For those that have lived thro' a loft conversion

[jalopy]

How long does it take to knock through the ceiling, install the stairs and for sanity to be restored? Breakthrough stage is almost upon us. Is this the worst part?

The stairs is almost the last bit before you get your house back to yourself. They have pretty much done everything upstairs by then. It really depends whether you are getting them to decorate for you or not.

Adding - remind yourself that it is worth it

whole process should take roughly 8 weeks depending on what rooms your new loft will be in bedroom plus bathroom just a plain room etc. dh is a loft conversion specialist!

Agreed, SP - ours was about 10 weeks, but we added a lot of non-related jobs onto it.

our guys went in and via the scaffolding as long as poss, using hole in roof , which became dormer.
knocking through was bad iyswim , as then they are then in the house, fair amount of dust and noise, but they were still in the loft, and used stepladder.
new stairs went in, in half a day.
it is worth it, extra space is great, and a very light room , we have dormers back and front

i mean , "in and out" of course

I went out for the day and when I got back all was neat and tidy on break through day.

I found the plastering worse tbh - lots of dust

perhaps it depends on the age of the house, ours being victorian terraced, lots of lath and plaster, horse hair etc, seemed to = lots of dust.

Thanks. Did anyone cover upstairs doors with plastic sheets to stop dust going into other bedrooms? Or is it not worth it?

ooohhh, and another question...what sort of flooring did you choose? Laminate, hardwood or carpeting?

didnt find that dust travelled a huge amount, but dusty house anyway

chose carpet, as figured it would sound less noisy when beneath it.

It only takes a couple of hours to knock through the ceiling and installing the stairs doesn't take long either as they were ready made and just slotted in. If I remember rightly we went out of the day and they were in by the time we went back. We had to have a wall taken down as well which was the only hairy bit as we had temporary bannisters on the stairs to the ground floor for a week or so until the carpenter could come. DS2 was only 12 mths old at the time so we had bits of board covering it all up.

Still, we were quoted 6 weeks which ended up being 13 so hopefully for most people it would be better organised and the carpenter would get there much quicker.

It really wasn't that messy so we didn't bother with dust sheets although the builders started using the stairs to get to the loft once they were in and put sheets down on the stairs when they used them. I think we just closed the bedroom doors.

We had carpeting in the bedrooms and lino in the bathroom.

how much does it cost - just a vague price for a loft conversion.?
We are selling our house and not decided whether to go for a 4 bed(not much to choose from) or a three bed and get a loft conversion

when they knocked through for the stairs I wnet out for the day and when I came back all was tidy and a set of stairs in .

they put dust sheets everywhere and sealed up all the rooms so that any dust wouldn't go too far .

As most of the work for a loft is done via the roof then knock through should only be a day. Then you can start to see that it will be worth it in the end !

gemmie - Ours was about £35k for a loft which is approximately 35ft wide. We got 2 bedrooms and a small bathroom for that.

gemmie - it depends on what kind of loft you want and size. do you just want a bedroom or 2? an en suite? a velux or a dormer? do you want a complete loft conversion or a budget one? Also depends on which area you live too and prices vary across the country.