remortgage - extension - how much?

[Brycie]

How much would a one storey extension cost do you reckon, with a new kitchen? Could we do it for 20K? Would we be better off getting a dead fancy conservatory and doing a new kitchen inside instead? Don't know what to do. An extension would be a sort of L shape because of a fat side return. It's so complicated. There's all the extras too aren't there like flooring and curtains. I don't know where to start. I've only ever done internal decorating. If anyone has any experience or any ideas I'm very grateful. We're in the south east (but considering shipping in builders from Wales?)

I'd allow 30k, but get some builders in to quote. We're doing ours next year but involves knocking down and rebuilding half the kitchen, shower room and utility, so more work - Anglian quoted good rates for glasswork but very expensive for the brick part, so may get them just to do the roof.

Don't underestimate the cost of censervatories these days. We are right in the middle of building one and initially boggled at the cost....seriously, we are building an average size one (albeit with a gable design which costs more than a lean to roof) and its costing over £20k Don't say I didn't warn you

*conservatories. Spot the genuine, handcrafted spelling error there.

Than kk you both, I have many more questions but am so tired.

Fire away....

OK How long does it take from start to finish? Do you think I could do a more extension type bit over the side return and make the rest a conservatory? How on earth do you clean a conservatory roof? If you put underfloor heating in a conservatory does it make it more usable like an extension?Are you planning to use your conservatory as an extra living room all year round? What's the difference between a gable and a lean to roof Can you link to any pictures that look a bit like yours? Are you getting one person to do all of yours eddie? I'm nervous at getting two different lots of people in for glass/bricks as they will blame each other when things go wrong.

we are just at the start and don't know where to start!

hi, we are about to have a conservatory built, mainly as we are mid terrace, and a 'proper' extension would have made the middle of out hosue far to dark.
ours will be, roughly 3.5m by 3.5 m.
having underfloor heating, self cleaning roof.
gable roofs aparently cost alot more, we are having an edwardian one.
its only 2 walls of glass, as 1 one wall is the back of our house, and one is attaching to the neighbours existing extension.
we are having dwarf wall, with 2 tilt and turn windows.
one company are doing it all. they have put in planning, are buliding it and doing all internal and external work.
its costing £17,000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
sorry if thats all craqp info!!

That's great information thank you. The price seems very good - will there be any internal work with that?

no, no internal work other than the current back door and window being changed.
we want it as a seperate room, we have a teeny house and need somewhee for the kids to do homework in the quiet, and as a 'spare room' for an elderly rellie.

I fear we are going to have to go for something bigger and custom built in which case it might be cheaper to go for an extension rather than an conservatory.

if you have enough like coming in the the middle of the house then maybe that's a better idea. we are mid terrace, so if we had a proper extension the middle part of our hosue would be really dark, next door have a proper extension and so i know it looks dark.

I'm wondering the same as you OP. Leaning towards a proper extension which will involve re-doing the kitchen and turning it into a kitchen diner. Would really like a utility room too though there's not much space to play with. Mid-terrace so I'm not sure about light. Think I'd like glass roof but otherwise real extension?! Don't know if that's possible.

antoinette
you can get roof windows, velux type things, that would give you light, or go for an Orangery?

What's an orangery?

its like a cross breed between an extension and a conservatory. more solid but lots of light.

That actually sounds perfect. Ok, thank you, am off to do more research!

Sorry for taking ages to reply. We are building a gable conservatory, 3 x 4m in size.

We are a detached house, and are knocking through the dining room to extend and make a family type room. We will only have 2 glazed walls as we are building a full height wall for privacy on one side and the other wall is the existing house wall. W are glazing to ground ie no dwarf walls. The gable roof is like an A frame shape...gives much more headroom and makes the room feel bigger. Yes, it's dearer but looks brilliant, at least on plan anyway haha.

We have one company doing the lot.......everything from design, planning, building, plumbing,joinery and electrics....all under one roof. We went with a trusted local company rather than a big name national.

We are tapping into the heisting plumbing system and adding a full height radiator for heating, plus an electric stove type thing for the days when we don't want to heat the whole house iyswim.

We are having to have major remodelling done at the back of the house for access to the conservatory. We only had a back window rather than patio doors so they are having to be retro fitted. That's been the worst bit so far.

As for cleaning the roof, my dh and a long lance on the kaercher will sort that out!!

We are paying £23k for our extension, not the cheapest quote we had but a company that we know and trust. If you google gable conservatories you will see what they look like......they do have a different look but it suits our modern house.

Thansk for replies. Yes, am also mid terrace but we seem to have quite a lot of light, there's no property behind for a long way.

Eddie that's a great price for everything you're having done, good luck, with all of that!

Whatatwat I like the sound of an orangery too. But a really big one. !

No worries. The company we went with was mid priced in the quotes we had.....but as I said there's a lot to be said for a company that handles and project manages the whole lot.

We are halfway through....the foundations are in and the walls built. We have a break right now and the joiners return a week tomorrow to start on the framing etc. Its very daunting to knock great lumps out of your house though.....need nerves of steel when they attack it with a saw!!!!

I'll come back later this evening and link to the sort of thing we're building, but my tea is ready right now (cooked by my lovely DH, baked gnocchi, yum!!)

www.modeconservatories.co.uk/gallery/ (look at the picture under "gable") is similar to what we are building.......except we don't have the silly "sun" bit in the gable front and the glazing comes down to ground i.e no dwarf walls.

We're having a sunroom built just now, it's not really a sunroom as we will have one solid wall, one wall with French doors then one wall with two standard window, it's going to be fully insulated and have proper roof tiles. The valuer who came round said that conservatories don't add much value to a house and there's issues of heat loss with the roof if it's one of those polycarbonate ones. My friend has a traditional conservatory and it put me right off them, they can't use it in winter (even though it has a radiator), or summer as its too hot, if it's raining (and it rains loads here) the noise is deafening. We're going to use ours as a playroom so I wanted it to be warm and cosy plus the solid wall can be filled with Ikea storage units

It's 3.5 x 3.5 and costing just over 15k, currently we have s floor and foundations, we're also having a side extension done to increase the number of bedrooms

A good way to get the most for your budget is to consider how the thing will be built before you plan. Sounds obvious, but if you keep the design as simple as possible you should get lower quotes. Try to think like a builder.

If you have a side return already and a decent sized garden you should simply elongate the extension rather than fill in the return - that will give you plenty of light and usually means drains are easier to manage (otherwise you have to build over the drains and have access points etc. You won't need veluxes and the roof can be simple. You might be able to use the existing doorway so no need to knock down any existing walls. All this stuff saves money.

If you can find someone that builds using SIPS panels it will be even cheaper because they are very quick to put up and foundations don't need to be so deep.

Achillea we've done just that, we wanted to get a new kitchen but it was too much, we're reusing door and windows where possible, no new sanitary ware, moved extensions lightly so gas box and boiler don't have to be moved etc.

We've had terrible problems with the foundations though, the ground is unstable and we've needed more work so more money