Owning your own home

What's under the floor us the deciding factor for cost I believe. I.E. concrete pad / DPC Vs suspended

floor is laminate

👀

there is a chap in Bromley who does them, i know this because we are potentially buying a flat of the same vintage and design, engineers condemn them and fit wet heating as they aren’t qualified for warm air, lots of people like them and they are quite efficient plus you can circulate air in summer and even fit a cold air unit to them.

if purchase goes through we’ll be fitting a combi and rads because they dont do hot water and the flats have an ancient immersion buit into the wall in the bathroom which is not ideal.

agree about the rads though but who wants to be wearing a hat indoors..

If you lay new floors anyway there are ufh systems that don't add much height.
But might be difficult in a house because stairs, and probably not that nice when you already have low ceilings.
If I was going for a whole new install I would at least do some calculations, even if you stay with gas you are ready for a system with low temperatures later.

Any recommendations for non-wool carpets in beige/oatmeal colour, and also suppliers?
Tried Tapi which are a bit pricey, and some samples from designer carpets and online carpets. Wife wants something neutral and not grey.
Had a nightmare with wool moths before and want something soft for bedrooms.
We have a fitter lined up.

That’s literally the radiators we oped for.

You can’t really beat going to the carpet shop and checking out what they have for colour and texture, whether it’s your local shop or a big Allied. The Internet is no good at texture 😀

I should add here that we have anthracite column radiators and they heat up very quickly and maintain heat after the valves have closed.

YMMV

Posted this before Christmas but the campaign to community-fund the Ravensbourne Arms needs help, if anyone has a little spare cash and desire to see a community owned live-music venue in Lewisham - donate from £25 or invest from £100.
https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/save-the-ravensbourne-arms

Bought a shop with dilapidated outbuilding in Surrey Quays 5 years ago. Took a while to get planning and money to convert the outbuilding into a 2 bedroom house, the shop will be our studio (my partner and I are artists.) Contractor has been on site for exactly 1 year now and we’re moving next month. Never wanted such a big project but it’s the only way we could afford to own in London. May at some point write up some list of mistakes I made.

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Definitely interested to hear more. Honestly I’m amazed that a big build project is cheaper than buying somewhere a bit dated but basically fine and just living in it. I realise it can be cheaper - obviously developers and builders do up and sell on for a profit all the time - but I didn’t think it worked out that way for retail customers.

More pictures!
That looks amazing.

i am liking your fenestration

awesome. would like to hear/see more about this

Woah looks adventurous well done!

Looks amazing - yes please tell us more

And as you're a local shouldn't you be calling it "Surrey Docks"?
(My late boss was from there and loathed it being rebranded Surrey Quays!)

Looks really interesting -more photos please!

This is looking great, a bit different from when I was last there!

More chairs!

Brought this brand new at a massive discount (£350 ex. postages), it’s a John Lewis mid century show wood armchair, £700 brand new.

Girlfriend didn’t like it one bit mainly cause the cushion haven’t been broken into yet, if anyone like to pick it up from Catford, same price; £350.

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no space for chair but I think I want that Checkpoint

Has anyone used a company/firm for a rear ground floor kitchen extension that does everything from start to finish (design, planning, building, the whole nine yards)? We're umming and ahhing about whether to redo the kitchen as it is or go all out. Hard to decide without even a hint of an idea of likely costs.

This is amazing.

Hah - just got one of those weird memory smell ticks. As soon as I saw that chair, I could smell my grandparent's house from when I was a kid.

Nonchalant cucumber.

Wasnt sure whether to post this in the politics thread or here but - Labour amendment to reduce existing ground rents to a peppercorn defeated by 144 majority.

https://labourlist.org/2022/01/tories-reject-bid-to-protect-existing-leaseholders-by-144-vote-majority/