New build- what should you pay to include and what to do yourself?

[squashie34]

Just as the title suggests, we are buying a new build house and have been shocked that pricing up all the upgrades/extras it is over £20,000 added on to the cost that we need to pay if we want the developers to do it all for us. I know that developers over charge for many aspects of these, so I was looking for any advice on things that people believe we should get the developers to do and things that would be cheaper to do ourselves?

For example, we want granite worktops but they are almost £4,000 - would it make sense to have the cheapest kitchen and then get these installed ourselves after?

Another one is All of the bathrooms are only half height tiling and the other half it's 000s- again is it worth just taking what comes as standard and getting it retiled or should we just get it done for ease?

Any advice gratefully appreciated!

I won't see the point in having one thing installed to rip it out?

For example when I took old laminate out it left damage and marks on the wall where it was attached. You would have to fix that.

Also laminate you would probably have a sink with a drainer where with granite it may well be an under mounted sink.

With filing they would probably put some sort of edging at the end of the tiling so you could not just add more. Also would you be able to source their files as they probably buy jn bulk direct from somewhere.

Currently in a new build 6yo. With hindsight: granite worktops totally worth it and agree with points above re sink and drainer. We have half height tiles in en-suites and bathrooms and been completely happy with that but paid extra for full height over bath so we could put ima shower screen when kids were older which was worthwhile. I wish I'd paid for half height tiles in the WC, standard was paint and skirting. Definitely get someone else to lay turf it's terrible quality from the builder. I've had extra sockets added later by an electrician, cheaper and no hassle. Probably worth getting ceiling spots as hard to retrofit. I wish I'd got an outside tap at the front as well as the back.
We decided to go with the builders flooring so that if there were other problems they would be liable. This was helpful as they can several times to adjust doors and when we had a leak that damaged wooden floor they just replaced it

I'd think about how much damage will be done taking out the standard stuff as it will really bump up the cost of replacement.

Granite worktops are pretty pricey (been there, done that) and there are also plenty of bad companies and fitters around (also been there). At least if you get one of those with the builders install it's covered by the snagging! There's a good chance that taking out worktops and any upstands will damage the walls so you might need some plaster repairs, almost certainly need to repaint. PP is correct re sinks too.

Tiling is also surprisingly expensive. And again, if you have any problem with your bathrooms then it's the builder's problem. We've had two (minor) leaks in our new build bathrooms but one of them was in a wall which backed on to the bath so was tiled full height. At one stage it looked like the whole lot was going to have to come down and if it did...it was the builder's problem to get replacement tiles, pay for it, refit them. As it was a skillful tiler managed to pop out a small area but they still did all the legwork to fix and replace. I suspect they wouldn't have been doing that had I retiled the walls. Ours aren't full height tiled everywhere, we only have tiles in baths/showers.

Our turf is also shit, but they're probably going to replace it. That said, our house was complete before we ever saw it so the turf was already in.

It also depends on how much hassle you want. I didn't want to live in a house filled with white walls, so we moved in on the Friday and our decorator came round on the Monday and painted the whole place. Two weeks from moving in and every room was decorated, all the light fittings were done, I'd made and sorted all the curtains and it already felt pretty much like home. From day 1 the kids could play in the garden. That's kind of one of the nice bits about a newbuild - you can move in, park your bum on the sofa and do very little.

Definitely get quotes for anything you are debating over as trades costs are really high just now.

Agree with others. Best to get the developers to do work inside the house. It will be more expensive than getting independent contractors in but you will get the work done in reasonable time. Granite is a great worktop choice. Had mine for over 10 years. Cost about £2500 sourced directly from a wholesale supplier. Well worth the cost. Still looks like new.

Builders are over run with work at the moment. There is also a huge shortage of building materials and massive price hikes due to heightened demand. So you might wait a long time and not save very much money by getting the work done independently.

Agree local gardening service and plumber fine to do the outdoor works

Thanks all this is super helpful!

We are moving into a new build next week and got the developer to provide everything. We are moving 100 miles and wanted to be able to walk in with everything done and know it was all insured. It was a massive chunk of money so I was scared at the time to part with our savings, but I'm so glad we did it now. No worries about levelling the floors or getting tradesmen in.

We got the builder to do anything messy or difficult to do afterwards - so if you like the bathroom tile options, get them to do full height if you want full height as adding extras won't be easy. We got the induction hob from them as it was the same price as RRP (so we could have saved a little bit on the purchase cost) but we didn't need to worry about disconnecting a gas hob etc. But we got our own flooring, got large fitted mirrors directly from the same company that supplies the builder, went direct to Hammond's for fitted wardrobes to get a better deal. We also weren't moving in on the day we got the keys so had time to play with.

What extras are you considering, maybe we can guide which ones are worthwhile?

@PlanBea

That's really helpful, thank you. I think we know for sure that we won't get carpets included and will fit those after to save some money as the price they want for that is extortionate. My OH used to be a carpenter so plaining the doors won't be a problem. Can I ask whether the built in wardrobes were much cheaper?

The list we have of extras are as follows, that would be amazing to say things you think we could do ourselves. We are moving back in with parents for 3 months as we have sold our house so we don't necessarily need to move in on day 1 either.

-kitchen upgraded cupboards, integrated appliances and granite worktops
-spotlights in kitchen and all bathrooms
-amtico flooring in hallway, kitchen, wc
-extra plug sockets around the house
-half height tiling in WC
-full height tiling in main bathroom
-full height tiling in ensuite
-external plug socket outside
-light above garage
-integrated wardrobes x2

I think that's everything! It's coming out around £21,000 to get TW to do it all.

