Has anyone had a chimney breast removed recently?

[lalalonglegs]

My friend has bought a house and wants to reconfigure the ground floor and possibly the upstairs as well. There is a 150cm wide chimney breast in what is currently dining room and back bedroom. She has been quoted #4000 to have them removed which seems steep - I've never done this work so I don't know if it's madly over or whether we're being naive. (Live in London so prices to tend to be ridiculous toppy.)

The removal of the chimney breast itself should be relatively cheap - what will cost though is putting in RSJs to support the chimney once the chimney breast is gone. Unless the chimney itself is being removed?

No, chimney still there so just the chimney breast on first two floors will go but remain in the loft which she wants to convert so could the RSJs used for that also support the remaining chimney?

I don't think so - RSJs for lost conversions tend to run from side to side across the house, from one supporting wall to the other, whereas, assuming the chimney is on a dividing wall, the chimney RSJ would have to sit running front to back IYSWIM. A structural engineer would be a good idea to be honest.

Yes, you're probably right re: engineer. Still #4000 - it's a lot. Anyone done this recently?

I was quoted about £5k for a similar sounding job

sounds reasonable to me - I assume this includes all the making good, plastering etc? Quite a big job all that

I think I paid almost £3,000 for a small flue to be sorted out rather than a chimney breast in 2006, so I think the price she has got is good. I would second titchy and say I think getting a structural engineer in would be a good idea too.

We had our chimney breast removed on Monday. No need for an RSJ, the builder inserted two brackets of some description, which were passed by the building inspector and structural engineer. Not sure of the csot as it was done as part of some other building work we're having done.