Extension Thread 2021.....aka "where's the bloody builder?"

[Callmejudith]

New thread!

[quote wonkylegs]@MissFritton65 oh no that's rubbish at least you noticed quickly.

Update on my dad - he's all ok, I think the shock was too much. He's back at home but having trouble sleeping in the house. There's still a lot of clearing up to do as they basically emptied everything all over the house. Burglars are real shits.

On a more positive note the decorators started today and I'm now trying to decide on the central feature light - finding it hard to narrow down from these 6 [/quote]

Top right of the four images is my favourite, modern but not harsh, and looks solid and easier to clean if needed.

Where is it from?

Happy NYE everyone, getting excited that 2022 will be the year the house is transformed, fingers crossed!

@PoshWatchShitShoes how did you get on with the decorator, are they going to make good the stairs? Agree that with your amazing finish elsewhere that the stairs weren’t acceptable.

@NewHouseNewMe and some others, snap on the kitchen. Horrible old dark varnished wood here, hit and miss whether there are handles on cupboards and doors, Lino on hard concrete floor with holes in, laminate worktop with holes worn in. Dodgey 80s brown tiles. The works!!

@MissFritton65 love the navy quartz too, so unusual.

@StrongArm sounds like a bumpy start with neighbors and planning ,but wtf about their bath draining into your drive - you have leverage there!

@wonkylegs so sorry about your dad, hope he’s on the mend. I love the light on the bottom right on the photo of 4, reminds me of a rhythmic gymnastics ribbon.

@Badgerooney I am hoping to start April too, sounds like our projects and timings are similar.

@Sewfrickinamazeballs next week, how exciting! Yes I expect your neighbors should be grateful your garage has held their up for so long. Make sure if they want your builder to shore it up, that they pay.

@Sewfrickinamazeballs

Builders start next week. What's the etiquette re kettles etc. I'm happy to buy a second one and provide tea/coffee/sugar and milk and let them get on with it but not sure where to set it up for them. What did you all do?

So nervous the costs are just going to spiral. It's keeping me awake at night. The builder has quotes for everything down to door handles so not many expected costs to add, just all the unknown stuff.

Also, next doors garage is leaning on ours and ours is being demolished next week! She (she rents the house to our wonderful neighbours) is sending her son around on Monday. Not sure what he thinks he can do. Expect our builder will be calling her pretty soon to ask her what she wants to do. I don't think we are liable to pay for it as the garages aren't attached, just very close together.

We got a white £8 supermarket kettle and stuck it on a temporary table by a power pint in the extension space with tea/coffee/sugar and milk. When there was no power available, we made them a drink in the morning before we left, my husband popped back at lunch and made them a fresh one (when he was local). To be fair they didn't expect us to make them any hot drinks though.

Also when it was roasting hot (ours has taken forever and spanned all of the season's!!) I filled empty coke/lemonade bottles with water and stuck one in the fridge overnight and two in the freezer so as I could take them out in the morning and they would gradually defrost during the day and still stay relatively cool .

Happy New Year everyone and good luck to those starting and finishing projects!
We had our kitchen designed yesterday by Wren which was very exciting! Although we plan to buy from DIY kitchens. Looking to start our build in March so not that long now. Planning was approved Christmas week and building reg drawings being completed in Jan along with structural engineer calcs start of Jan. I'm a little bit worried about finding somewhere cheap to live 🤔

@GardensandGrandDesigns

Happy New Year everyone and good luck to those starting and finishing projects! We had our kitchen designed yesterday by Wren which was very exciting! Although we plan to buy from DIY kitchens. Looking to start our build in March so not that long now. Planning was approved Christmas week and building reg drawings being completed in Jan along with structural engineer calcs start of Jan. I'm a little bit worried about finding somewhere cheap to live 🤔

This looks great, and super similar to our layout.

