to a couple of chaps who "do" drives- work took them 3 days, but they didn't stop. You could look into buying the materials yourself and hiring people to lay it.

I don’t need to say up @onedayinthefuture I’ve got the money and then some in the bank. I’m just surprised by the cost.

Yep it’s all mad. Having front garden landscaped this week and it’s 6k It’s going to look lovely when finished but my word.

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You'll have to save up then, always baffles me when people complain about the costs of

OP didn't say she could not afford it. OP said it's very expensive. That doesn't mean it's out of her price range. That means she doesn't think it's good enough value to waste her money on.

Do you always struggle to read things properly in your desperation to have a dig?

I really fancy putting in a green driveway. I think it would need to have a solid path up the side as well as I don't think it would be all that easy to walk on, especially if wearing heels. There are a few different types but generally they are like this. www.gardenista.com/posts/zangra-grass-pavers/

We gave gravel at the moment and it gets carried into the house all the time on the bottom of trainers or sandals with deep ridges on the bottom. Plus there are always ruts in it from where the wheels of the car pass in exactly the same place all the time.

We were quoted 10 k for ours for tarmac!

Railway sleepers with gravel in between? We had block paving years ago and it cost a small fortune. Needs a lot of upkeep and I wish I'd had tarmac now!

I was quoted 4K for block paving - I'm in Kent. Decided to stick with the gravel I've got!

have a look at grasscrete.
makes the drive look like a garden as opposed to parking lot.

I’ve just been reading about gravel with a grid system underneath which keeps the gravel in the same place which sounds good. But we’d need to smash up and remove the current concrete, put rubble down, whack it, put a membrane and sand down, put the grid down and then gravel.

Not as quick and easy as chucking a couple of bags of gravel down!

I suppose the reason I don’t think it’s worth spending 4k on the drive is I just don’t feel I’d get the benefit. Current drive is functional.

A new drive would look nicer but I don’t sit in the house looking at the drive!

That’s the annoying thing with boring improvements. We need our guttering or soffits or whatever doing at some point and it’s not exactly something that will give me pleasure once it’s done. I feel like things like that shouldn’t be expensive. See also garden fencing (other than the very cheapest panels).

Teddy I’m currently having a patio built with exactly the same flags you have there - sane edgings, too. It’s 5 metres by 5 metres and includes removal of bushes and earth, new fence panels and quite a lot of electrics (sockets, down lighters, up lighters, ground lights). Total cost is about 4.5k and we have enough flags left to build another patio next summer. I didn’t even negotiate the price.

We did ours a few years ago but 4 cars at a squeeze that was about £3k

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