Big house renovation experiences

[sdra]

Hello
Thinking of buying a house which needs a lot of work. It's structurally sound and has electrics, water etc but needs a lot of tlc as well as some internal configuration including knocking some walls down, converting garage and moving staircase. No extension build needed. Also needs new kitchen, bathrooms and windows. It's got planning and in dream location. Could be completely beautiful and I have visions of adding solar panels and water filtration system and making it well insulated etc etc so it's greener too.
Never done anything like this before. Not even put in a new bathroom. Is this crazy?! I think we could just about not live there while it's done depending on how long it would take (6 months??) Does this seem realistic? Or should we try and get a caravan and live there while done. Or would you advise to steer well clear?!

Don't live there. Be back later

Don't live in it. I've just had a lot of work done to my house. New windows, render, internals doors, flooring etc. No new kitchen or bathrooms. It took 8 months and was horrific to live in. As you would be doing more I would say to not live in it until it is pretty much complete. I'm not sure a caravan for months on end would be any better.

We've done this. It took about five months in the end which is longer than we'd thought. We stayed in rental throughout. Make sure you're somewhere near the house as queries will come up and you'll need to be on site to answer them. One or other of us goes on site 2-3 times per week.

Ours is fully managed by the building company, so they charge 18% on top of the cost of anything (eg bathroom) to deal with the supplier, chase up parts, coordinate all the trades etc.

It's cost more than we thought. We'd originally budgeted £150k and it's ended up at £180k. They can't fully predict prices until they get stuck in and find things they weren't expecting!

Look out for smallish incidental things that add to the costs. You'll need empty house/renovation insurance which is a LOT more expensive than normal house insurance. We needed to pay a structural engineer for plans for new staircase and for a beam to go in as it turned out a wall was unsupported. You also need to pay for Building Control.

It is worth it - we'll soon be moving into a beautiful house in a great location - but it has been stressful. I think we're also far above the ceiling price for the road, which I'm not worried about as we intend to live there longterm, but we wouldn't make back the money we've paid at the moment. Hard to tell though as it's also the biggest house on the road!

Good luck! Happy to answer questions.

We've done this / are doing this and living in it. The living in it is super not fun but obviously we've saved on rent. Windows were a huge expense - £30,000 for wooden sash windows, and it took about 6 weeks to fit them which was hugely disruptive. The DUST from knocking down walls etc. was horrific. I have no idea how much we've spent - but we've also done everything we can do ourselves, ourselves, ie painting, tiling, fitting the kitchen etc. We've still got one more bathrooom to go and lots of little things to do - such as putting the skirting boards back in the dining room. I love the house now, but it has been really hard and I will never do this again.

Sounds like it will cost about the same as building a new house.

We’ve done it and lived in it. Did it in stages. Roof off, with tent over and lived downstairs. Then once new storey was completed, we did the knocking through downstairs. The only time we had to move out for a week was when the heating and boiler were ripped out and replaced. Being without a kitchen is the most disruptive. You need a brilliant builder. Also need to put stuff in storage and live with just the basics. I liked being on hand to make all the many decisions. Absolutely essential to have a portaloo for the builders, so you can keep your own bathroom private. The dust is unbelievable, it just gets everywhere. Also you need to tell your insurance and mortgage company if you’re doing major works. Worth it in the end, but you need to stay calm throughout to stay sane. We managed with kids and dogs, but had ‘zones’ that were safe and weren’t being worked in. Never again! But better than moving.

5 bedroom big semidetached in an expensive bit of the north west. Quoted before lockdown and they kept to the quote. We budgeted £175kand it came out at about £200. About £10k unexpected issues and the rest stuff we added on.

big extension, new kitchen, moving a staircase, internal reworking, 2 new bathrooms and new plumbing system.

we looked at putting in air source heat pump, but just couldn’t, despite best efforts, insulate the house enough.

but if you are going to do it, now is the time as you’ll need different pipe work and radiators and/or underfloor heating.

first thing we did was a very detailed budget, everything including decorating, carpets, new furniture we’d need, curtains, refurbishment of flooring, the garden being reinstated and new paving…

it’s all possible, but you’ll need a decent contingency, and a good builder.

we lived in it, the worst bit was the bathrooms…lot of dust. And the moving of the staircase…
lit would have been a lot quicker and easier if we hadn’t been living there but it was really handy being on site to stop stupid stuff happening and to make sooo many decisions every day. So I would probably do that again…

I’m doing this OP 😁 completed on a bungalow yesterday which needs a HUGE renovation, there’s nothing that won’t need to be changed. DH & I have 0 experience of renovations either, but we’re soooo excited! It will be our forever home once finished

We are doing this. Not living in it- as well as the added stress, living there can add cost and time as the builders have to work around you.

will be worth it in the end (I hope). But we’ve found inflation has hit buildings works hard- make sure you have a realistic idea about costs.