Happy New Year everyone - especially those just starting off and those who just enjoyed Christmas in their new kitchens.
Our extension and room is ready for the arrival of the units from DIY kitchens sometime next week ( not good with telling me which day!), then it's order the quartz worktop, possible electric underfloor heating and LVP to finish
This weekend's mission is to order an undermount sink and tap. Anyone with any experience of Franke sinks and taps? Thinking of a pull out tap but I'm always conscious of our very hard water.

Spent the day at the flat yesterday cleaning and awaiting IKEA’s delivery of the missing items. My kitchen fitter has informed me there is a problem with the worktop. The stairwell is too tight ( 1st floor no lift) for the worktop to come up the stairs. Will need to be about 4 m long and a second one about 3 m long.
This is my appeal for help! Does anyone know of a way round this? He is suggesting using a wooden worktop and doing a couple of joins, but I am really not keen. I have a wooden worktop at home and with the best will in t e world life gets in the way and I don’t care for it properly. As it is a rental property I can’t expect tenants to care for a wooden worktop, the constant drying, mopping up, oiling at least monthly etc.
Could a worktop be lifted in via the window? Here’s a pic, there is also a second window which is unobstructed. If anyone has any advice I’d be most grateful!

Feeling low on inspired ideas to workaround your problem, sounds like it will need to come up in pieces and be joined in situ - why does that mean it has to be wooden though I wonder? Agree wooden is a bit of a pain if heavily used, I loved my wooden island top in last house but it took a lot of maintenance and never looked pristine for long.

@whataboutbob

Spent the day at the flat yesterday cleaning and awaiting IKEA’s delivery of the missing items. My kitchen fitter has informed me there is a problem with the worktop. The stairwell is too tight ( 1st floor no lift) for the worktop to come up the stairs. Will need to be about 4 m long and a second one about 3 m long. This is my appeal for help! Does anyone know of a way round this? He is suggesting using a wooden worktop and doing a couple of joins, but I am really not keen. I have a wooden worktop at home and with the best will in t e world life gets in the way and I don’t care for it properly. As it is a rental property I can’t expect tenants to care for a wooden worktop, the constant drying, mopping up, oiling at least monthly etc. Could a worktop be lifted in via the window? Here’s a pic, there is also a second window which is unobstructed. If anyone has any advice I’d be most grateful!

Are they sure it's too tight? Have you checked on some sofa websites. You can input the stairwell dimensions and size of the sofa (worktop in your case) and it lets you know if it will fit.

Otherwise, I think it's a case of how much money you want to throw at it. I'm sure you could hire a cherry picker and lift in through the window but I guess it depends on access below.

Maybe they are suggesting wood so they can feather the joins better but not sure.

8 days till our work starts!

Any tips for things that you wish you had done at this point?

Any ideas for what we can cook with a microwave, air fryer and instant pot?

Thanks for your thoughts @Sewfrickinamazeballs and @Littlemissweepy. I hadn’t thought of the sofa website and will have a look. I’m kind of inclined to believe the kitchen fitter, he is very thorough and he tells me he did a plywood template and tried to manoeuvre it up the stairs. We might be looking at a cherry picker, you can hire scissor lifts eg to get big furniture up. This feels like the renovation that never ends!

Cherry picker may end up being the best way to go. Probably not as crazy expensive as you might think. Hope so anyway.

Pic through the lantern of a rainbow today*. One more day before builders due back. Hope they can finish off the kitchen before we completely move out of the old one.

*can’t figure out how to post it, will try after dinner!

Happy New Year all 🥂

We are supposed to be moving back in a week tomorrow!!! The builders are being so fucking slow though. I've really had enough of them.

Lots of small jobs they need to finish!! Main builder guy is having some medical issue that will hopefully abate just for him to get his guys finished!!

Hope everyone is well. Fingers crossed for anyone pushing to the end stages

@Classicblunder my main tip is to choose wall colours fairly early on and order sockets and switches as soon as you can. I still haven't ordered mine and now the ones I like have a 4 week lead time 🤦🏼‍♀️, so the electrician will need to come back in a few weeks and we'll be majorly short on sockets when we move back in.

