Builders mess - what are your top tips?

[Scaredycats]

We have builders coming next week to knock through a load bearing wall between our kitchen and garage. Our kitchen is still functional atm as DH will be removing the old one/installing the new one, and there’s no parts of the current kitchen on the wall being knocked down. I’m really worried about the builders dust. Would you take everything out of cupboards? Try to tape them off? Everything ‘freestanding’ is getting moved to the living room. Any tips for trying to save the rest of the house from dust?

Are you planning on trying to use the kitchen while this is happening? Because you won't be able to cook in there. Everything will be covered in dust and grit.

I'd take everything that you can out of the room, and cover anything you can't take out up with sheets or blankets.

Hang a sheet in the doorway to minimise the dust travelling to the rest of the house. It is like talc and hangs in the air, and gets everywhere.

I agree - empty all the cupboards. The dust will be immense - and the vibrations might break things anyway.

I put draft excluders against the doors - but to be honest nothing really stops the dust. I am still finding it and building work finished over six months ago!!!

Tape plastic dust sheets over the doors and empty all the cupboards, remove all appliances etc from worktops. The dust will get everywhere - you can't stop it, but you can minimise it by sheeting/taping over the doors.

Surly any decent builder will sheet as much of the room off as possible if people are still living in the house ?

yes it takes time to do it , but its part and parcel of working in occupied homes.

You cannot leave anything in the kitchen if they are knocking down a wall in there! That's crazy! You need to box the majority up and only keep out the bare essentials like 1 plate per family member. Make a temp kitchen in another room that the builders won't be working in, like a microwave, toaster and air fryer on a dining table or something.

Really, they don't! They huff and puff at every little thing you ask them to do. If you find a considerate tradesmen, look after them, there are very few about!

Like i said any decent builders.

Dampen the dust sheets, that'll stop most dust spreading.

From personal experience everything will be covered in dust, it doesn't matter what you do. It will get everywhere, learn to (briefly) live with it.

Lots of wine and restaurant dinners will help you cope. Try to keep a sense of humour.

The unbridled chaos will pass eventually and it will have been worth it.

Thanks, I’m not planning to leave anything out in the kitchen tops obviously, and almost unnecessary items have been put in storage. We’ve got a few mugs plates etc still in our kitchen cupboards so was not sure if we should empty them or just tape covers over the units.

@TheNoonBell would love a glass of wine but I’m also pregnant so having to get through it sober!

This, although from experience, dust still travels. A super decent builder (like my DH) will damp everything down with a hand held garden sprayer to reduce the dust further, but I know he's a rarity on this one!

Tape the edges of cupboards, as long as the tape won't damage the surface if left for a period of time. Clear all surfaces. Ideally set up microwave/toaster and a temporary tea station in another room near the bathroom. Minimise travel through the house if poss. Shut doors you don't need to go through and stick plastic sheet over. Dust sheet over furniture in adjacent spaces. You can't stop all the dust, can only minimise the impact. Good luck 🍀

Get a portaloo if you don't have a downstairs loo.

Protect any floors they're going to walk on (if you plan to keep them). When I've had insurance work done (they tend to be more careful) they used corrugated plastic sheets on the hard floors and rolls of sticky carpet protector on carpeted areas. Or just use any large cardboard boxes you can lay your hands on, open them up and tape them down.

Fix plastic sheeting across any doorways.

Builders honestly only care about what they're working on, in my experience, they don't stop to think about the mess they make.

All downstairs flooring is coming up, and we have a downstairs loo which is also mid-reno so they can use that. A good tip about doorways - I’ve ordered some door covers from Amazon for the living room.

When i knocked through , not a whole wall but plenty of dust i just sealed it up will plastic sheet , a few bits of tile lathe and duct tape the only difficult bit was trying to seal it on the stairs. It stopped 99% of the dust. But I wouldn’t use black plastic again , it just made it too dark.

Blimey. We have a temp kitchen with all open shelves. We've just had a load of walls down and up. We just wiped stuff off and carried on. Yes it was dusty but life goes on.

I could not imagine taping up cupboards!!!

You just have to grit your teeth and pretend it isn't happening.

I wish I had a magic wand to get rid of builder dust! Despite having very good builders who did their best, the dust is just a fact of life in a build job.

I live alone and in the end after three days, I gave up trying to live in the chaos. So I moved in with my dear sister. It's ten weeks now and two to go. I wish you well.

I will get a cleaning co. In to do a deep clean, the whole house is a dust bowl! Goes with the territory I suppose.

Think you mean you had grit in your teeth ………😬

We've just opened up a 4 metre opening between kitchen and garage, I taped plastic sheets to the ceiling to protect the old kitchen. I removed everything from the work tops but left everything in the cupboards and taped the edges with masking tape. Yes it is dusty process but I just wiped everything down at the end of each day and it wasn't as bad as I expected. The breaking through was months ago and has only just been plastered due to the other work required so we kept a plastic sheet up to cover the new opening and reduce drafts. Yes the dust is annoying but I've just increased how often I wipe down surfaces.

Henrys are far and away better at coping with plaster/brick dust than posher ones like Dysons. The filters don't block up as quickly/easily, though it's worth using disposable bags for building dust and knocking out the big fabric filter each time you change bags. Dysons can just give up the ghost completely when faced with building work; also the filters block up at the drop of a hat and cleaning the filters takes ages.

You can get special clingfilm-like stuff to go over carpets. Our plasterers use it, apparently it costs a lot but they put it over the star/hall/landing carpets when going up and down the stairs plastering veluxes on the landing and in the bathroom, and we didn't even need to vac the carpets after. I told them the carpets were long past their sell-by-date and we really didn't care, and I'd happily just put my old dustsheets down and vac afterwards, but they insisted.

We've just finished 2 yrs of renovations, but lived in a static van in the garden. I was grateful to be away from the dust. We had 1 room with some storage crates. We are still finding dust and grit INSIDE closed crates! Remove everything you can from the kitchen OP! When we had plastering/painting/glue things done- we covered the door handles in cling film. Also covered the flooring where the work people will walk, with either unfolded, large boxes or a plastic, protective temp flooring you can buy.

I would also recommend putting out as many bins or even buckets with bin liners in as you can- in the house and all around the garden! We had a skip out the front. Despite this, I would find sandwich wrappers, cans, costa cups, cigarette packets 'hidden' inside brick holes, garden pots, in the walls ir just thrown in the garden etc! 🙄

Tape up everything, including doorways. And don't let them use your vacuum unless you're happy to write it off!

If only! In my experience they see the house as a “site” for the duration rather than your home. It’s tough going through it but worth it in the end

Get some cleaners booked for when they finish, and at key parts of the build eg the day after they knock down internals. Also try and get your hands on a second hand vacuum cleaner that can be binned or kept as a spare afterwards.

We spent £50 on a basic builder’s vac-one of the best £50 we spent on our job!

Make sure Building Control is in place and regular inspections are carried out from the start and get a completion certificate at the end - this is the home owners responsibility but many builders organise it for the owner , just make sure they do !

if you are removing a load bearing wall you will need Engineers calculations and correct sized steels

don’t let your builder fob you off and tell you it’s not needed