Owning your own home

I really don't get it. Plenty of places say you need about 1500-3500 per square meter, I'm looking at less around 10 square meters worth of extension, so its pretty simple maths.

Is it entirely made of magic structural glass?!

Depends on the finish but we were looking at buying and totally renovating a 3 bed house including an extension and it was £100k tops.

See, see... what is it that makes everything so damn expensive for me? Am I missing something?

Finish wise, going for a couple of spenny things (ish, 1 x IQ Glass pivot door) but happy with Ikea kitchen (for now).

@Bainbridge I assume thats not in London and not with any Architects involvement?

It's prob my bloody accent, people always assume...

See, see... what is it that makes everything so damn expensive for me? Am I missing something?

Out of interest, how are you finding potential suppliers?

I'm not quite there yet but overall top line project estimations are coming in high. Had my first proper meeting with my Architect and what we thought was estimated costs were all without VAT...

No architects but in London and with a very qualified builder with reams of experience.

I guess every job is different and had different challenges and associated costs.

Have you had 3 or more quotes and they are all coming in similar?

I'm just starting to think about this process now so it would be good to learn about what you are going through.

So the estimates are coming from Contractors based on verbal from the Architect?

Well I had one rough quote from a building firm, no architect involvement and that was about 75k, maybe it was a too high end firm.

Have you managed your own project and designs?

Happy to share all via PM...

Yes please

I live in a nondescript 70s built semi. Where can I browse the Internet for ideas of how to decorate?
Is this what Pinterest is for?

https://www.themodernhouse.com/sales-list/great-brownings-ii/ ?

What sort of thing do you want done ?

https://imgur.com/a/nodAsNQ

I had this non structural timber framed utility room/conservatory built a few weeks back with 3 skylights in the roof, properly insulated with celotex , 3 rads plumbed in , clad in British ceader, toilet/sink etc - 6.5k. the key is the find a decent local builder who charges a fair rate. I also got lucky with the cost of the roof windows etc which helped.

I did a side extension about 7 years ago.

The basic building work cost about £30k, to arrive at a weathertight box. That included a steel beam where the side of the house used to be. Spec was fairly lo-fi, mainly block and render, pvc roof light and windows to the side. Had to get my own garden door as builder only wanted to fit a pvc one. Structure is fine, though. And meets building regs.

The whole thing ended up costing about £100k, including fitting kitchen. My original fag packet budget was £60k.

It's prob my expectations not aligning with my budget...

here are some examples (although I'm not expecting anywhere near this level of internal finish)

@ChasnotRobert cheers for sharing, thats kinda my big fear, cost creep, if it goes over our initial pot of money which isn't miles away from yours we will not be able to get more money. Thats a terrible sentence.

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Have you had the plans drawn up?

My polish builder I use probably could give you a quote on this and he would almost certainly be able to do it and do it for a good price. but. He is a bit of a flake. Sometimes doesn't turn up when he says. But when he does he works hard.

If you are budget driven then I'd give him a call but it might be that you won't be able to put up with his flakeyness.. I put up with it because my utility room would have been 12k going with pretty much anyone else..

I have worked up scale floorpans myself, on to version 16, which is part of the reason I want to hand this all over to an expert who is certain about their decisions.

I pretty much want the moon on the stick which is part of the issue, not sure I could handle flakiness, I'd prob have a nuclear level melt down and give my self a hernia.

A good chunk of mine was getting a kitchen from John Lewis (the department store, not the bespoke kitchen people).

Could have saved maybe £15k there if we went with IKEA kitchen.

It's a combination of things. Mainly London prices and demand.

When you say architects' involvement, do you mean you are speaking to architects who are planning and designing your extension? Or that your building contractor/you have told your architect what to draw for planning?

If it's the former there's your problem. You're paying someone who has spent >7yrs studying a complex subject, to draw a Gantt chart and a spreadsheet of costs. Moreover as a species, their attitude to finances is more in line with an oligarch's wife than with a builder.

I know someone who needed a full restoration of a Georgian town house. The architects they spoke to were looking at a quote of ~£0.5M for the build. Although it cost a lot, the final bill was no where near that.

Also I know you don't think your wish list isn't unreasonable, but things in there may genuinely push the price up, or at least force you to use certain people who are more expensive. For eg that IQ Glass looks awesome, but I'm guessing the glazing alone is ~£20-50k +VAT? in which case anyone looking at the work will probably be thinking "if s/he can spend £x on glass..."

@chrisbmx116 Have you tried using an architectural technologist rather than architect? if you know what you want, they should be able to draw all the plans up to meet building regs and planning. We found that until we got the plans properly done, builders quotes were all other the place, as they were not quoting for identical things and had no idea of spec etc.

Cheers for the suggestion, part of the problem is I am not 100% sure I know what I want and due to the fact I dont have a castle to play with I need to be more careful, I imagine if you get a Wing wrong you just relegate it to serpents quarters?

^ This (Sam). The devil is in the details.

A good architect will help you get the most from your budget and should empower you to make tough decisions...

I was quoted 14k for a full service from the architects, so designs, putting out top tender, and keeping an eye on contractors... I feel thats pretty reasonable.
I have had quotes from IQ Glass, a single door is around 9k including fitting so glass will be about 15k in total, all good.

Maybe I'm just panicking about the amount I may have to spend.

I was quoted 14k

That's a pretty high percentage of costs if you're hoping to keep build comfortably south of six figures, no?