Is that Taylor Wimpey? I bought a TW new build. If you want spot lights I’d have them put them in, we had them done by them. We did the carpets ourselves as our friend bought the same style property as ours and it cost them £3000 to carpet the house with cheap carpet, we paid less than £1000 for the same space to be carpeted.
We had extra plugs put in when I costed this up it was similar to having someone do it so I did it for ease. We had an outside tap and plug put in also.
We did full height in one bathroom and half height in the other, it hasn’t been a problem but if I’d of had the money I’d of full tiled them both completely. Tiling is expensive so I’d be tempted to just get it done.
I would be wary of getting it turfed by them as they dumped stuff in loads of peoples gardens on my estate and just turfed over it. Found all sorts when we did our garden.

I’ve never bought a new build but something a guy on our allotments said was really useful to know. He was a site foreman for builders but has been retired for 15 years. He said nowadays they put very little topsoil in the back garden - it’s literally as little as they can get away with, five or six inches.
As a result it’s really hard to grow things if you are interested in gardening. He advises paying for a deeper depth of topsoil, marking out your beds and putting manure on them, and getting a landscaper to lay turf independently.

Our kitchen (DIY painted shaker, quartz worktops, decent integrated appliances) cost just shy of £20k including fitting so unless it’s a very small kitchen that’s not unreasonable

We finished our build about 3 years ago and my strategy was to have the builders do the hard finishes (wood floors, tile, structural alterations, lighting design, Italian showers with rainwater heads, balcony railings, water filtration system, etc) because those are difficult or expensive to change. It was incredibly expensive and meant we couldn’t get everything we wanted, but in retrospect I am so glad that I had the builders do the things they did.

Things we ordered elsewhere and hired a handyman to install after we took possession of the house or otherwise outsourced:

• kitchen (it wasn’t included in the price, so we bought from the company we wanted it from and had them do the install)
• built-in cabinetry and wardrobes
• outdoor work (decking, plantings, etc)
• utility room and granny flat kitchen cabinetry (we installed ikea in both places)
• shower glass, taps, vanities and cabinets
• interior painting (this was a full 10k cheaper to hire a professional painter once we got the keys rather than have the builders do it)
• light fixtures purchase and installation

Bearing that in mind, from your list I think the things I would outsource later would be the garden and the built-ins. Those require no ripping out to install later and you won’t pay the markup.

Is your kitchen included in the price of your build? Honestly depending on how big your kitchen is, 4K doesn’t seem so outrageous for granite worktops. Mine are quartz and I think cost about 3-4K. If you are convinced thag you can get cheaper elsewhere, would it be possible to have the kitchen amount credited to your bill (provided your ‘extras’ spend is more than the cost of the kitchen) and then you can outsource it to where you actually want your kitchen from? I don’t think changing the worktops would be such a crazy difficult job, so if your budget absolutely cannot stretch, you could go for whatever is included and change it later, provided you’re happy to live with it. Just bear in mind that the supply and labour bottlenecks are likely to affect markets for at least another year, so prices to outsource might take you by surprise.

Forgot to add: the outdoor tap and light and all the extra sockets and the spotlights are definitely things I would have the builder do. Those will be a pain to change and I don’t think it will be that much cheaper to have an electrician/plumber to come and do it, so the value add of waiting would be little to none.

Built in wardrobes - I didn’t get from the house builder as we ran out of time and thought it would be cheaper to get them done later. It turned out they’re really expensive no matter who does them, so I wish we’d just gone with it.

Ours was already finished and kitted out with the most basic everything when we got it. If we’d had the choice:

• I’d have paid more for kitchen units and worktops I liked, as once it’s in it’s hard to justify the expense of taking out perfectly-good-but-not-my-favourite kitchen

• minimal tiling or splash back is fine, it’s easy to add tiles. For the main bathroom we re-tiled when we eventually added a shower to the bath, once the kids were older.

• if we could have had a bigger patio area with their basic (cheap?) patio slabs, that would have been great.

Our neighbours were the first in and they paid the various tradespeople already on site cash to do all sorts of extras.

Given your DH is a carpenter I'd be very tempted to do the integrated wardrobes yourselves - more because all of the ones I've seen in new builds are quite basic. Ours were included as standard but they're just a shelf and a pole and as a result they're an inefficient use of the space; the ikea PAX we had in our old house were far better in terms of what they held.

Amtico - same issue as tiles with potential leaks. We've actually had 3 leaks, two from showers and one when the outside tap froze. We didn't know there was a separate stopcock for it so I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of rapid running water and discovered the kitchen flooding from under the sink. We were very lucky in that I happened to wake minutes after it happened so I saved the floor but because it was within the two years the builders came out the next morning, replaced the tap and fixed all the plumbing and basically said "keep an eye on the flooring, if it starts to swell and lift we'll get it replaced" which they wouldn't have done if it hadn't been fitted by them. We're part of quite a big estate overall with 4 or 5 different builders and going by the facebook group leaks are really common in the early days so it's something to consider.

How much are they charging for the kitchen upgrade overall?

Oh gosh that's very expensive. So we reserved after that point so didn't get a choice, also meant we were able to negotiate money as house was nearer completion.

Granite definitely if you want it get it now.

We only have half tiles in bathrooms and have never felt the need to add more. We tiled the kitchen and I was surprised how cheap that was to get done so you might want to find out the cost although again for ease I'd do it before unless it was a massive saving.

Flooring is an area that can be negotiated on usually, we got all our flooring included without having to pay (again due to timing)

External socket was included but only cost £60 to get done in our last house.

We were too far gone for wardrobes, we negotiated £3000 cashback to get done ourselves but if done at the same time would have been VAT free.

My biggest disappointment is appliances, I would have loved induction hob and double oven but as I say too far gone and very difficult to do now without making a big mess and incurring large costs as a result.