Getting a simple loft conversion done - any advice please?

[Bougie]

Can anyone offer advice on getting a really basic loft conversion done please? It needs the essentials to be properly done by workmen, so planning and building regs are complied with, stairs and plastering and electrics and flooring professionally done. No bathroom, no decoration or plastering, just a frankly rough and ready extra space for a fast-growing DS to retreat to, shut the door, paint the walls black and lurk with all his clutter and old pizza boxes.

I'm thinking that perhaps £25000 might be the bottom line for the whole thing, in SE London. Does this sound reasonable, and has anyone got any hints tips or warnings, please? Would be so grateful for any advice... also any builder recommendations. Thanks!

Have you checked that you have enough head-height to make this achievable with building regs sign off? It needs to be (iirc) 2.4m from the apex of the roof to the bottom of the joists in order to give you the all important 2m clearance at the top of the stairs.

If you do have clearance, I think that £25k in London, even for no bathroom and a shell finish, would be a little low but possibly doable if you shop around.

We've just had our loft done in NW London however we had a dormer put in and an en suite. You mention having plastering done then go on to say not having plastering done so wasn't sure. It wouldn't be very nice for someone to relax in with rafters, brick walls etc so I would recommend plastering. Apart from not having a bathroom or building a dormer for extra head room, you're pretty much doing everything we are doing. We also had to put in fire doors on all habitable rooms in the house or had the option of putting smoke alarms in all rooms. Plus new stairs had to be fire proofed plus our original stairs. Our basic cost was about 40k but we had to pay for bathroom, paint, flooring on top of this including the cost of decorating the landing, stairs etc.

I'm not sure if I have any top tips but some extras that came up during the conversion were:
Having a cupboard under the eaves and having a light in it
Building a second cupboard in another odd shaped nook
Take into account cost of lighting - we have LEDs
Our loft had never been used so was empty and this helped a lot.

The builders swept up 100 years worth of dust from the loft before the breakthrough into main house which avoided lots of dust coming into the house
We had the over the house scaffolding with cover which helped through the various storms in February. This added about 1-1.5k to the cost.
if you are going to lose part of a room to accommodate stairs, consider the impact and costs of redcorating etc.

Good luck!!!

25k seems low especially if you factor in VAT.

Materials are expensive, stairs can be 1k for basic, steels will be several thousands, scaffolding is similar, much more if 'tin roof' cover needed.Insulation is a building regs requirement and is manually intensive work as it has to go between rafters so lots of cuts.
Velux windows are around 1k.Floor joists need to be reinforced so lots of timber.

Then there is electrics and you should allow a few hundred for each socket or light fitting.

Add in planning and building regs costs which is £1-2k.

Posted too soon..I do think 40k is more do'able.I also think it's worth doing it well, consider a dormer for another 5k and you will get s much more useable room.Those that build a basic loft room often regret not going a little further and getting the right space.

We did a loft and love the space with a good sized dormer and large velux windows.

We're in Surrey and have juat spent £44k on the loft. We decorated ourselves. Plus had to pay for bathroom.suite and flooring on top.

Not plastering won't save you much and I think £25k will be v tight

Agree £25k seems low. We're paying c.£43k for conversion with a dormer but no bathroom changes. But that's a builder's finish - then need to factor in carpets, decoration, additional furniture etc. Will be well worth it, but think you may struggle for £25k - none of our (Surrey) quotes were even close - and that was before all the extra costs.

Agree with everyone else, £25k = £21k before VAT, I would very wary of any builder who was prepared to do a loft conversion for that in SE London. Why not get a few quotes from the various loft specialists and see what they look like? Don't forget to add 10% contingency.