Talk me through cutting costs on an extension

[WhatWillSantaBring]

We are getting a large (8x3m) extension to our kitchen, plus some internal layout re-jigging. After 2 months of effort, we FINALLY have some quotes in, and they are £20k over the original estimates (and our budget).

We think with a fair wind and some pragmatic steps, we can get this to work (as we can hopefully find some extra funds/save elsewhere), but I'd love some advice on where we can skip/scrimp/save.

-Underfloor heating (electric) - will I forever regret not having it? (£4k saving)
-Stone flooring - Can the installation cost really be £50 / sq m? Would bamboo/lino be cheaper to install?
-Excavation work - Could DH and his brother manage this with a mini digger (and spreading the topsoil round the garden, that could do with flattening anyway) (£3k saving)

• Me and DH and his brother doing the painting and decorating. (save £1800)

Any other ways you can think to trim down this quote? Some of the elements will be what they are (e.g. cost of exterior wall, as it has to match existing)

Can you put down cheap lino for now, and put the underfloor heating and tiles down at a later stage when you have more money?

We saved shed loads by doing a chunk of the work ourselves.
We dug the foundations and hired skips for the soil. (There was literally tons & tons of clay/soil to remove).

We orderd and barrowed in the ready made concrete foundations and got the hard-core from a local builders supplies.
Invest in a couple of wheelbarrow and be prepared to give up all of your days off from work as its a slow and hard.

DH fitted the kitchen, did the plumbing and decorating himself. Do you know any brickies who could do a foreigner for you?

Have to say that we did all of this prior to having kids. Impossible to do with kids.

Lose the floor for a start and do the decorating yourself. We will have cheap vinyl down for a few years and will then hopefully be able to afford electric underfloor heating and engineered wood (can't be doing with stone, sorry). I wouldn't do the excavation yourself, ours is going on at the moment and it's a really tricky job actually (although we have a sewer to work around). We're also saving by sourcing some of the doors ourselves, fitting the kitchen ourselves and just getting someone in to do the gas bits (my brother is a sparky though which helps). I would also look at what you can defer costs on. We will almost certainly overspend on our budget (have you factored in planning permission costs and building notice charges btw because that has added nearly two grand to our budget) so now no longer have the money to buy the kitchen or flooring. So it's Carpetright, and their buy now, pay later for the floor and Ikea's interest free credit for the kitchen. Bathroom bits we've been buying as we go along, but again, it will probably be Bathstore.com and their interest free credit for those.

Grab lorries are cheaper than skips too.

Hmmm, could be tricky then! We have one toddler and I'm heavily pregnant, so me doing any work is out of the question. DH currently between jobs though, so we do have one source of free labour. He's OK with DIY but has a tendancy to get stressed, so I wouldn't want him doing anything that "mattered" (such as plumbing).

We have halved the price of the kitchen already and PP/Building Regs costs are already in the budget.

I want lino anyway I'm a lazy slattern and it looks so much easier than stone because I hate the combination of small children's heads and stone floors. I wonder if £5k could persuade DH into going for it.

I'm scared DH will take away my fake aga (which I'm paying for out of my "own" money rather than our joint money).

Our other option is to break into my emergency funds- currently tied up in shares, and I've always said is there to cover death/life changing injury.

Remind me that this will all be worth it?

Ooh fake Aga? Link please.

My husband sucks at DIY. But he can at least be trusted to look after the children while I do it and having a handy brother is also very useful. Do you have any teenage relatives who might fancy earning some booze pocket money by painting for you? I plan on getting my student brother down for a few days to paint walls and floorboards. Could you/competent relative do the tiling? That always seems to add loads to the cost but if you stick to easy tiling (like metro tiles) it's not too difficult. We're not putting the island in at first, going to live without it and add it on when we have a bit more money. We're also buying second hand units where we can and stashing them (it's Ikea, so easy to pick up second hand).

It will be worth it. We will make back the cost of the work when we sell and anyway, our house was getting unliveable in to be honest and it had to be done or we had to move. It is cheaper for us to improve than to move (but more stressful I suspect).

PS do NOT watch that horrible programme on how to double your house for half the cost. The last thing you want during a building project is Sarah Beeney or Kevin McCloud rocking up. Like the kiss of snide death.

Cash in the shares.

Eco Range or Heritage - both come in considerably cheaper initially than an Aga, look almost the same and (most importantly) seem to have much much cheaper running costs as they are fully controllable. (I've had to do the calculations on oil, as I'm off-mains gas)

I agree we could lose the island to start with, but its getting the damned extension built in the first place that is concerning me. FIL and BIL could tile but I hate imposing on people - its a big, arduous task. The painting I'm happy with, as we can do that anytime.

It WILL be worth it - not that we plan to sell anytime soon, but it will totally transform the house.

On the tiling, you could just pay someone on a day rate to do it. I'll probably do most of ours myself, but my sister's best mate is a tiler and I've asked her to do our showers (on her normal day rate) as I know her work is lovely and I don't want to end up with a leaky shower.

Keep telling yourself it's worth it. I went to Ikea at the weekend and spent a bit of me time stroking the kitchens. I also spend a fair amount of time with my wallpaper, tile and floor samples. It helps me see past the hideous mess that is my house. Pinterest too - if you put the ipad in front of your face, it hides the somme-alike of the back garden.