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

Not the cooker but that is freestanding and we already had it

would you recommend the kitchen?

where did you get your flooring please?

Me?

Yes for the price it’s decent. However HMKC kitchens are not actually solid wood, they are largely veneer and mdf (although this is better for stability and you wouldn’t know once painted). They have a perma sale situation so never pay full price.

thanks @user73

Building Regs first came in during the 1960s so hopefully the house itself is structurally sound. The estate our first house was on was 1960s and I can't think that any of the houses are needing roof replacement (DM lives there so we go back regularly).

Any house built before the advent of central heating is likely to have sone woodworm.

We bought a 1930s bungalow to renovate and had to replace a number of floor joists and all the floor boards. Not as expensive as it sounds as DH did all the work. It did however mean that we had a couple of weeks without floors so picking up a tool left on a window ledge required hurdling joists to get there.

No floors also created comedy moments if someone knocked on the door as we would be 2 feet lower than expected!

I would agree with pp who said live in it for a while then try to do it a bit at a time.

We are in the USA, not a very expensive area but anything related to home improvements seems to cost a fortune.

Currently having bathroom redone (a plumbing problem forced us to do it as fast as possible. We have a cheap spec, acrylic bath surround, vinyl floor (we wanted tile but few contractors offer it and for various reasons we needed someone to do the whole thing together rather than trying to find different contractors for different bits).

Anyway it is costing us $21k, not including the cost of the vanity or mirrors. I spoke to 4 different companies and that was the lowest estimate. And we had a 10 week wait for them to do it.

I feel like that is an insane amount for a fairylow end spec but it does seem to be what it costs at the moment.

@Aria999 thank you, that makes me feel a lot better! Whenever I watch HGTV they always seem to create magnificent luxury bathrooms for peanuts.

Well if you are so painfully aware that houses cost much less around the country, why did you launch into a comprehensive breakdown of your costs and a resolute statement that the OP must double and add 100k onto their proposed budget without any idea where they lived?

I live in SW London & you don't need 350k to do work. Also don't find work costs more in SW London as opposed to North, West or East London!

Look, it’s okay to have different views based on different experiences. The OP did not initially specify where she is - though from subsequent posts it seems she’s in a remote location which brings its own challenges and potentially extra costs.

I don’t know how much building works cost elsewhere in the country. I assume building material shortages, supply chain issues, wage inflation etc are not unique to London.

The fact you can get a new house on the cheap, in various parts of the country, doesn’t mean you can renovate an old house for the same price, unless you’re hiring Persimmon as your contractor.

Take a look at the Extensions thread - there are many posters there going through massive stress because they’ve run out of money due to the current market. Maybe you think it was wrong of me to warn the OP, but it came from witnessing and experiencing how difficult it is to manage a build currently. I don’t think I should apologise for that.

Of course if you do all the work yourself, are an architect with a spark DM, contractor DH and plumber MIL, your best mate runs a timber yard and your DSis is an interior designer, you can save lots of money. That’s a fairly unusual scenario though. Most of us have to rely on external professionals to do the work, and pay market prices for their goods and services.