Owning your own home

If you're in a position that you can live without, at least, a years' income from 1br flat then buying 2br flat and slumlord is the way to go. But then I'm risk averse.

Also, think of #contractedmidgets

Whoop whoop! Exchanged contracts, get keys next Friday.

Unfortunately have a month left of our lease where we're renting. This does mean though that hopefully we can get a lot of work done before we move in.

Knocking down a wall reflooring and putting in a new kitchen and bathroom.

Mrs Magpie wants IKEA kitchen as very good at storage and making use of space, so spent a very romantic Valentines day there yesterday.

Currently the debate is what to use as worksurfaces stone/wood? And flooring what type of wood, thinking oak boards at the moment.

For flooring, bamboo is cheap, resistant to water damage, soft and bouncy when you drop cups and looks good. It marks easily from chairs though.

Wood work tops look lovely but you've got to mop up every water spill

I've heard Ikea kitchens are best avoided, they don't have space built in to the cabinets for the pipes to run behind them, so you either have to run pipes through your cabinets, leave extra space behind them, or dig out part of your wall.

We're getting Howdens, B&Q and Benchmarx in to quote us for ours, between them they should be able to replicate whatever you liked at Ikea. And probably Worktop Express for the worktop.

Wickes?

Ikea plumbing fittings are shit, by the way. If you buy one of their sinks (which are decent and very well priced) you need the plumbing kit just for the overflow bit, but chuck the rest away and go and buy proper British standard plumbing fittings.

With my kitchen I bought just the doors from B&Q, and reused old carcasses. Screwfix provided handles and soft closers, Wickes the tiles and tap, and Ikea the sink. Worktop express did the oak worktop. It cost bugger all and looks great.

I've fitted IKEA, B&Q, wickes and howden...IKEA were the easiest to get spares when you damage the panels. The carcases are much of a muchness IMO

Worktop wise as long as it is fitted well and sealed they are all the same.

I fitted them all and probably spent alot more time getting everything perfect.

Agree and hence used selco and toolstaion/screwfix sinks that include all the fittings and drains

We got our carcasses from Ikea then I cut new doors, upstands and plinths from water resistant mdf which we could get painted to our specified RAL code out of a paint shop in Romford.
We could then spend a bit more on some swanky handles.
Counter top is white quartz, which I would probably advise against because it marks when you put any metal on it. You lives and learns.

RE spaces for pipes. I just shaved 150mm off the necessary carcasses to reduce the depth.

Looks great though.
Only think that ruins it is stinky arse bib shorts hanging off the door semi permanently.

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congrats magpie. why didn't you just agree a completion date that coincided with the end of your rental contract so that there was no overlap? or did you try this and it was a no go?

RE kitchens if you use your ikea family card when you pay, if you accidentally damage anything they will replace for free (this goes for any self assembly stuff they sell).
If you're happy to design the kitchen yourself look at diy-kitchens.com, really happy with the quality of ours and the carcasses come preassembled which saves a shit ton of time.

Offer accepted on a flat! (not in Kidbrooke)

Kidbrook's loss really ..

GREAT STUFF!

!!! ace. where?

Kidbrooke's got enough wrong with it without laner moving there.

Peckham, goodbye Catford dreams...

catford will always be here for you. good job!

Peckenham

Are the handles on the units leather straps?

Look similar to these

They are...

From a place called Superfront who make handles, doors, plinths and customising kits for Ikea furniture.

They're quite cool. The ones on the heavily used bit of the kitchen go darker and softer quicker, like wearing in a brooks saddle.

Couldn't push the date back that far. Already delayed a month. It's no biggie though as we want to get a lot of work done before we actually move in.

Nice work. Whereabouts in Peckham?

Hmm interesting. Which things do you need to replace.

The IKEA kitchens comes with a 25 year guarantee, think it's ten years for the taps.