Extension thread 2022 part III.. celebrations, crises and will it be finished for Christmas?!

[NewHouseNewMe]

3rd thread of 2022 - can't believe I'm still here!

Sorry not been on in a while, been training for a new job.

glass saga continues, well it’s gone quiet and we have no glass fitted but a few faulty panels stacked out the front 🤷‍♀️
haven’t started tackling the snagging or dealt with any final bill so it’s all just on hold.
tbh that might be a good thing as I’ve noticed a few settlement cracks here and there - I hope they’re just settlement! That will need some attention.

@SheriffCallie that all looks amazing! The automist system founds clever! But I’m intrigued that your building control insisted on it, was never mentioned here. Don’t actually know where we are with building control in terms of what is still to be signed off.

Hope everyones projects are moving forward!

I need to order a sink for our new kitchen! Aesthetically a ceramic undermount sink (we are having brass hardware, taps etc) would like nicer,😫 however I am assuming a stainless steel sink would be the practical option. Please give me your advice/experiences!

Thank you! 😬

I went for stainless steel and so far I love them. Had a ceramic double Belfast sink before and it was getting chipped, but still nice, and it lasted a long time - put in before we moved in.

our glass saga may be nearly over, another delivery this week, the guys seem happy enough finally and are due to try and start installing next week.
but first they have to put in some extra brackets as they aren’t convinced the track that comes for the glass will take the weight. I’ve given up being interested now!

have booked a cleaner for a post build deep clean for Tuesday, will see how she gets on, but hoping to keep her as a weekly cleaner now I’ve gone back to ft work.

snagging list not started on yet, new cracks have started appearing, but hoping just settlement stuff that can be dealt with easily.

how’s everyone else getting on?

We went for a ceramic sink, having had one at our previous house and really liked it! We had stainless steel in our rental inbetween and didn't like it, have to polish it to make it look more attractive otherwise the limescale etc really shows up. Ceramic really easy to keep clean. Have never chipped a ceramic sink but we do use a washing up bowl so nothing goes directly in the sink.

We've now moved in. Still got builders working on the snagging list but it is really tiny things now. It's been exhausting but we're getting settled. It's a very different space to our previous house so has needed some rearranging of stuff! The removal men were very confused that everything wasn't just going from one room to another with the same name!

We ended up cleaning both houses ourselves - the builders' clean wasn't very thorough so we did it again ourselves. Then had to clean our rental for the tenancy end inspection! Regretting not booking professional cleaners although the timing was really tight so may not have been feasible!

Thank you @LivingInaBuildingSite and @RidingMyBike , I appreciate your feedback.

@RidingMyBike is there a particular ceramic sink brand I should be looking it, which hopefully won't chip?!

Can't wait for the snagging stage, we are still in the dusty, half finished room phase 😭

We’ve put a beautiful blanco ceramic sink in, I found our previous stainless steel one a nightmare to keep clean and shiny. Had a ceramic Belfast before for years in a previous house with no chips and no washing up bowl (have lined the new one with a Lakeland sink mat - worried I am clumsy and will break glasses!)

We had a Laufen ceramic sink at our old house which was still going strong a decade after installing. We've got a Howdens ceramic one now but only had it a few months!

Not quite finished for Christmas but 💯 finished for Easter,
The builders skip leaves tomorrow. The movers moved our furniture into the house last week Friday, sofas delivered yesterday.

The coming days we unpack to finally move in on Friday. OMG, I am beyond excited that 1yr after putting in our offer, 8 months after completing, 17 weeks after the builder started (the contract timeline was 12-16 weeks) we have our family home.

We went for a shaws of darwen ceramic sink. Its a double (1000) and i wish we had gone sightly bigger as its just a bit too small. I love how it looks though.

So glad that many of us are reaching the end of the work. I’m feeling pretty exhausted, I have quite a stressful job and I now realise that much of what helped me cope with work was having a relatively peaceful homelife. Being busy at home too has really impacted, so I’m looking forward to some nicer spring/summer weather so I can really enjoy the finished house and garden.
We are just tidying up the last bits, painting some internal woodwork, and planting some shrubs in the new borders. And waiting for the final bills 😬.

All in all I’m so glad that we did it when we did, we all love spending time in the new space. My favourite bits are the herringbone floor, the kitchen unit lighting, and the Quooker tap. All costing a bit more money, and that we considered cutting back on, but now seems worth it.

We will be applying to remortgage in the next couple of months so I’ll be interested to see what the surveyor values us at now. I think DH will want us to have added the equivalent value, whereas I am a bit more pragmatic and see it as money we have spent to make the house perfect for us.

Hi everyone. Been lurking a bit on this thread- still early days but already had to sack our first cowboy builder! (C.£30k down to boot) luckily found a brilliant replacement who is doing an amazing job so far and hopefully should recover some of the loss as he is doing a lot of the work himself and weee paying directly for the subcontractors/ material etc

Wondering if anyone had recommendations for aluminium sliding door companies? We need bespoke sizes which presumably rules out some companies, but any suggestions welcome!

@whensmynexthol1day , I’m sorry, that’s shit. That’s not a small amount to lose. Glad you are back on track and can recoup some of the loss. Any repercussions for the cowboy?
Our sliders are fab, I love them. Can’t recall the name of the company as building firm got them for us. Could look it out, but it’s an Irish company so prob no use to you?

@whensmynexthol1day we are using express Bifolds (also do sliders, windows etc not just bi folds) they do bespoke sizes.

Thanks both! We've given a date for the builder to pay us back an amount before we start to post about him on sm and report to trading standards. Sadly I think there's no point in legal action as im pretty sure he will be going bankrupt soon. Luckily we've found a new builder (ironically one of the sub contractors on our build that he hadn't paid) who is absolutely fantastic so I feel so much more optimistic
I've asked for a quote from express bifold- were you happy with the quality @Littlemissweepy? And were they reasonable value?

@whensmynexthol1day what a terrible start you have had but at least you have got back on track quickly. Good luck with the new builder.

Too early to say, they are still in manufacture and won’t be installed until next month. A family member has them and is very happy and we spent a long time at the show-room opening and closing them! Price wise they were cheaper than I thought they’d be but by then I was conditioned to everything being about 2-3 x more expensive than I had hoped!

Thanks! I'm waiting for a quote from them so we'll see what they say...

Haven’t been on in ages as nothing was happening.

today though, 4 guys on site, and first piece of glass has moved from the front driveway to the back patio.

not in place yet but it’s progress…

the glass saga has been tedious in the extreme but may be nearing its end today 🤞🤞🤞

First piece is in!!

And alarm man has finally turned up too.

The sun is shining, all adds up to a Good Day.

To Do List:

Security cameras - have a new number to contact

Patio glass balustrade - just waiting for glass to be installed Happening!

Downstairs loo: pick a mirror. Long bare walls atm - thinking maybe a large wallpaper sort of mural thing?

I keep adding bits
Including:
Broken tile in upstairs bathroom to be repaired

Broken edge of tile in kitchen to be repaired

couple of broken kitchen bits/edges of shelves type thing
missed bit of painting outside by front doors
issue with paint peeling on a bit of dado rail

Deep clean post build, need to find a company - have a recommendation, not contacted yet, may wait until an unknown point in the future! Have a regular cleaner now