Budgets on homes under the hammer nonsense

[sherbetpips]

Budget £5k - new kitchen, bathroom, plastering and windows. Yeh right. Drives me nuts and some of the kitchens are just one wall of cabinets. Just a bathroom fitted by someone else is £5k! So for those of you that have the know how and can diy are those budgets real?

Yes, if all the labour was d I y and thus not charged. And some of the shows are a few years old.

We fitted a complete new bathroom for £600 in materials, from an empty room. Still looks like new three years later. Two solid weeks work though.

You can buy a good quality sink, shower, bath, toilets, taps etc, plaster, tiles, flooring and accessories for that little? Wow feel ripped off now!

Well a lot of the properties on homes under the hammer are buy to let flats or two up two downterraces. They are fitted out with pretty basic kitchen and bathrooms and the people buying either do the work as part of their job or have good trade contacts who will give favourable rates due to the amount of work being put their way.

As pp's said, they will have 'contacts', do most of the labouring themselves/friends/family. IKEA kitchens figure highly and are good value. Bathrooms bought at ''trade' prices or in sales, same with flooring and windows.
When I hear of people paying many thousands for kitchens/bathrooms, I am sooo grateful that DH is very competent at this kind of thing.

Toilet + sink set = £140 from Wickes
Basic bath & panel = £200
Taps = £30 from Screwfix (x2 for bath and sink)
Flooring = £50 for basic cushioned flooring
Shower screen = £100
Basic tiles @ £10/ sqm = £100
Paint £20

Labour = £120 per day X 2 days

Other costs (plumbing, wastes, sewer pipe, etc) £100

There you go. Bathroom for a grand.

Kitchens can be bought dirt cheap from trade / ex display etc. Our plaster costs £100 per day. Painting is easy to do yourself.

Carpets from a trade supplier can be £5/ sqm + fitting if you want to buy that cheap.

We do lots of renovating and it's much cheaper to buy the bits yourself and get a tradesperson in at a day rate. Or do it all yourself if you're handy.

We've just put a huge two-storey kitchen extension on the back of our house (bifolds, u/ft heating, stone floors, roof lights, bedroom with balcony etc) etc for thirty grand doing all the labour ourselves (apart from a bricky who charges £100/ day and someone to sign off the electrics). It would've cost £120k if we'd employed someone to do it.

It does help to have a tradesperson for a husband.