Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Property/DIY

Join our Property forum for renovation, DIY, and house selling advice.

Original poster

Extension quotes of £4,875 per sq. metre 😧

31 replies

KimKardashiansArse · 03/06/2017 19:38

I've had 2 quotes so far for my 16 sq. metres single storey extension (in the South East, not London) and both are £65k plus VAT (i.e. £78k). This is just the structure to a plaster finish with plumbing but no electrics. I budgeted £35-45k inc VAT.

Please tell me these builders just don't fancy the job and that this isn't the going rate for a little single storey extension to a modest terraced house. Sad

OP posts:
clockwotch · 03/06/2017 20:12

Have you had drawings and structural engineer stuff done? Because our similar single storey is coming out like that in Kent because it requires a huge steel to make it open plan and that alone costs £17k, so we've decided to go non-open (closed?) bringing the cost down quite a bit on other things too.

Badweekjustgotworse · 03/06/2017 21:23

Shock bolysbit that's a lot! We're in planning at the minute for a 38msq extension and if that's the price per sq we may as well just chuck it in and sell the house.

Get more quotes in asap op

Badweekjustgotworse · 03/06/2017 21:24

Holy shit = bolysbit according to the gerbils in my phone

3luckystars · 03/06/2017 21:26

Have you an architect?

Maybe you might not need to build on as much and change the layout a bit?

suze28 · 03/06/2017 21:27

We had a big extension a few years ago and the biggest steel, 23ft long, cost 2.5K. Clockwatch how does that compare to yours?

KosmoKramer · 03/06/2017 21:28

I've just had a 14 square extension and it cost £19k. That was including VAT, French windows and a velux. It made three extra rooms.

3luckystars · 03/06/2017 21:28

Gerbils!!!

clockwotch · 03/06/2017 21:41

Suze my understanding is (as my husband has had most of the dealings with this because I haven't had time with work) that it's not the length of the steel but the thickness, a T-shape so awkward to get in, steels for the ground work too to support it all and because we have limited rear access it was going to be a lot of work to actually get them in and then more building works around it all.

We've opted not to do it because it wouldn't have made sense as an investment on the house to overspend on it and not get the return when sold.

suze28 · 03/06/2017 21:46

Clockwotch Yes ours were like goalposts to hold up the steel, dug 1m down and filled with concrete. It was a huge job at the time. Our steel had to be double width. DH who works from home had to go whilst they were lifting it in as half of the back of the house was held up by those acro things (very technical I know) and he had visions of it all falling down!

clockwotch · 03/06/2017 21:55

Ah no I think we needed a big T in the ceiling of the room and then we also needed further steels in the ceiling and then we needed horizontal steels beneath the floor. Builders agreed it was overkill but engineers insisted based on an eu regulation. I think if we went ahead we'd be able to build 50 more storeys on top Grin

We had 3 quotes though and they were all the same Confused

suze28 · 03/06/2017 22:01

Clockwotch can totally see why it wasn't a viable option!

Crumbelina · 03/06/2017 22:14

Urg, I really hope it's a couple of firms with more than enough work and not the going rate. I live in SW London and assumed it would be around £3-3.5k per square metre for a fully finished extension. We're renovating a house at the moment and most quotes shock the hell out of us. Smile

Just to give you a laugh, we asked a builder for a quote for foundations for our extension, i.e. trench digging, pouring and levelling a bit of concrete. Should take 2 weeks and materials will cost around £5k. We waited 2 weeks for a quote and were told it would cost £35k! Bloody London!

I hope you get some reasonable quotes in soon. Good luck! Smile

Original poster
KimKardashiansArse · 03/06/2017 23:07

clockwotch yes we've got full building regs drawings with structural engineer's calculations for steels. I don't think it's the steelwork though because one of the quotes splits that out at £2.5k.

badweek yours is the kind of extension I'd expect to pay £78k for! I hope you have better luck than us.

3luckystars no architect because it really is tiny. It's a wrap-around extension that goes out by less than 2m. It just wouldn't be worth doing anything smaller.

kosmo I could weep reading your post. How did you find your builder? If you're anywhere near Berkshire can you give me their details?

crumbelina Shock at the £35k. I think I need to move to London and become a groundworker.

OP posts:
Original poster
KimKardashiansArse · 03/06/2017 23:16

I forgot to say that we've got 2 more quotes coming in (hopefully). DH is going to phone the two who have quoted to ask why their quotes are so high. I think I might post it on one of those job sites too.

OP posts:
NamedyChangedy · 03/06/2017 23:33

We're in exactly the same position OP. Single storey side extension, 1.6m and some internal refurb work (moving the utility room), pretty basic spec.
We've had two quotes so far, nothing under £65K. Based on our architect's advice we'd budgeted £35K, thinking that would be on the generous side. We have a couple of builders still to quote next week, really hoping they're more in that range...

3luckystars · 04/06/2017 08:20

I was just asking about the architect because I wanted to get a similar wrap around job done, and I showed the house to 2 separate architects and they both said 'move this room here, do this instead, you have enough room, it's just badly laid out'

I was just wondering if there was any hope that you could do the same and the size of the extension might reduce? It cost me €60 to get them to do a quick drawing of their ideas.

I would love to get a job done on our house too but your quotes are so expensive! You must be shocked because I am!

Loopytiles · 04/06/2017 08:22

We had 20+ builders round to quote for an extension (south east but not London) and if they provided quotes (many didn't) prices were sky high.

clockwotch · 04/06/2017 10:18

The builder we're going with is actually a friend of FILs and has been fantastic consulting with us, he's spent ages talking with us about options and trying to get the cost down for us. I think a lot of it is labour and materials cost - we need a lot of mud/rubble removing which is going to cost a lot. We've decided the costs will go up after brexit though because of material cost and potentially lack of Eastern European labour (hopefully freedom of movement will still be in effect though) so we've decided to go for the closed plan option and just add a box on the back and not take down the existing walls.

dancingqueen345 · 04/06/2017 10:52

Bloody hell that sounds rediculous! We've just put in for planning on a c. 30m2 extension and budgeting about £50k which based on high level quotes we've had back is totally do-able. I'm in NW though.

Fingers crossed for you that you get something a bit more sensible in!

Loopytiles · 04/06/2017 10:54

A related issue was that a lot of the builders we saw did not want to have a proper contract and wanted cash in hand for part of the job.

crazycatguy · 04/06/2017 10:56

We are in the throes of a 4mx3m extension with quite a bit of internal work. Quotes ranged from 21 to 43.5k!

averythinline · 04/06/2017 10:57

Sounds similar to here..w London I'm afraid ours is slightly larger at 24sqm but quotes 75k ish plus vat.....is only a box :( probably not worth the value but means we don't have to move so will probably do it anyway...

NamedyChangedy · 04/06/2017 11:01

Gosh Loopytiles 20+ quotes?! Our architect advised us to get 4! !

I'm now wishing we'd included more builders in the tender, as then I'd feel I had a firm answer - if they all came in at £60+VAT or more, then I'd know that's just the market rate.

Now sitting here with pencil and paper trying to work out what the plans might look like without our lovely extension. It's not a huge space we're asking for, but it would have made such a difference... Sad

Loopytiles · 04/06/2017 11:13

Yes and it took around a year to find a builder. Our project cost almost double what we'd guessed. Local friends (several) who invited 10 builders to quote only ended up with 3 written quotes, all £££. Seems lots of builders were really busy and not interested.

Loopytiles · 04/06/2017 11:20

From 20 builders we got 8 written quotes and five of those were resistant to having a contract.