Good luck for your works!!

@Sewfrickinamazeballs the light is from here m.beautifulhalo.com/height-adjustable-modern-wood-chandelier-multi-light-36w-led-warm-light-starburst-chandelier-in-acrylic-shade-for-restaurant-cafe-bar-p-317178.html

We are edging closer to completion today Tiler has started this morning
Decorator did the majority between xmas and new year and is coming back next Sunday to do touch ups and outside
It looks fab in the sunshine today

The portaloo disappeared just before Christmas... I found the replacement!!! 😠

My master bathroom that I've never used grrrrrrr.

Hi all!! Sorry had a bit of a break from all things build. We had a lovely Christmas and have absolutely adored using our new space.

@PoshWatchShitShoes oh my holy god to that toilet I would be RAGING. But I am also lol that you’ve still not ordered your sockets!!!

As suspected our builder has gone awol with still bits to finish on the outside and a velux which doesn’t open. DH’s friend reckons we can bet the outside done separately for much less than we owe the builder. Going to speak to one of the lawyers where I work and get their input. What id to do is write to the builder and say “you have x time to complete xyz or we’re using the completion money to use someone else”

Decorator is back tomorrow to finish the downstairs loo and get started on the hallway. I need to work out the budget for what we have left to do (it will surprise no one that I spent a fortune on extra Christmas shit to make everything pretty)

Ok off to read the whole thread

[quote wonkylegs]@Sewfrickinamazeballs the light is from here m.beautifulhalo.com/height-adjustable-modern-wood-chandelier-multi-light-36w-led-warm-light-starburst-chandelier-in-acrylic-shade-for-restaurant-cafe-bar-p-317178.html

We are edging closer to completion today Tiler has started this morning
Decorator did the majority between xmas and new year and is coming back next Sunday to do touch ups and outside
It looks fab in the sunshine today [/quote]

Thanks. I have almost bought from them before but saw the comments on the Facebook page and made a hasty retreat. Might be worth checking first, even just on lead times as they come from China.

@PoshWatchShitShoes

The portaloo disappeared just before Christmas... I found the replacement!!! 😠

My master bathroom that I've never used grrrrrrr.

I'd be fuming!

Morning to my fellow renovators 👋

I'm on site. It's busy. I've started having furniture redelivered this morning. Probably a stupid idea from a potential damage perspective, but I'm fed up now!!

Hope everyone's weeks have started well!

Hello and HNY all!

All quiet since the Christmas break started but builders back today.

Sorting out fiddly bits in the kitchen like cutlery drawer inserts etc.
No news of when electrician will connect everything, or gasman for hob, etc etc.
I’m aiming for zen status as I’m sure this will be the year it’s finished 😂

(Until I start on something else…!)

Hope everyone is having a good week back
The tiler has got off to a great start this week, photos attached. The tile was a replacement as the one I wanted wasn't available and I wasn't convinced I'd like it but now it's down I do.
Also he's really quite a canny guy so we've had a nice chat over a cup of tea today which was great as the kids were driving me mad, they really need to go back to school! Roll on tomorrow.

That looks good @wonkylegs they should age well with time. Glad the site’s busy @PoshWatchShitShoes it’s good to get that feeling that things are moving forwards! I had a good start to the week too. Good chat ( over the phone) with kitchen fitter who fortunately has abandoned the idea of a wooden worktop. The only way in is to cut the worktop outside the flat and do a join once in place. I know this probably sounds horrific but I’m willing to go for it to move things forward. After that it’s paint the hall and bathroom, and install vinyl flooring and then ( I hardly dare say it) were done! I’ll be popping over on Friday to check on progress and discuss last details. Looking forward to it! Good luck for this week to all on this thread.

@whataboutbob good news that there's a work around to the worktop issue. The fitter must be used to working with joins.

@wonkylegs tiles look lovely. The exterior of the building is so warm and welcoming 👏