175k am I bonkers? Pricing a potential renovation....how??!

[Greenlife1]

Might be being a right wally but how do people figure out how much money they need for a house that needs a shit tonne of work doing?!

Been looking for AGES. A house has come up in the (very small search) area we are looking at. It is 3 bed and we need 4. It is a 1960s dream. Nothings been done to it in the last 60 years apart from a newish conservatory and a little extension.

We would need to fit in a new bedroom so that could mean either a loft conversion or extension to the 2nd floor (not sure if planning would be given for the 2nd floor extension tho) would also need a little extension downstairs (possibly possible through PD).

Would like to move kitchen into the extension once we've built it. The kitchen would need to be redone. Would like to move and open up the staircase as it's really dark and awkward. Would like to make the integrated garage an office/ utility space.

I imagine it needs new boiler and rewiring.

The bathrooms need doing but they could wait or we could do them on the cheap.

Everything would need plastering once sorted and new flooring too!

I think we would have about 175k to spend if we got it for the price we would offer.

Any ideas how I can price this up for a very rough guide?!

Thanks x

That is far from typical though. Our 4m x 6m extension was three times that

When was this though? It's noticeable how much higher costs are now compared to the last time we did a renovation.

Around 3/4 years ago. The major costs were materials. They have no doubt gone up.

The main thing I was trying to show was how much cost can be saved by doing a lot of the work yourself.

DH taught himself how to do dry walling by watching YouTube videos. It helps that he is very practical anyway but take your time and a lot can be achieved.

Our mantra was 'overall effect'. Our house is not a listed building so good enough really is good enough. A bespoke kitchen would be out of place. We went for DIY shed kitchen carcasses with doors from an online supplier who had a more interesting range. The internal baskets etc were bought from a different online supplier which saved a fortune compared to B&Q prices yet were the exact same thing.

Builders like Howdens kitchens cupboards because they come ready constructed. They also get sizeable discounts which the customer never sees.

3-4 years ago is an entirely different world in terms of costs though both labour and materials costs have gone sky high since then.

I suppose a lot depends on individual circs too. What sort of work did you and your DH have to fit the renovation around? I've seen friends manage to do a lot themselves but they often had supportive extended family too. We wouldn't physically be able to do it ourselves, partly because we don't have the skills, but also full time jobs involving travel, having an infant school aged child and no family support.

@Greenlife1 can I ask you why it was not worth going high end for your last kitchen? Is it because you don’t notice the nice fixtures and fittings after a while, or you discovered they didn’t really make you happy? I’ve always made do with what was already in the places I rented or my current home, and dream of having my own quality kitchen one day.

builders just finished my works today. 10 week plan has taken nearly 6 months . Trades ok, main contractor was nightmare- bully, aggressive and increasingly so as project he was supposed to be managing ran out of control

i have spent £65k on around 90m2 of warm platform flat roofs, reinstating 2 large doors, a skylight, new patio, raising floor of a room and insulating. Re- rendering rear.

no new foundations, kitchens, bathrooms etc.

that price was 30% more than quotes I got in January this year ( the £65k waswgreed in April). Those builders pulled out for more lucrative work. My builder now claims to have made no money - possibly hasn’t as he screwed up so much that additional work was needed to make good the shambles

As I said, it was more about demonstrating the cost savings of doing as much as possible for oneself. We had no family assistance. DH fitted the work around his job. I fitted the project management around my own FT job.

The footings had to be dug by hand as it wasnt possible to get a digger into the back garden. That job alone saved a couple of thousand.

People do tend to frighten themselves off doing things for themselves but there is a lot of information out there. YouTube is full of tutorials on all sorts of topics.

Why would I pay someone to put kitchen cupboards together when I am quite capable of doing it myself? The first one takes ages then by the time you get to the last one you are doing them in a few minutes. This was the job which always fell to me.

The DCs didnt need childcare but also they have grown up with DIY projects going on around them so learnt not to touch the things they were told not to touch. This was the latest of the many DIY projects DH has undertaken.

In last house we re did bathroom. It looked good. But Id rather have saved some £ toward retiring a bit earlier or a holiday or whatever.

There’s only so happy a new bathroom will make you.

@GnomeDePlume we’re mid way through fitting our new kitchen. It’s actually v straightforward, particularly if you take your time. It’s just common-sense diy really. Same for fitted bedrooms etc - and IME doing it yourself means you make damn sure it’s perfect rather than “it’ll do”.

Where the hell did you get £150K for a loft conversion? Mine didn't cost anything near that by a long long way.

Anyway, has it really not been touched since the 1960’s? Does that mean no maintenance for 60 years, no central heating, etc? If there’s been seriously limited maintenance for such a long time I’d be concerned about the roof, any chimneys, soffits being sound, render / pointing, etc.

Id imagine a replumb and rewire, some work to the roof, lots of insulation, new windows & doors, then the extension costs. Replastering. Some work on sub- floor might be needed.

Tge costs of the finish will hugely vary, as pointed out above. Screwfix white plastic sockets or Dowsing & Reynolds? Etc...

