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Thanks.
Well I think that we started stuff in 2020 and so costs were just way up, scope creeped and then you have unforeseen costs. I learnt to live with it and they were really helpful. I would recommend them totally as a business.
It certainly didn’t start with a 1 ! -
Robin Day reclining chair
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We've got plans for a downstairs extension, realistically next year. It will be a ground floor extension with new kitchen and a utility room/downstairs shower room added, possibly in the side return.
Meanwhile, we also need new electrics throughout and new and re-sited radiators (though not a new boiler, luckily). Everything in the house dates from 1940s - 1980s and no room is currently in acceptable condition.
Different builders who've come to look at the place have said different things about whether we could do it in stages.
Given that we could get the radiators moved, rewiring done, and then decorate the upstairs rooms and living room within the next couple of months, is there any reason not to do so other than the possible cost savings of doing it all together?
It seems like the disruption might be worse if every room was being attacked at the same time, whereas if we were to get some stuff done sooner, we could have nicer rooms to retreat to while the kitchen is getting smashed up, and feel like we were getting somewhere.
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Builders will always push you to do it at once without you there because it makes their life easier and means you're not going to around as much to oversee and medle.
From what you've say it sounds like you can do it in phases. If you can time the radiators with the summer will give you more flexibility on timing and project drift.
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Pretty sure all your big purchases were after you starting following me on insta.
Just saying… -
Been quoted £1500 to tile our kitchen walls and floor. Each would be about 4 metres squared. Is that not ridiculously expensive?!
Floor tiles are big but really thick so might be hard to cut? Wall tiles are very rough Moroccan tiles I.e not clean squares, so those will be a bugger no doubt.
Got no idea on this stuff, but anyone tell me if that’s vaguely reasonable? Can’t be two days labour I’d imagine.
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Our bathroom cost £1k and was a pretty complex job - so that seems fairly expensive to me. Especially if the floor tiles are large format
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Adhesive is actually pretty expensive and you need loads of it.
In my experience tiling is expensive, but also shows up poor workmanship. Make sure they’re good & asking the right questions. Try and get a personal recco from a detail orientated person that you trust. Think about the job very carefully - align floor tiles to wall, or cabinets? Where does the first full tile start and then where can you hide the cut ones? What happens at this or that junction etc. These are questions you want them asking too. Like all building and finishing, it’s all about attention to detail.
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EC are a rare beast of a design led architecture firm who actually also build what they design via their contracting wing. So in theory they are a step ahead of a regular firm who will either have a QS do a cost review or make a broad guess. Or not - and wait till tender returns come back high er.
Even so I gather on this project the initial design needed to be revised to meet budget.
My point is that until you resolve any design to a reasonably high level of detail - you’ll never get a real idea of costs. And bearing in mind the design and planning process may take 6-12 months + it’s no surprise that often tenders come in more than expected at the outset.
Some clients will weather this because they want what they want - others can’t and have to compromise.
Within reason - If you start a conversation with a client by being negative about what they want to achieve given the budget - the risk is they go elsewhere to someone else who tells them what they want to hear.
I think it’s unrealistic to expect architects to also be cost consultants (and yet the RIBA domestic schedule of services seems to suggest we should be)Architects are not trained in this at any point.
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But they’ll have a hell of a lot more experience than homeowners. I’d be paying for and expecting them to bring that accumulated knowledge.
Obviously a totally different beast, but I never under price furniture to get a job. I have to swallow the cost if materials are more than expected anyway so I don’t want to win a job only to resent it and the customer later.
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Yeah, I'm not bitter about it. There were times I was a little miffed.
I do think that their process has room for improvement in the first 1-3 phases of the schedule bc the costs were fairly out from what we were first presented with, to once we were at stage 4-5. Which wouldn't be a huge issue if you hadn't paid £10-15k to get to that point.Once you commit to the build, then costs can vary and unforeseen things happen, especially in old houses.
You are also paying a premium for a turnkey service which reduces the amount of stress - something which having had quite a stressful 12m with work/family I was very grateful for. I'm a layman about these things and would rather pay someone to deal with it than have it stress me out.
My wife worked out the final cost yesterday :'/
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Custom kitchen, under stairs storage, new buggy/scooter/coatroom, bathroom storage and wall of storage between downstairs bathroom and playroom.
The storage in the playroom was recommended by folks on this thread, so that surely!
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Sounds like you’re doing it right.
The most painful jobs I’ve run have been where a contractor has turned out to have underpriced and is then doing everything then can to claw back - getting contractural and inflating claims. It becomes adversarial and toxic.
It’s a very good reason to find a niche sector and stick to a group of contractors you have worked with successfully in the past.
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adversarial and toxic
Do you usually do contract admin on trad jobs? I know a lot of people lament the loss of influence but I'd really rather not. Heard from a (non-domestic) client about a year after we'd 'finished' a small project that they were still arguing over the final account. Very glad the QS was the CA on that one.
Pricing is a difficult one. There is some limited training in methods depending on where you study but it's very rare to find a designer who's actually skilled in it. Unless you're also the contractor, you're guessing what someone else will price it at, which introduces a different set of variables and some people think is pointless anyway. But of course if you're the client, especially an inexperienced one, you look to the designer to have some clue of what they're designing in relation to cost.
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How do I bathroom / kitchen / extension? etc.
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@chrisbmx116
It is very, very nice.
Re the budgeting I would be a little miffed if the architects got it materially wrong because that is part of what you're paying them for. I assume that the total eventual spend for the refurb started with a 2?