Did it but lived in rented. It was a tiny flat to keep costs down but there was no way I could have lived in the house. I have heaps of allergies and dust was crazy.

Best money we spent during our extension was renting round the corner. It was more than our mortgage but the build was completed quicker and it kept us sane.

Lead times on builders can be crazy. Do you have kids?

I have done major renovations a few times. Both of my last projects I did not live there as it would have been impossible. The key things are you need money - sounds obvious but budget well as it dwindles much faster than you anticipate. Also you need honest, reliable trades people. I had a nightmare with my last house as I had relocated and did not know anybody, I had the good the bad and the ugly which added so much more stress to it - get recommendations rather than online reviews like Trustatrader. Be prepared for it to get much worse before it gets any better and don't lose hope that it will! It can be incredibly rewarding in the end but you do need deep pockets and a lot of patience.

Thank you thank you this is so helpful! Just at work but will come back to this. We're quite scared but also v excited at the possibility of creating something lovely. But scared of the money pit and also worry of house prices etc etc but feel like we need to just go for it.

Price it up, get advice to check you are not spending more than the value will increase.
We are about to embark on a massive project and n what was a bungalow that has been poorly extended multiple times, extension gutting and reorganising. We are so excited and it will be fabulous when finished, but I know we are going to go through hell doing it.

How did you find fitting the kitchen? Considering doing this ourselves as we're pretty handy but slightly nervous about it.

You say it has electrics but are they recently updated and with a new ish fuse board? Easier to re-wire at the empty stage than later. Also consider plumbing, would it be a good idea to get any floorboards up before decorating? We had to replace the pipe coming into our house during renovations and make it larger to support two showers at once (planning for the teenage years) and it was easier before new flooring went down.

Windows being replaced is cold in the winter!!

@LostSleep to be honest DH did it - to my design. He fitted in the kitchen in our last flat too so I knew he could do it. We used really standard IKEA carcasses, painted the cupboard doors, gave them really nice handles etc. - and then we've got concrete countertops that DH cast in place which I LOVE. They've not grey because he used Snowcrete which is white, and then we added dye so they're pale pinkish. They cost about £10 (if you don't include DH's time - and that was a couple of weekends) and he found out how to do them from a YouTube video. Everything was mixed in a bucket so no concrete mixer etc.

You don’t need to do it all at once, do it in stages and live there as it’s being done.

DD and family bought a very dilapidated rat infested house and have been living in a static caravan for two winters. They may be in by Christmas this year! If your house is structurally sound your top priorities should be insulation, plumbing and electrics. When you say water filtration system, do you mean reed bed? They need a lot of care and people have got nasty infections from them. Get a modern water treatment system aka septic tank. Solar panels? DD would have loved these but their roof can't support them (Victorian slate) It's nice to dream but do your research! Good luck.

puffykins bravo your DH!

We have done this three times and lived in all three times. There are benefits to being on site and to not being on site. The main issue at the moment is that prices are stupid so you need to think about what you can live with if you need to stop halfway through and save up more money to finish.

Don't live in it. Whatever your budget is, expect it to overrun by 20 to 30%. Whatever timeline they give you, expect it to overrun by 1 month for every 3 months estimated.

Currently doing this and living upstairs. I think we were naive about just how horrible this would be. The builders put a temporary wall/ for around the stairs to reduce the dust but it was still pretty dreadful when walls were being knocked down. If you can live nearby I would say it’s the best option.

We have no DIY skills so having someone overseeing everything for us has been invaluable. It’s meant everything has been well co-ordinated in terms of tradespeople and has minimised delays.

The other thing I was naive about was cost. Any thoughts I had about possible costs before we started getting quotes have been blown out of the water. I think because costs of building materials have gone up so much in last few years. In our case we also needed a lot more electrical work than we first realised.

Good luck!

With regards to the electrics - our house was 90s built with ok electrics. However, with a heat pump being installed, solar panels and battery, charge point for electric cars etc we’ve had to have them upgraded.