@GnomeDePlume
Costs have principally gone up due to materials costs
I was talking to a specialist contractor today and they said that the insulation they use has gone up 65% in 3 months and that was on top of a 22% rise earlier this year.
No look at that across the board and you can see why no matter how frugal you are at the moment costs are dramatically different from where they were even a year ago.

... and when you check the Land Registry for the actual sold price, they made absolutely no profit whatsoever.

@TheGander Good question! It just didn't measure up to expectations, and no, it didn't make me happy- it made me bloody pissed off most the time. Having to deal with irritating trades people and even more irritating imperfections just was so not worth the expense.

I could have taken my family for a very decent holiday every year for a decade and got a wren or ikea jobby and been happy I'd got a bargain. Also, I felt sickened with myself sometimes at how sucked into the whole thing I got..what with people not being able to make ends meet and there's me whinging over a quartz splash back.

It was about 4/5 years ago and I am a completely different person.

Don't get me wrong a nice kitchen is a nice kitchen but I've seen some fan upcycled/ reclaimed and high street combos.

@sazno its pretty retro....
That being said the windows look good and more recent. The conservatory is lovely which is interesting as I can't stand them usually! I've been told there's fairly new insulation in the roof but otherwise it's a complete doer- upperer!

@wonkylegs thank you. Its this that concerns me. I wonder if we can get tge house a bit (significantly) cheaper so we have a contingency for materials. I imagine material costs/ sourcing aren't going to improve anytime soon.

That’s brave to come to that realisation Greenlife. It’s true we get so suckered into the whole trophy home thing, it’s huge in this country.

I don't know, we have been uncovering some stuff in our house which looks like someone did it after watching a YouTube video and it's not pretty!

If you are / have been in the trade that's one thing but otherwise I think too much self taught diy is a risk.

The house we're renovating now (as in paying the builder to renovate!) had been done up in layers by people who didn't know what they're doing. We're basically stripping it back to a shell and starting again.

I've found the property you're looking at and I would say it looks very well cared for. If possible I'd live with the downstairs bedroom. Maybe make airing cupboard an en suite into back bedroom initially. Family bathroom is large and could be made smaller perhaps?

I think it’s essential to shop around. We’re doing a loft conversion, ground floor extension (small) and general refurb and our first quote was around £500k + VAT. Having had a few conversations with other builders now it sounds like that is far, far too much. I also expect costs to come down as people shelve projects due to the recession, I think some builders are already adjusting their prices to keep themselves busy but others are hoping to hold on.

Some things you can do yourself, others not. Obviously not gas, electric, or IMO roofing, unless you have special skills. I also include plastering, because you can't just do it slower as you can other jobs if you're learning/amateur.
We have stripped out jobs here that, given specific things we have found, and what we know of previous occupants, I'm pretty sure have been done by either incompetent pros or pros willing to do a cheap nasty job, rather than amateurs. If you're an amateur at things like decorating, bricklaying, putting up studding and the like, and you take time to watch videos/read regulations and articles by manufacturers, etc. and use your common sense about whether a youtube video is being done by an idiot, you can work out how to do a lot of things.
Our plasterers have a high opinion of My Bluemongoose's battening out- he's not a trained carpenter, but takes a long time over it, far more than a carpenter would do, but every batten is bang-on vertical and flat with all the others. The plasterers tell me that they have insisted walls were re-battened on some jobs where a pro carpenter has made such a bad job of it they said it would have been impossible to get the boards and plaster flat. They suggested the first time we came that we had a go ourselves if we thought we could do it, as they didn't know even one chippy they'd recommend for the job, and were so pleased with what they got to work with that we did the same with the next lot- the end result in both cases were lovely smooth walls. Mr Bluemongoose is on with battening out job no 3 now.

I’m agog at the 25K for kitchen cabinets

“FWIW, our kitchen is not high end or bespoke, but cabinets came to 25k, worktops 8k, sink/tap/appliances 9k”. but is not high end 😂😂? a 2400mm long worktop piece in b&q is under £300 , at 8k you had granite, which is high end
a standard kitchen from howdens/wren/b&q is around 15k
What the hell you’re talking about??

Sounds probably about right. We are about 60k into a 2500sqft Reno.

So far done - new plumbing, new central heating, radiators, full rewire, boiler, a mid range bathroom - nice fittings/ cheap tiles, new carpets upstairs and a 2/3 skim, renovated original double glazing 20 large sashes and upgrade to slimline double glaze glass. Mates rates for everything bar the windows and plaster. No markup on materials as own sourced.

About to get two new rear doors in - that’s expensive at 6k.

Make sure you get a reputable builder. Have payment plans set up, so they're doing the work as you're paying the money. Personally I'd get insurance but that's because I had a horrible time with my builder, but above all get everything in writing, quotes should be actual quotes, not estimates (my builder tried that shit with me ... it didn't work!). Have contingency but don't tell them that. Others I'm sure will have good tips - good luck