Home DIY

He is all of those things and more.

Yes it's exactly the kind of thing it does well. Scraping with a carbide scraper is an option but it's physical and takes a knack.

to add to this, any decorator worth his salt would use an IR gun

nitromors is just dead time (for which you may be charged)

My core skills are joinery as in furniture making and anything detailed with wood, decorating like kitchen painting, furniture painting, high end decorating. I can fit make and fit a kitchen, so plumbing and electrical skills too. Bathroom fitting complete, like tiling, plumbing etc. I help long term clients with property maintenance too although I'm trying to get out of that.

I'm booked for a year and turn down new work pretty much every other day, I have people waiting 2 years sometimes. I know it seems a bit extreme but the work I do is the same price as everyone else but with a very high level of detail and I aim for durability of finish too. I basically have low overheads and try to work in my local area as it keeps costs lower.

I've spent 30 years doing the job on my own, very rarely taking on someone for a couple of months if the job is extremely physical. I have worked with one or 2 people I respect but most are happy to get away with stuff as long as they get paid and I care about the job being done as well as I know how and hopefully at least a little better than the client expects.

It is a little bit depressing when a client says 'That's much better than I expected' but in a way that suggests they mean. 'You could have done it worse and cheaper'.

Yep, that's me but with a beard.

thats fucking awesome! do you have a website/mybuilder profile link?

I've never needed to advertise so no online presence, no calling cards and no sign writing on the van. It's all word of mouth. If I wanted to start to specialise I would have to travel further and advertise, because my skill/tool set is suited to fixing any kind of household problem it's always easy to find work.

Fair enough!

2 bed flat though, how many circuits do you reckon? I'd guess maybe 6. Cooker, Kitchen Ring, maybe 2 lighting, 2 socket rings or maybe 1 and a shower circuit. If the CU isn't plastic it wouldn't be cracked, so wiring is possibly 70's onwards at worse. £100 or less for the CU and bits/bobs, £250 for a days work/signing it off + any extra stuff on top. Chances are they check the Zs at the most likely highest spot and whizz through the box ticking. Most obvious problem would be RCD tripping from a borrowed neutral on the hallway lights. If on the other hand you have to disconnect 60 12v downlighters to run an IR test, I can totally see your point.

Of course you could be cynical and suggest that they give you a low basic price then it's a lot of sucking through the teeth and chin stroking when the job starts and the extras pile up. Come to think of it it's not that cynical.

Of course you could be cynical and suggest that they give you a low basic price then it's a lot of sucking through the teeth and chin stroking when the job starts and the extras pile up. Come to think of it it's not that cynical.

standard fucking practice for the housing sector, but then 90% of householders are to put it bluntly, cunts

Hmm. In about 18 months I may be having an extension and need a new kitchen and bathroom.

Do you cover Charlton?

so £600 is definitely a lot then?

No, sorry. I'm based in Fulham.

Hard to say without seeing the CU/Wiring. Pics and we can help you a bit more. It's within the bounds of reason.

have haggled him down to £500 .. I'll post some pics tonight/tomorrow.

If he's seen it and assessed it on the surface then he'll have a better idea of what needs doing than we do. Just show us your crack.

Strokes chin...

Sucks air through teeth.

However a picture of the CU (with the lid off so we can see what the wiring is like inside it) will give us a better idea.

It is a little bit depressing when a client says 'That's much better than I expected' but in a way that suggests they mean. 'You could have done it worse and cheaper'.

It is sad that people expect shite work.

Just been quoted £3100 for a new combi boiler to replace the multi stage.

If it costs me £5k for a new wet room upstairs, that's a total of roughly 8k for the changes.

Will a bathroom / shower add more than that to the value of the house?

Or is it better fixing the current ancient bathroom first?

'You could have done it worse and cheaper'.

Who needs marketing consultants. This is going on my business card.

Will a bathroom / shower add more than that to the value of the house?

Probably not. Value comes from adding floor space, not from tarting up. Fix it because you're living there.

Any tips on getting to the point that you are turning people down two years in advance?

My brother has retrained (plumber, bathrooms,gas, kitchens), and while his work is tip-top, he is, let's say naive, when it comes to building a pipeline of clients for the future.

I'm back to parquet. The contenders for "bonding agent of the South East" are as follows:

Lecol 5500
SikaBond 5500s

Both of these require the mechanical (scraper) removal of the majority of the old bitumen.

BUT! In the black and oily corner we have:

Synthaprufe Original

Which being bitumen based is apparently happy to bond old bitumen (as long as it's flat) to concrete floor, and I can then sand the whole thing a couple of weeks later (or, more likely, be the cause of sanding).

Thoughts, LFGSS hivemind?

Note- I am cleaning the blocks up quite a lot so this maybe moot, and the Sikabond would be fine.

Lot of cleaning to do:

And the laundry room: