House renovation 2

[derek kelly]

In less than half an hour we are going to view a property that needs modernising, it is only 15 years old & the asking price is £50,000 less than a house that sold a few doors away, the one we are looking at has a garage which the sold one doesn’t, possibly a decent profit to be had.

 

[andyBeaker]

In less than half an hour we are going to view a property that needs modernising, it is only 15 years old & the asking price is £50,000 less than a house that sold a few doors away, the one we are looking at has a garage which the sold one doesn’t, possibly a decent profit to be had.

Possibly.

Or possibly not.

Fifteen years old and needs modernising - begs quite a few questions!

 

[Pow-Lo]

Possibly.

Or possibly not.

Fifteen years old and needs modernising - begs quite a few questions!

Might just be cosmetic i.e. present owners have no taste and the inside looks like a 70s council house.

 

[andyBeaker]

Might just be cosmetic i.e. present owners have no taste and the inside looks like a 70s council house.

Will be right up,Derek's street then.

 

[derek kelly]

House belonged to an old lass.
Jobs to do, move wall to make kitchen bigger & lounge smaller.
New kitchen,
Paint walls.
Upstairs, remove tank & install combi boiler, remove tank cupboard & put in a new bath, shower etc.
Remove bath from other bathroom & make it back into a bedroom making the house three bed instead of two.
Remove stairlift.
In the garden, trim trees to open view of the fields,
That’s about it, maximum spend, Bev thinks twelve grand I think twenty grand.

 

[andyBeaker]

House belonged to an old lass.
Jobs to do, move wall to make kitchen bigger & lounge smaller.
New kitchen,
Paint walls.
Upstairs, remove tank & install combi boiler, remove tank cupboard & put in a new bath, shower etc.
Remove bath from other bathroom & make it back into a bedroom making the house three bed instead of two.
Remove stairlift.
In the garden, trim trees to open view of the fields,
That’s about it, maximum spend, Bev thinks twelve grand I think twenty grand.

My tuppence worth.........

Assuming it's a stud wall I would estimate somewhere between your two estimates, significantly over the higher estimate unless you do a lot - a LOT - of it yourself. Assuming budget kitchen appliances and bathroom. Removal of stud wall may require the services of an electrician unless you are confident about moving/isolating switches/sockets etc yourself.

Dare I mention having a survey?

Consider making kitchen and lounge open plan, it's all the rage you know .maybe Install a serving hatch .

Depending on confidence levels you can do a lot of the donkey work on replacing boiler yourself - no need to pay a qualified plumber to physically hang it. in my experience plumbers are usually more than happy to do the connections and commissioning after the spade work has been done. And you can almost certainly get a boiler yourself significantly cheaper than a tradesperson will charge.

Find out what trades charge per day - I know what they are down here, you need to establish for your area. Unless you already have a working relationship,expect long lead in times so planning is essential,as every day you have the property it is costing you money.

Don't forget to include all the costs like additional stamp duty, council tax, etc and rubbish removal (not cheap!). Establish ceiling price for sale,- absolutely essential from the outset.

And a general piece of advice - anything unexpected tends to 'be a thousand pounds' to rectify. It's the law.

Good luck

 

[andyBeaker]

@derek kelly consider opening a trade account at Howdens - their kitchens are excellent and, importantly, the carcasss come readily assembled (saves a ton of time). Negotiate a heavy discount from their starting quote - they will match Wickes all day long and in my view the Howdens product is significantly better. Added benefit is you can just go to the showroom and collect any bits you need as they have pretty much everything in stock. Their design service is free and in my personal experience worth using, albeit I noramally change a few things.

Any particular reason you are looking at ripping out the boiler and tank and replacing with a combi? That's a big part of the renovation budget - is it really necessary? Updating controls is usually straightforward and a much cheaper option.

 

[derek kelly]

@derek kelly consider opening a trade account at Howdens - their kitchens are excellent and, importantly, the carcasss come readily assembled (saves a ton of time). Negotiate a heavy discount from their starting quote - they will match Wickes all day long and in my view the Howdens product is significantly better. Added benefit is you can just go to the showroom and collect any bits you need as they have pretty much everything in stock. Their design service is free and in my personal experience worth using, albeit I noramally change a few things.

Any particular reason you are looking at ripping out the boiler and tank and replacing with a combi? That's a big part of the renovation budget - is it really necessary? Updating controls is usually straightforward and a much cheaper option.

The tank takes up useful space & will need to go to make way for a bath.
There are several kitchen showrooms who sell their ex display units at greatly reduced prices, bathrooms we can get from a local auction.

 

[andyBeaker]

The tank takes up useful space & will need to go to make way for a bath.
There are several kitchen showrooms who sell their ex display units at greatly reduced prices, bathrooms we can get from a local auction.

Devils advocate question - will not having a bath put buyers off?

It sounds like a fairly small place that is likely to appeal to couples.......so I would suggest 'no'. But it might put people off with very young kids.

The point I make is that a relatively big spend needs to be balanced against narrowing your potential market - It is so, so easy to spend money unnecessarily that doesn't add value - which is what it is all about.

Ps plastering will always cost a lot more than you have budgeted for - it's the law. I now make what I believe to be an educated estimate then double it for budget purposes. Seldom disappointed.;(

 

[derek kelly]

Devils advocate question - will not having a bath put buyers off?

It sounds like a fairly small place that is likely to appeal to couples.......so I would suggest 'no'. But it might put people off with very young kids.

The point I make is that a relatively big spend needs to be balanced against narrowing your potential market - It is so, so easy to spend money unnecessarily that doesn't add value - which is what it is all about.

Ps plastering will always cost a lot more than you have budgeted for - it's the law. I now make what I believe to be an educated estimate then double it for budget purposes. Seldom disappointed.;(

About 35 years ago I moved a bedroom wall & did a decent job of plastering it, I then ventured to build a wall to separate the lounge & diner, I even installed a double socket into it, I am fairly confident I could still do a decent job however we do know a few people we can turn to ifwe struggle.

 

[slim63]

Ps plastering will always cost a lot more than you have budgeted for - it's the law. I now make what I believe to be an educated estimate then double it for budget purposes. Seldom disappointed.;(

About 35 years ago I moved a bedroom wall & did a decent job of plastering it, I then ventured to build a wall to separate the lounge & diner, I even installed a double socket into it, I am fairly confident I could still do a decent job however we do know a few people we can turn to ifwe struggle.

Plasterer= £100 a day plus materials & a decent one will finish a moderately sized room in a day on board, its prep patching & piddling around that takes the time so the more you can do yourself (properly) the cheaper it gets, but ......... if your prep is shite any decent plasterer will tell you to sod off & refuse to touch it so find out what he requires before you start

 

[andyBeaker]

Plasterer= £100 a day plus materials & a decent one will finish a moderately sized room in a day on board, its prep patching & piddling around that takes the time so the more you can do yourself (properly) the cheaper it gets, but ......... if your prep is shite any decent plasterer will tell you to sod off & refuse to touch it so find out what he requires before you start

You can't get a decent plasterer down here for £100 a day - shows the importance of knowing prices locally.

 

[andyBeaker]

Plasterer= £100 a day plus materials & a decent one will finish a moderately sized room in a day on board, its prep patching & piddling around that takes the time so the more you can do yourself (properly) the cheaper it gets, but ......... if your prep is shite any decent plasterer will tell you to sod off & refuse to touch it so find out what he requires before you start

One of my constantt battles Istrying to stop plasterers going over everything, holes for sockets in particular. Worst I have had is installing central heating in a property, removing the radiators, putting the screws back in the wall to mark the holes for the brackets and the effing plasterer took them all out to make his life easy. He couldn't understand what the issue was. Well, he did when I didn't pay all his bill.

I have a project on the go at the moment where we are going to use 'shadow gaps' in the plaster for the first time - adds quite a bit of labour costs but does away with the cost of architrave, skirting, etc along with associated labour. I think it looks pretty nice as well.

Along these lines....

 

[slim63]

One of my constantt battles Istrying to stop plasterers going over everything, holes for sockets in particular. Worst I have had is installing central heating in a property, removing the radiators, putting the screws back in the wall to mark the holes for the brackets and the effing plasterer took them all out to make his life easy. He couldn't understand what the issue was. Well, he did when I didn't pay all his bill.

There are two sides to that to be honest, a screw or a nail in a wall presents a danger to the plasterer, they have to be fairly quick to do a decent job at a decent price, simply put they shouldn't be there, leaving them in shows your inexperience & lack of understanding of the danger they present ................. first off it takes weeks to break in a new trowel (even supposedly pre-broke ones) if he nicks the edge on a screw every stroke is going to leave lines until he can wear it down again so the job is going to take longer & cost more
Worse than that a plasterers main tools are his hands & his hard won skill, a gash on his trowel hand can put him out of action for weeks, plaster gets in it & it festers, seen this happen more than once ! ...... so remove the damn screws etc to keep him safe but measure up & make a note of where they are to make your life easy later

Sockets get plastered over so that the face will sit flat when you refit them, you will often see a plasterer sinking a socket in further so he can do this, he should always cut out the excess when the plaster is almost dry, if he does not do this sack him as its part of the job

On the flip side plasterers that dont plaster down low enough on a wall to allow the easy fitting of skirting board used to be the bane of my life EG they know we are fitting 4" skirting & still leave a 6" gap, sacked a few for that in my time

 

[derek kelly]

I know an excellent plasterer, his sons have taken over the business but they aren’t a patch on him, he has done plaster work in a few of my houses, I may be able to tempt him out of retirement.

 

[andyBeaker]

There are two sides to that to be honest, a screw or a nail in a wall presents a danger to the plasterer, they have to be fairly quick to do a decent job at a decent price, simply put they shouldn't be there, leaving them in shows your inexperience & lack of understanding of the danger they present ................. first off it takes weeks to break in a new trowel (even supposedly pre-broke ones) if he nicks the edge on a screw every stroke is going to leave lines until he can wear it down again so the job is going to take longer & cost more
Worse than that a plasterers main tools are his hands & his hard won skill, a gash on his trowel hand can put him out of action for weeks, plaster gets in it & it festers, seen this happen more than once ! ...... so remove the damn screws etc to keep him safe but measure up & make a note of where they are to make your life easy later

Sockets get plastered over so that the face will sit flat when you refit them, you will often see a plasterer sinking a socket in further so he can do this, he should always cut out the excess when the plaster is almost dry, if he does not do this sack him as its part of the job

On the flip side plasterers that dont plaster down low enough on a wall to allow the easy fitting of skirting board used to be the bane of my life EG they know we are fitting 4" skirting & still leave a 6" gap, sacked a few for that in my time

Despite my 'inexperience' I agree with everything you say ...... but when the plasterer has been briefed about the radiator brackets, agrees to work with them (I don't care how, as long as the screws are back in when they are finished) then just ignores it there's not really much to be said!

Very few Plasterers in my experience (inexperience?) go back and carve out socket holes....until they are reminded!!

We have a couple of really good ones on board at the moment and we do our best to keep them on board with tea and bacon rolls!

 

[andyBeaker]

In less than half an hour we are going to view a property that needs modernising, it is only 15 years old & the asking price is £50,000 less than a house that sold a few doors away, the one we are looking at has a garage which the sold one doesn’t, possibly a decent profit to be had.

Did you get it Derek?

 

[derek kelly]

Did you get it Derek?

No, not getting into a bidding war.