Daily rate for various trades in London?

[Crumbelina]

So DH has finally agreed to get some professional help with our house renovation (he's been doing all the work himself for the last 2 years!). It's been a struggle as we have a 16 month old, but DC2 is now on the way and I refuse to live in a building site for much longer!

So our first task is to get some windows and doors bricked up and after getting some quotes it seems that bricklayers are £200 a day! Currently wondering why I bothered going to university? I guess it's not that surprising. We live in SW London and I'm sure that supply, demand and house prices means we attract a lovely premium price.

Just out of interest then, can I ask people in London how much they've been quoted recently as a daily rate for trades, please? I'm thinking electricians, roofers, general labourers, plumbers, plasterers, bi-folds/sliding door installers, etc. Obviously lots of people will be given a set price but any information will be gratefully received. Oh, and could you mention which part of London you're in please, e.g. NW, Central.

Plastering can be approx £250 a day. Like you OP I should have got a trade rather than degree!

The building sheriff site may give you some ideas. Is SW Richmond or further out?

Another option is to get tradesmen from outside London and put them up at a 'Budget hotel'. It can work out cheaper.
Do you have links outside London?

I have found that the rate are generally extortionate. Quotes for different jobs have worked out from about £200/workman/day to probably best part of a grand. On the other hand, MIL managed to find a semi-retired local decorator through a message board in a shop and he worked out at about £80/day. We are currently getting a lot of work done by an experienced builder who is new to the UK and work out at 100-120/day depending on hours worked. He's very professional and reliable but not very familiar with UK material and techniques so needs a lot of hand-holding lol

Wow, up to £1k! Strangely enough though it doesn't surprise me that much.

We're in Kingston which is just south of Richmond. I guess we're just going to have to suck up the costs as we don't have links outside of London unfortunately. We'll make savings because we'll be doing lots of the project management ourselves and not hiring a builder.

It's a difficult job but I can't begin to imagine how much mark up builders must add?!

I think they want to earn a decent amount, need to allow for periods with no work, vans, tools, adverts etc. Just make sure you get at least 3 quotes for a job. Also ask your neighbours for recommendations. Ask each tradesman how long a particular job would take and be careful with any wild estimates - eg one plasterer told me that my hallway would take him + assistant 11 days to plaster and cost 5k. From experience, I thought it should be a 3 day job for 1 person. In the end got it done by a guy who took about 30h and charged £600...

It's not like they'll be earning a fortune on £200 per day. Based on five days per week and 48 weeks per year it's £48k per annum... not a massive London salary.

Also, everyone say get a minimum of three quotes, nobody gets paid for quoting, this might take a day each week so that reduces their income to closer to £40k.

CuthbertDibble, I'd say that's tons of money - double of hairdressers, drivers, bank assistants, and more than most architects, teachers, nurses, dietitians etc. basically more than most people in graduate jobs... Not to mention plumbers or electricians who seem to be on 60K+/year.

Does it defo work out cheaper getting independent trades in? Sometimes the general builders get their workforce at a lower rate and make their margin on the mark up, the benefit being the worker gets regular income and you get a 'project manager' (use the term loosely) in the general builder. It might be worth you getting a quote from a building firm to finish the job off. I know a couple of firms who cover your area but they mainly do big refurbs.

£180-250 per day based on the skill level involved. Electricians and plumbers charge the most, decorators and basic odd job guys the least.

I never really understand why people assume a tradesperson should charge (or indeed earn) a lot less than them because "they have degree". Well done but so do a lot of people. Having been self employed myself, they will set their rate based on the cost of living (with no paid holidays, parental leave for sick kids, no pensions or sick pay etc) plus the cost of insurance, equipment wear and tear, keeping a van running etc. £200 a day rapidly diminishes when you consider all that stuff. I offered to help out a mate who was setting up as a chippy with his accounts and worked out there was no point him going to a ltd company straight away as his earnings would be under the higher tax threshold. As a sole earner in the SE, that's in no way a great salary. I manage loads of people with degrees, including Masters and PhDs and I can tell you, not all of them 'add value' the same way a good carpenter does

They will also charge what people will pay because of the extent to which their skills are in demand. As you do, presumably.

Well, quite. And that's why I mentioned supply and demand, particularly in London. I'm not being critical of the wage they earn. More than anything, I'm quite jealous as it is a good wage (especially the cash in hand element) and maybe I should have taken a different path. Then again, I do understand the instability/hidden costs and the quiet period in Jan/Feb.

I also work with people with Masters and PhDs. In fact my research company is full of them and I quite frequently despair at the lack of common sense displayed by some (not all of them) and how they relate to/empathise with members of the public when conducting interviews.

Anyway, I digress. I think that we're likely to save money by employing independent trades as I'm guessing that the price per square foot is around £2k+ which would make our extensions around £100k. Our current (very approximate!) estimate is that we might get away with £60k. Maybe ...

Thanks for all the advice and information all!

£200 a day doesn't seem like a lot to me. I'd expect to pay that, and I'm not in London. They do have overheads so it's not all in their pocket. And at the cash in hand...there are plenty of tradesmen that are honest with the taxman. You shouldn't assume that you can get cheaper rates because you suspect they're avoiding tax.

Well our bricklayer arranged a date with us to start the work and has subsequently disappeared and gone no contact! I guess £200 isn't worth getting out of bed for.