Another "is £x enough" thread - full renovation

[Andthenanothercupoftea]

We had a house sale/purchase all lined up but it seems to have collapsed (waiting to hear from our vendor, but not looking likely). As with many other areas the housing market seems to have stalled a little and the only property that fits our location etc. requirements needs a full renovation.

It's cheaper than the previous property we had lined up and I think we could get about £45k together to fund the work.

Are my estimates below at all accurate:

New boiler and central heating system -£6k
New kitchen - £12k (likely Howdens, we have most appliances)
Carpets and underlay throughout (3 beds, hallway/stairs/landing, living room) - £3k
Replacement bathroom - £4k (no changes to plumbing needed, probably half tile)
Addition of ensuite £5k (including getting plumbing upstairs from kitchen - loo/sink and maybe shower?)
Plastering throughout (£3k)
Painting throughout (£3k - probably get someone in to do this properly with just white throughout and we'd do our own colours afterwards slowly)
New skirting boards throughout -?? Not even sure who would do this?
I'm guessing some electrical works - ??? £3k? (Literally no idea, but probably hasn't been touched in 30+ yrs)

That would give us some contingency. I know it's all about "how long is a piece of string" but would be good to know if we're in the right ballpark, particularly given recent increases in costs of materials etc.

For context:
It's a 3 bed house (relatively small e.g. living room is 5mx3.7m)
We are in Oxfordshire
We'd be aiming for mid-range finish (durable for a family home, nothing fancy)
We have a couple of trusted friends in the trade who would be able to advise on the project management side (and would likely do at least some of the work)
Would like to get everything done within 6months to a year

I think the rewiring seems low as I've recently paid £12K. I had quite a few quotes and this was one of the cheapest.

Carpenter could do the skirting boards. A lot of your estimates seem quite low to me (I'm SE not London). In particular £5k for new en suite, £3k for all plastering - I've paid more than this recently.

Bathroom and plastering seems too low to me. We have just had a bathroom done, no moving of anything and we did it cheap at just under 6k incl all items and labour. That was me shopping around and getting discount codes etc......

Plastering you are probably looking at £500 a room for a skim. Do you need the ceilings down as well as that will cost more.

We required a 3 bed 30s house 10 years ago and it was closer to £5k

If you are plastering your whole house £3k is not going to come close and it is very short in supply currently.

Plastering is low.

Just paid £3k for 2 large rooms.

Rewiring, if it's a complete rewire, looks low to me too. Remember that unless they can pull wiring through, there will be a lot of plasterwork to sort out as well- and you'll be likely to want a lot of extra sockets and bits and bobs if it hasn't been done for 30 years- a new consumer unit probably too. I'd allow more like 6-8K for a complete rewire on a house that size, given what we paid here in a cheap part of the UK (NW) just over a year ago and I would assume Oxfordshire is fairly expensive for tradespeople(?).

I agree OP, I feel these estimates are a little low.

We have recently paid £400 per room plastering, this excluded ceilings. Room size ~4.5m x 5m. Hallway, stairs and landing was £1.2K, again excluding ceilings.

Just finished a rewire that all told would be about £11K plus additional light fittings (for a 5 bed).

Bathroom - quote was 10K, but that included a new ceiling, fit a new shower, toilet and sink. Half tile but a full tile around the shower. I imagine it'd be lower for standard re-fit.

Painting - quoted at £220 per day.

Carpets - cost of carpet per m2 plus another £10 for underlay.

I feel you are under estimating on much of your list

Lots of materials are currently unavailable or short supply many that are available have risen in price by 30% .
Any estimates for work currently will be different by the time you have the work done as its rising so rapidly

We've just finished a renovation and some of those quotes are quite low.

Carpets for just the upstairs have cost us closer to £5k. Flooring downstairs was £11k!!!

Plumbing and electrics can throw up loads of surprises which can make a budget spiral.

Painting is ok, as long as you stick to white. Just get them to do a basic and you do the colours on top.

Howdens seems about right for them.

Start looking for a good builder now as they are booking up fast!

I agree your estimates are a bit low, and however carefully you plan there will be unforseen expenses when renovating - hidden nasties under the floorboards, a dodgy bit of plumbing, the opportunity to do something really useful or amazing for a little bit more money.

Also don't forget to factor in temporary accommodation.

It often works out cheaper and quicker to move out (or not even move in) than to try and live through it.

When you say it needs work, is it liveable at the moment? If so, I'd say move in and wait at least 6 months before doing any work. That will allow you to really see how the house works and how you work in the house. It can save some costly mistakes later.

Services like architect your home are great for getting ideas on what to do without spending £££ on architects fees

Well out on bathrooms, if it’s 30 years old the plumbing will definitely need changing, adding a new en-suite where there isn’t plumbing or waste will cost a lot more than £5k. Plastering & decorators aren’t cheap, either. Could you save money by doing the painting yourselves?

Agree bathroom and plastering are too low. We are redoing our (tiny) bathroom atm. Quotes were £9k and £17k (!!).

Unfortunately most of that looks too low.

I think your bathroom and kitchen are too much. A bathroom with no plumbing alterations should be about £2k. A kitchen should be much less than £12k, look at symphony and gower rapide.
I carpeted a very large two bed for £1200.
Your wiring estimate is probably too low.
Joinery can be expensive as its time consuming to do well
Ive done 3 full renovations on large 2 beds (same floor area as modern 3 beds) and spent about £40k each time. If its an old house I suspect you'll find something hidden.
I would allow £60K for a 3 bed. Get yourself to your local builders merchants and buy what the builders buy in terms of bathroom and kitchen.

Thanks all! This was mostly based on our experience of doing a kitchen and bathroom 3 years ago - our kitchen was £9k and bathroom came to about 2k (but needed some re-jigging).

I'm also surprised about the plastering - the guy we've used recently has a day rate of £180 plus materials - I assumed 2 days per room but perhaps I was underestimating the time needed or maybe how much prices have gone up.

The ensuite was definitely me pulling a number out of thin air and is something that could come later if needed. As was wiring as it's not something we've done before.

It's in habitable condition, but I wouldn't want to live there as is for long.

We'd definitely be happy to do some work ourselves, like painting and ripping stuff out but we've had some disastrous attempts at some stuff before and either bodged or had to pay out to get it done again.

As for temporary accomodation we could move in with family for a couple of weeks whilst the worst was done and would move lots of our stuff into storage from our current property.

Seems like it may be worth investigating further if needed... Although it's the sort of property that's ripe for a small developer to buy and flip so may disappear quickly.

We are buying a 90s dated 4 bed, needs new boiler and probably heating/rads throughout, probably a full rewiring, we want to knock a wall down to make a kitchen-diner, new kitchen, new bathroom and ensuite (already in place) and all ceilings need a replaster. New carpets/flooring throughout.

Ideally in time we'd like a new garage door, front door, re-render a front section of the house, improve the patio'd garden and section off part of the garage to make a utility. These bits can definitely wait though.

I've budgeted £60k for that, with contingency to go up to £90k. We'll do a lot of the grunt work ourselves where possible.

You need to consider that costs for lots of materials have gone up enormously in the last few months due to scarcity and high demand.

You may have no choice but to delay work as jobs are taking longer and tradesmen are harder to line up.