House needs rewiring - any wisdom to share?

[ThomasRichard]

It's starting to get a bit critical now as new light fittings won't go in as the fittings aren't earthed.

Any words of advice or a rough idea of how much it will cost? It's a 3-bed 1930's terrace in the SE.

We had ours done. It's messy and disruptive but ultimately necessary. Think very hard about where new sockets should be and book a plasterer to come and repair the holes and channels made.

This is your chance to get plug sockets installed all over the place and put light switches where you want them.

I wish I'd insisted on Ethernet cables being installed too.

I didn't know Ethernet cables were an option - thanks for the tip!

We've had a quote for rewiring a 1939s 3 bed at £3400. We're in the Midlands.

Prepare for disruption. We moved last year and I asked two electricians to give us quotes for rewiring our old house as the lights fuse frequently.

They both said they would never take on a job like this with a family in situ , so we didn't get any quotes. They said the fuse box dated from the 1980s and fitted minimum h&s standards so the house shouldn't burn down .

We haven't got £3-5 grand now as we've spent it all on the gazillion unforeseen issues lurking under the roof/carpets/flooring [shakes fist at the surveyor].

Think we paid around £5k in the SE a few years ago. We moved out and housesat for a friend for 3 weeks. Downstairs we had concrete floors so there was a lot of channelling out to do!!!

We had a 1965 fuse board so needed desperately doing...

Argh ok, so it's likely to be a nightmare then. I was thinking of doing it on one of the weeks when STBexH takes the DC on holiday but of it's going to be longer than that I might need to ask my parents very nicely if we could stay with them.

I'd better get saving! I was thinking about getting solar panels at the same time but that would mean it taking much longer to get started while I get the £ together. Anyone know if they could wire it so that we could switch over to solar later without redoing everything?

We are just about to start a full rewire of our 1930s semi, our electrics are so dated that we were almost cut off when our supplier came to look at installing a smart meter.

We are having everything including, alarm, CCTV, CAT 6 throughout and a 'server room' set up under the stairs.

We knew that staying in the house whilst down wouldn't be an option due to the amount of disruption so we are moving out for a week or so. They have estimated 7 days to complete 1st fix, 2 days plastering the channels and a further 7 days for 2nd fixed (at which point we can move back in if we want).

All in we are looking at approx 6k including 6 good quality outside wall lights (North West)

It was messy but sooo worth it. We got extra sockets in each room (some of our rooms only had a single socket on the fireplace) and in the right places - so 3x double sockets behind the tv for all the media gubbins, bedside sockets etc
Plasterer had a bit of a job in places as the victorian lathe and plaster didn't enjoy being knocked around. Luckily we have a huge underfloor void which made the ground floor work easier.
Consider any external electrics or additional electrics you want doing at the same time, we also had hard wired smoke alarms and burglar alarm done at the same time. We also had a light put in the loft and under stairs cupboard.

Checked with DH ours took 2 weeks but was only 1 man working on it (it was the kitchen that took 3 weeks).

Our electrician did the first fix of plastering/patching then we had our own plasterer come and do it all plus skim some ceilings so that was done in a day.

We did virtually empty the house though!!! Emptied upstairs no carpets etc. and stacked everything in the middle of the downstairs due to having concrete floors there so most of wiring maze is under the upstairs floors and down through the ceilings etc.

Ok. We have a big underfloor void too so that should make things easier. The rooms that really need more sockets are the DCs' bedrooms, which currently only have one (!) each, and the kitchen, which only has two spare. A wired burglar alarm and outdoor security lights would be great but I'm not sure about a wired smoke alarm system; wouldn't that fail if there was a powercut or some other fault?

When we extended our current property, one of the planning conditions was a wired smoke alarm system. They have 10 yr back up batteries in.

We're currently looking to move and I would definitely include them again ( even if not required too)

Yup the wired smoke alarms have a battery back up in case of power failure. It is the best way to do smoke alarms as they are more reliable than batteries alone. It's how they are done commercially/institutionally. They look almost exactly the same and can be tested in the same way.

1930'sHousewife - that is really interesting that you say Cat6 and server room. We are buying an 1890's house that needs a complete rewire. We haven't had a quote yet but a friend said that we should go category 6 and also have a switch panel (or something like that - can't remember what he called it) that sounds like your server room. Also ethernet in all the rooms. I think ours will be more like £10,000 as it is a 5 bed massive house.

Wiifitmama, ours is a large 4 bed so we were quite pleased with a 6k quote as I had visions of it coming in at 10k myself.

We are having Cat 6 ports in all bedrooms and living areas leading from a managed 24 port switch under the stairs (we decided on a TP-Link Jetstream). We thought that while we are having to go through the upheaval and mess that a rewire causes we should future proof as best as we good - plus my other half is tech mad.

Future proofing is our aim too. Ethernet is a must and the switch thing seems to help with any future changes.