Anyone take on a major refurb? (shudder)

[lamandler]

So after two long years of looking and a year of renting we have had an offer accepted on a house a few doors away from our current rented house. It's of course (being London) too expensive yadda yadda but as a doer upper untouched for 50 years we can afford to do some major bits of work now and the rest over the next few years when I sell a kidney.

So the plan is:
Loft extension
Move bathroom to first floor
Rewire and plumbing
Strip out and replaster/redecorate the whole place

The kitchen is ancient and we would love the whole Victorian terrace side return but it won't be happening for a while, so we will make do with a quick kitchen refit.

I'd love to hear from anyone who attempted similar, and lived to tell the tale! Do I need an architect for that work? Any beartraps to avoid? How much will I get through?

We are living the dream as we speak and not wanting at all to put you off, it is hell at the moment. We have all but guttered and extended to the rear and side of our detached house. But we are 4 months in and this last 1-2 months is going to be the worst as we are now down to living in one bedroom and the box room plus only half of our front room. (there is only the box room of the original house that was not touched by the builders). We have had no kitchen for 2 months so far, we have two DC (3 & 5) and I am pregnant too! Would I do it again - NEVER AGAIN WHILST LIVING IN THE HOUSE. But i do love the buzz of building work and creating a house/home.

I have done a loft and you need to check things such as height in the loft as we had a victorian terrace that did not have enough height in the loft so the ceilings on the whole first floor had to be lowered, not something that can be done whilst living in the house. Replastering is very messy/dusty so might be worth doing when the house is empty. Give everything a quick coat of white paint then move in. I would seriously consider staying in your rented accommodation for a couple of months whilst you get the shell of the house done if at all possible.

But you know in your heart that it will all be worth it in the end to get your dream home. Even if we could afford a 'turn key' house (drools at the thought) there would always be something we wanted to do to change it or better it...... GOOD LUCK and go for it!

My DH and I got the keys to our "new" house 5 weeks ago. We were moving from a 1 bed flat to a 3 bed house so needed to buy something that needed work so we could add value. So far we have....

new heating system
rewired
new windows and external doors
new kitchen
new carpets and flooring

Still to go....

new bathroom
decorating and final touches
gutting the front and back gardens (next summer!)

It's been the most dusty horrific nightmare 5 weeks but we are slowly getting there and if you want it badly enough and put your mind to it, you can do anything! I got my new kitchen from howdens and we have kept the cost right down by buying our appliances from gumtree. Keep your eyes peeled for bargains.

Our bedroom is completely finished and that was a good move, somewhere you can go at the end of a long day and properly relax.

It will probably take us a year to get the house as we want it.

Good luck! I feel your pain!

Sorry to thread-jack but I am a complete newbie to home renovations. We're in a similar position to nearlyuptheduff - moving from a 1-bed rental to a 4-bed victorian terraced house. It's a bit of a tip but as far as we can tell is probably only cosmetic, probably needs new kitchen and bathroom, whole thing needs a good clean and in the first instance probably a cheapy neutral carpet and some neutral paint. We're going to get a structural survey done - if there's anything serious that needs doing we can't afford it, just assuming so far that it's all cosmetic (with the possible exception of a rewire being needed - don't know how much to budget for that?)

In the longer term we're hoping to do a side-return kitchen extension and a loft conversion, but that's several years down the track.

Those of you who have shared your experiences above, would you feel comfortable giving the rough costs of the work you've done and roughly where in the country you are? We're in London and we've got about £10-12k initially for cheap refurb of the whole place which I think will be sufficient for a basic kitchen/bathroom/neutral carpet/paint and a bit of furniture. Major extension/remodelling work would be done in future by remortgaging as and when we've paid enough off to borrow more. No idea how much a rewire might cost. Any suggestions or examples that I can work with?

We've just done a total refurb - and lived to tell the tale. It was quite stressful, but not too bad really and certainly less stressful than buying a house and doing it bit by bit. Like yours, our place was untouched for 50 years and needed EVERYTHING doing to it. It had damp in every room - rising, penetrating, condensation - you name it, it was dark and musty but we loved it. It was in the perfect location and we knew that we could make it work. We ignored various family members took us aside to tell us we were making a big mistake and didn't listen to the builders who told us it was going to cost 70/80 grand MINIMUM and luckily found a recommended builder who thought he could get it done in 6 weeks for 50k.

Best thing we ever did. In no particular order (and without an architect), he put in a loft room, fixed the roof, put in a new damp proof course, treated all our timber for whatever they treat timber for, did a total rewire, put in a completely new central heating system, replaced all the lead piping, repointed outside, took all the wallpaper off inside, moved some walls, replaced some ceilings, reinstated all the fireplaces, put in new windows, new front door, fitted a new kitchen and bathroom (which we sourced really cheaply - from Ikea and Plumbbase), sanded all the floors and painted everywhere. For 50k - including all materials. Took him 8 weeks in the end, but that's mostly because we naffed around for a couple of weeks agonising about the floorboards.

The place looks bloody amazing. We've lived in it for a couple of months now and we're still amazed at what we achieved in such a short space of time and with a (relatively) small budget.

We weren't living in it at the time though - we stayed with relatives for a couple of months till we couldn't stand it any more the place was habitable.

You have to be totally on top of your project though - we had spreadsheets coming out of our ears and visited the site every day to check on progress / make decisions and whatnot. I literally spent every spare moment sourcing door handles / toilet cisterns / kitchen draws but it was totally worth it!

Ecuse just for reference really, we spoke to lots of builders who specialise in total refurbs (including a close friend) and they ALL said you need a minimum of 60 - 80 to do the lot on a 3 bed house (rewire, refit, replaster, new kitchen and bathroom etc). I was gobsmacked, but that seems to be standard in London / South East.

If you just do a kitchen and you don't have many cabinets and go to Howdens / Ikea then you could get buy on £5,000 for that. As an example, our kitchen was from Ikea and it cost something like £1200. On top of that we bought our own fancy German appliences, which cost about the same again. Fitting was about a grand, plus flooring, lighting, changing the exterior door which was rotten etc etc.

I think you're probably looking at about £3k to refurb a bathroom and if that's all you're doing, with a lick of paint (assuming you're doing it yourself) and basic carpeting (budget on about £500 per room for a midrange carpet) then you might just get it all done for 12k.

That said, if you find that you need to rewire / replace the central heating further down the line (and you probably will, if the house is very old and untouched) then you're looking at way more money. Especially since you'll have to replaster. Plasterers cost £££...

Wowser noclue your builder sounds amazing! Are you in London? DM me if you are!

And thanks everyone for the good luck sentiments. Still no further on with things, waiting for vendor's probate - survey tomorrow so I may be back here tomorrow evening sobbing onto the laptop!

Noclue would love to get your builders details too (we are in Herts)